Why do we need to soft proof?

So it occurred to me that when LR soft proofs an image it "knows" how to represent my original image as though it it is printed. My job then is to get the "Proof image" to look like the original image by tweaking the sliders etc.
But here's the thing, LR "knows" all of the colours of my original image and the way I want them represented. It then changes the image to represent how it will be printed, so it "knows" the effect the profile will have. So why do I need to fiddle with sliders etc when LR has the knowledge to do the tweaking to get the colours via the profile, back to the original?
Surely the experts could program a function that when I click a button automatically it changes the settings in the proof copy to match as close as possible the original? I can then make choices from there.
Any thoughts?
Peter

You can assing one there, and / or on dialer interfaces. It depends on what you are doing.
These will be the address used by PPP when it runs on the B-channels.

Similar Messages

Is Lightroom 2.2 color managed? How to soft proof?

I was just told that LR 2.2 is not color managed and softproofing is not possible... is this true?
I also have PS CS4... What is the best way to use LR 2.2 for you image editing in a color managed workflow if you also want to Soft proof before printing when you also have PS CS4?

It is correct that LR does not have soft proofing. But you don't have to print from PS to use soft proofing.
For color images, when I've finished with Develop in LR, I then edit in PS and do the soft proofing there. I have recorded some actions (two per paper type - one for each rendering intent - relative and perceptual) which I then apply as appropriate. The actions apply two adjustment layers - a curve and a hue/sat (to do a saturation bump - not necessary for all papers). I then tweak if necessary, flatten the layers and save the result.
I then print the PS edited file in LR. In my case I also rename the file to indicate the paper and rendering intent, plus I keyword it accordingly.
It's a pain but works very well. By printing in LR you can take advantage of the built-in output sharpening, and it's generally more convenient to set up - at least for me.
I have an Epson 2880 - when printing Black and White I use Eric Chan's profiles for the 3800 ABW mode - they seem to work fine for the 2880 - at least for me - I get results that match what I see on screen. For B&W I do not need to use PS at all - I just print directly from LR - no need to soft proof.
Selby

Why are my soft proofed prints always too dark in the dark areas and why are the colors, especially red, washed out.

Use a calibrated camera and monitor. Work in PS CC. Have a controlled work room. Soft proof according to Jeff Schewe of the 'Luminous Landscape'. Printing on a new Epson r2880 with a custom profile. Use fresh Epson Luster paper. The problem keeps persisting no matter what I do. Any and all help will be much appreciated.
Thanks.
Richard

Please turn off your auto reply in your emails. The forums are designed to be used through a web browser while logged in to the forum. We don't need to see stuff like your "On Sun, Oct 12, 2014 at 10:50 PM, station_two <[email protected]>". Everybody sees everyone's post.
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Now, did they first send you a target file which you then printed on your particular printer using your intended paper and inks, then snail-mailed the print to them in California in order for them to make your custom printer profile for you, which they then in turn emailed to you? If that was not the case, you do not have a custom profile at all, but a meaningless stock one. Even if they used a printer model exactly like yours when they created the profile, it was not done on your particular unit and therefore is not valid.
On the other hand, if the procedure above was indeed followed correctly, then that custom printer profile is showing you exactly what your images will look like once you print them.
That's precisely what soft proofing is for, so you can adjust your image while in Proof view.
Hope this clears it up for you.

Can I soft proof in LR4 like I can in PS CS5?

I haven't used LR 4 yet, but did view the soft-proofing tutorial.
I applaud Adobe for adding this functionality in LR4. It was one of the most obvious lacking features in the previous version, and I've still been mostly doing all my printing through PS CS5.
While soft-proofing is not a perfect replacement for test printing, I've been mostly satisfied with proofing in CS5.
Proofing in LR4 seems a little different, but by using a virtual copy it looks like if I use my printer/paper profile I should theoretically be able to not only be able to deal with color gamut issues, but also adjust contrast & brightness to more closely match my original developed image, and could compare the original with virtual copy in compare mode. Is it that simple? And if so, why is there a contrast & brightness adjustment in the Print module? That latter adjustment would be similar to what one goes through in PS CS5 when soft-proofing prior to printing. However, why have it if it can be done in the Develop module......and regardless, from the video tutorial it looks like you can't preview the image after making those adjustments in the print module nor compare it with the original......thus forcing one to make multiple prints until the result is satisfactory.
Just seems to me there is a bit more tweaking to do in LR4 to make the soft-proofing more functional. Or, perhaps I'm too stuck with the paradigm set forth for soft-proofing in PS and need someone to clarify how I can achieve the same result in LR just as confidently.

Beaulin Liddell wrote:
BTW, I've benefited immensly from your and Martin's Evenings books.......you've never steered me wrong.
Thanks for the kind words...but LR4's soft proofing is worth the effort to use. It really is better than Photoshop's soft proofing. I'm still on the fence regarding VCs vs Snapshots for soft proofing It's a tossup but the VC part has been built in while making a snapshot wasn't.
The advantage of LR4's soft proofing is you get the ability to do a Before/After while still using the full range of LR4's controls to adjust the printed version. Makes it really easy to nail great print (assuming you have good print profiles).
As for the Print module Brightness and Contradt...that's really a special case that doesn't involved color managed output. It's a crutch for those who don't have a locked down system. It's east to tweak but you have to make example prints since the controls don't actually display but only impact the output. I tend to avoid that.

Soft proofing: how to A/B?

Hi all,
I'm kinda new to soft proofing, so maybe this is a silly question, but here goes:
My workflow for printing is that i first tweak my photos so they look like how i want them on my computer monitor, for uploading to Flickr.
After that i choose the one(s) i want to print (Epson 3880) and go into "soft proofing" mode.
After i've tweaked the photo to compensate for the print, i want to A/B with my original. What i've noticed is that i need to generally add a bit more brightness and vibrance to approach (on physical paper) what i see on my computer screen, so i want to be able to A/B between my original photo and the proof copy.
But the thing is, when i do this the "soft proofing" module remains engaged for both my proof copy (that's ok) and for my original photo (not ok!) which was tweaked to look good on the computer and never meant to be printed, and on which i never did any soft proofing!!!
This makes it really hard to A/B between the two copies.
So why doesn't the soft proofing module automatically turn off when you switch to another photo on which you haven't done any soft proofing?
Hmmm, clear as mud methinks!
But does anyone see what i mean and could offer any tips?
Thanks! ......... D

Daz V wrote:
So why doesn't the soft proofing module automatically turn off when you switch to another photo on which you haven't done any soft proofing?
Soft Proofing "simulates" on your computer display (transmissive) what the print copy (reflective) will look like in your hands. The two are radically different in contrast ratio, black level, and white level achievable, so it makes little sense to try and compare the two. They will always look quite different. The goal is to adjust web based images so they look good onscreen, and print based images with 'Soft Proof' so they look good in the actual reflective light viewed print copy. What are you trying to achieve?
You can view them side-by-side by windowing LR and your browser and viewing the image in both at the same time. In fact that would be much close to reality, since browsers aren't always properly color managed. Two separate displays would be even better for this purpose.

Dueling Features: Soft Proofing vs Print Adjustment

I'm really trying to appreciate the value of the new soft proofing feature that's got many around here excited. While there are other uses I'll get to in a minute, is it fair to say this feature is designed to make printed output predictable and save paper? I watched Julieanne Kost's tutorial and saw how we can identify out-of-gamut colors on our display device and any number of output devices/processes/papers. Her mooring pole example only seemed to illustrate the inherent compromises we have to make. If we're lucky our monitor IS showing us a hi-fidelity rendering of the image gamut and we're making an informed creative decision about which way we accommodate outlier colors in the output space. If, as in her example, both ends of the line are out of gamut, I'm not sure we're doing much more than fiddling. Not that I have anything against the illusion of control... if I did I couldn't stay married.
So assuming we've got a good monitor and decent eyes, soft proofing gives us some predictive power over what we're going to get before we feed a 24 x 30 sheet of Exhibition Fiber into the 9890 and blow $6 plus ink.
More useful in my own case is the potential to tailor image adjustments to client's prepress requirements. If I can get a prepress profile from a magazine client I can try to give them images that print better on their presses while staying true to my vision. Am I on the right track here?
Getting back to the title of my post, the print adjustment sliders just leave me scratching my head. After working so hard for the calibrationists out there willing to spend an hour to save a sheet of paper, along comes the no-preview-try-it-you-might-like-it approach of the brightness and contrast sliders. Talk about appealing to two different mentalities. One saves paper, the other says "throw another sheet in the machine and let's see what comes out"
I'm purposely trying to be humorous. I picture two LR teams arguing across the meeting room table. The calibrationists vs the gunslingers. MadManChan tell me it ain't so.

VeloDramatic wrote:
Getting back to the title of my post, the print adjustment sliders just leave me scratching my head. After working so hard for the calibrationists out there willing to spend an hour to save a sheet of paper, along comes the no-preview-try-it-you-might-like-it approach of the brightness and contrast sliders. Talk about appealing to two different mentalities.
Yup, very confusing. Especially if the issue is, my prints are too dark compared to my display which this is presumably supposed to fix. If the prints really are too dark, the RGB values need to be fixed and we have to wonder why the user didn’t see on their calibrated display, the RGB values are too dark. If instead, the print is darker appearing than the display, the fix seems to be to properly calibrate the display or fix the print viewing conditions to produce a match. And if the print is only too dark appearing compared to the display, what do the sliders do once you have a lighter (matching) print next to your too bright display and move the print away? Seems it would appear too light, not a good solution.

When Soft Proofing in LR4 most of my loaded printer profiles are not visible

I am running LR4 and CS6 on an HP desktop with 4Gig Ram, Win 7 Home, Profiled Monitor using DataColor
In CS6, all my loaded ICC printer profiles appear when setting up the soft proofing...
In LR4, most of the profiles do not appear...
The problem is that I print to an Epson 7600 CMYK printer with UltraChrome Ink and mostly on Canvas so I need to proof for that environment.
The problem is that I print to an Epson 7600 CMYK printer with UltraChrome Ink and mostly on Canvas so I need to proof for that environment.
Photos of the two different pull downs are attached.

dmcrescent wrote:
Not sure what makes you think the Epson 7600 is a CMYK printer, but it isn't. You may be running a CMYK RIP attached to it, but the printer accepts RGB data, not CMYK. The only reason I can think of needing to profile in CMYK would be if you were using profiles generated for a press. I'm sure there may be others, but can't think of one off the top of my head.
Well you can send either RGB or CMYK to the printer but you have to first setup the proper driver for either. Unless you are proofing (make my Epson simulate a press sheet), I can’t think of any reason to send it CMYK data. The limitation is the driver in terms of what you send it. With a 3rd party driver (might be a RIP, might not) it can be possible to send CMYK data to the Epson. Epson bundles the ColorBurst product for this purpose (press simulation, use of CMYK profiles).
Since the Lightroom path is solely RGB, it can’t do anything with CMYK data. So the profiles are filtered out of the list. And don’t expect this to change anytime soon or ever. If CMYK is your game, well you need Photoshop or some other application to handle this data. And you’ll need another driver. So in context of this post, CMYK is simply not a possibility and that is why the profiles are not accessible.

Soft Proofing?

For those here who are having success with their printing. What if anything are you doing about lack of soft proofing in LR.
My current situation is, I get acceptable prints only 50% of the time. Everything is color managed of course and I'm printing to Epson R2400 using Velvet Fine Art Paper and Epson current icc profiles.
What happens is I can make Develop adjustments to two similar images and when I print one comes out fine and the other does not.
Following advise of others I have set up presets for my printing and still check settings after clicking print button. All appears good but result are unpredictable.
I have managed to get some very nice prints on VFA paper so I know it's possible. Just seems like something in the settings is not sticking from one print to the next. Any thoughts on this issue? Like many others here I can print from Aperture or PS with 100% perfect results every time.
I have tried doing preview after starting the print dialog (osx) but the previews are always very oversaturated and very bright. I understand from reading elsewhere that OSX preview is not reliable. I've also tried printing to pdf first and opening in Acrobat however the result is still bright and oversaturated but not as much as the preview version.
I really want to stick with LR but this unpredictable printing thing is making it tough for me to do so. Trying to get consistent prints has so far cost me almost as much in paper/ink as I paid for LR. Since print output is my main goal it's important to me that I get this working. Otherwise LR will become a doorstop.
For the record: (in case Andrew Rodney weights in) I'm shooting with a Nikon D200, Raw in AdobeRGB, Macbook Pro with monitor calibrated with spyder2, using paper/ink icc profiles from Epson (I know their canned, but their the same ones used in PS with perfect results)in LR for my R2400 printer connected directly to my Macbook Pro using firewire.
Is there something I'm missing?
THH

"P.S. when a print comes out bad is always muddy, blocked up in the shadows and somewhat washed out overall(looks like its foggy). Is that a clue to anything?"
It's a clue that your image needs the contrast range of a glossy paper vs a watercolor paper...or that you need to go into the shadows to "open" them up so they print.
The d-max of a glossy paper (like Luster) can hit 2.39/2.4 on Luster but a watercolor paper can only hit 1.7 or so d-max. What that means is that between max white (paper white) and max black )d-max) a watercolor paper is gonna plug up from the midtones down to the shadows...black will be black which is the d-max.
And yes, having a soft proof function in Lightroom would greatly aid in evaluating how much "opening" of the shadows you need to do. Which is why I tend to round trip from Lightroom to Photoshop back to Lightroom very important fine art type prints. While in Photoshop, I can take advantage of local tone/color corrections while doing sharpening and image enhancements such as a mid-tone contrast adjustment, saving the -EDIT file back into Lightroom for printing. While in Photoshop (before saving) I will softproof using the paper profile I'll be using and add an ajustment layer or two (usually a curve and a Hue&Sat adjustment).
The imprtant factor here is to separate out problems using Lightroom functionality such as not using OS X saved presets, remembering to update LR templates and using the correct settings to print from issues of printing difficult to print images on low d-max papers.

Soft proofing LR4

Not all of my RGB profiles which are in my colorsync profiles folder are available for soft proofing in LR4. I've copied and pasted the profiles into my profiles folder. These are Imageprint profiles. I need some help with this. Thanks.

sbradom wrote:
I am on a Mac and I did run my profiles through first aid in colorsync. This did not fix the problem. Hence, they claim that my situation is unique as ALL of their other customes have no problems after running first aid in colorsync. Maybe I should call Adobe....
Got you. Yes, the comment to run em through Profile First Aid seems like a BS answer from them. And no, your situation isn’t unique as I’ve heard this from other CB users. But yes, Adobe needs to figure out why one of their applications works with the profiles and one does not.
If you have other Adobe applications (Acrobat, InDesign) that can access profiles, it would be useful to know if you can see them or not. That could help speed up a fix from Adobe’s end.

Soft Proofing with Adobe RGB

I am experimenting with soft proofing various sunset images. The problem I'm seeing when I soft proof the images in Photoshop using the Adobe RGB profile is that the oranges and magentas in the sunset turn yellowish. Can someone please explain why this is happening. I admit that some of these images are coming from the internet and have no embedded profile. I have always thought that the Adobe RGB profile had a larger color space so I'm not sure why I'm getting the obvious changes in the sunset colors when switching between sRGB and Adobe RGB.

With a standard monitor everything you see on screen is already soft proofed to sRGB. That's all it can reproduce. So soft proofing to Adobe RGB makes no sense. It's beyond the monitor's capabilities.
Even if you have a wide gamut monitor soft proofing to Adobe RGB makes no sense. You'd need a monitor that reproduced considerably more than Adobe RGB (which doesn't exist), and a file in an even larger space such as ProPhoto.
If you see a difference, you have "Preserve RGB numbers" checked in Proof Setup (which you normally shouldn't). This is the proof equivalent of Assign Profile - IOW how it will look if you assign Adobe RGB as opposed to Convert to Profile, which is what you normally do and which will preserve color appearance.
The other possible explanation is a rather evasive bug in Photoshop, reported from time to time. Sometimes people see a color shift when converting to the very same profile as the file already is. I can't reproduce that, so I can't give any more details.

Costco and soft proofing show dull washed out image

OK, so I am trying to utilize my nearest costco to print some images from lightroom 5. I am getting back dull washed out prints.
Facts:
I shoot in RAW in manual mode
I am using sRGB when I do my post processing
I export to jpg for printing
I used the costco LR5 plugin from Alloyphoto to upload to Costco
I have installed the printer profiles from drycreek for the specific location/printer and have chosen the correct profile as I export
I made sure that I chose to have Costco NOT autocorrect the color
Even when I use LR5's soft proofing, I get the same result on my monitor
I checked the print I got back and it says that they did NOT autocorrect (taken with a grain of salt)
The machine they are using is a Noritsu QSS-A, so I know my profile is correct
I have attached a screen shot of what I am seeing.
Why am I seeing this on my soft proofing as well as my prints?
How can I solve this and get vibrant prints?
Any advice would be helpful.
Message was edited by: moviebuffking

moviebuffking wrote:
I have calibrated my monitor as good as I can get without specific hardware. I have 18 years experience calibrating monitors (via optical media and my eyes), so I know that mine is very close.
It is virtually impossible to "accurately" set the Luminance, Gamma, and Color temperature "by eye." This is most likely the cause of your prints not matching the screen image you see in LR. That being the monitor's Luminance (i.e. Brightness) level is too set to high.
http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/colour_management/prints_too_dark.html
To see if this could be your problem I downloaded the posted screen shot and cropped out the 'Copy' image, which has your adjustments applied to it. Here are my results:
Click on image to see full-size
I needed to apply a full F stop (+1.0 EV) of Exposure correction to achieve a good midtone brightness level for the print image. You'll notice I also added -50 Highlights and +50 Shadows along with +25 Vibrance. I bet the image with my adjustments added looks way too bright on your uncalibrated monitor.
You have two (2) issues–Monitor Calibration and LR Basic Panel Control Adjustments
Monitior Calibration
I would highly recommend investing in a hardware monitor calibrator such as the X-Rite i1 Display and ColorMunki, or Datacolor Spyder models. If you tell me what make and model monitor you are using I can recommend specific calibrators.
Temporarily you can try adjusting the monitor "by eye" to get it closer to the desired 120cd/m2 Luminance, 2.2 Gamma, and 6500K Color Temperature using the test patterns at this site:
http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/
When the monitors Brightness and Contrast controls have been correctly set the screen image should look much closer to the prints you have recently made with the LR Soft Proof adjustments. So in fact you will be adjusting the monitor to make it look bad with the LR adjustments you applied. The proper monitor settings will make the Lagom test patterns look correct AND should make your bad Costco prints now match the screen image using you original LR settings.
After changing the monitor's Brightness and Contrast settings try readjusting a few of the image files you had printed and send them to Costco as check prints. Compare them again to your monitor's screen image. They should be much better!
LR Basic Panel Tone Control Adjustment
LR's PV2012 Tone controls can provide much improvement to your raw image Highlight and Shadow detail. Start with all of the Tone controls at their '0' default settings and adjust them from the top-down in the order shown below.
1. Set Exposure for the midtone brightness ignoring the highlight and shadow areas for now. Setting Exposure about +.5 EV higher than what looks correct for the midtones seems to work best with most images.
2. Leave Contrast at 0 for now. You’ll adjust this after the first pass.
3. Adjust Highlights so that blown out areas are recovered and “fine tonal detail” is revealed.
4. Adjust Shadows to reveal fine detail in dark areas. For most normal images simply setting -Shadows = +Highlights (Example -50 and +50) works very well.
5. The Whites control sets the white clipping point, which you can see by holding down the ALT key as you move the slider. Adjust it to the point where you see clipping just appear with the ALT key.
6. The Blacks control sets the black clipping point, which you can see by holding down the ALT key as you move the slider. Adjust it to the point where you see clipping just appear with the ALT key.
7. Now go back and adjust the Contrast control to establish the best midtone contrast.
8. Lastly touchup the Exposure control for the best midtone brightness.
9. If necessary “touch-up” the controls using the same top-down workflow.
moviebuffking wrote:
Am I correct in assuming that the soft proof (with a certain profile) is a "preview" of what that print will look like?
Soft Proof does two things. It shows you what the image's colors will look like in the target color space (i.e. printer profile). You can see what (if any) colors are "out of gamut" by clicking on the small icon in the upper-righthand corner of the Histogram. You can also see if any of the colors fall out of your monitor's gamut by clicking on the small icon in the upper-lefthand corner of the Histogram.
When you check 'Simulate Paper & Ink' the Soft Proof image's contrast and color saturation are changed to make it look closer to what the "reflective" print image will look like when held next to the monitor for comparison. Many people have difficulty using 'Simulate Paper & Ink' since it requires using precise light levels for viewing the print and a well calibrated monitor.
In summary my best suggestion is to purchase and use a good hardware monitor calibrator on a scheduled basis to insure you have an "accurate" screen image inside LR and other color managed applications like PS.

Soft-Proofing issue

I'm having hard time understanding soft-proofing even if I watched the video softproofing video. I turned S-P on for a bright and vivid image, create a virtual copy, set target colorspace to sRGB. It tells me that some colors are too saturated so I select them and reduce them until the RED goes away. It now gives me a poor copy of the original (dull colors). How come, when I export my image as .jpeg with a sRGB color profile, my target jpeg is identical to my untouched RAW file.
I thought the goal of soft-proofing was to make sure that I can emulate the limitation of a target color profile (like sRGB). In my case, if my colors in the jpeg export are identical to my RAW image, how come LR shows them as too saturated?
can someone enlighten me.

theslayerizer wrote:
My problems is that LR indicate color limitations in my picture but when I export my source picture with jpeg in sRGB it displays exactly like my source in Lightroom. So why does it show me limitations that I don't really see when I do my export. If the soft proof was accurate, my expectation is that my exported jpeg should have color issues due to the color warnings that LR showed me when I turned soft-proof on.
First, the OOG isn’t accurate. See the other thread here on soft proofing. If I export data as sRGB from LR, re import it and ask to see Out Of Gamut (OOG) overlay for that space, some OOG still shows up. It should not. It doesn’t when you do the same operation in Photoshop.
But the real use here is to show you what colors are in the LR color space (Melissa RGB) that can’t be reproduced on any device based on any profile. So it is useful to some degree. But in the end, there isn’t anything you can do about it IF you decide to convert to that output space. You view something soft proofed in sRGB and there is an ugly red overlay. You are going to convert to sRGB so colors are going to clip as a result. In my video, I illustrate it is simply educational, and easier to simply let the profile do it’s thing and convert to a smaller color space (because that is what you need). You could screw around and attempt to do this manually with HSL or other controls, but the net results are not as good and just take longer. So use the OOG overlay with some care and don’t be overall alarmed. Taking wide gamut data and funneling it into a smaller gamut is just something we have to do.

Soft Proofing: Aperture vs Photoshop

I'll start by saying that I,m no expert in this area...
So why do I see such a difference in soft proofing in Aperture vs PhotoShop?
The difference between my calibrated screen and a printer's ICC profile is much bigger in Aperture then it is in Photoshop.

They are totally different apps but with a small amount of overlap.
You need (inexpensive) Photoshop Elements for individual image editing. PE is poor for management of batches of images.
Aperture and Adobe's Lightroom are (a bit more expensive) apps for the management of batches of captured digital images. You will want one of them (here we prefer Aperture) as you get into shooting substantial batches of DSLR captures. Aperture will deal with the editing issues of 98% of your images, but you definitely want PE for the 2% which will likely include your best shots.
-Allen Wicks

Soft Proofing: View Proof Setup Custom: Profile Disappears when Re-opened

Photoshop CS6 on Mac
Edit an image file and get it to where I like on the monitor
Duplicate the file and set the new file to the profile for the printer which will be used, by using View > Proof Setup > Custom and setting an imported printer profile for the printing company that I use.
As soon as you do that, the file looks like crap, so...
Edit the soft proof file to get it to where it looks good again.
Save off the file for the printer and also save the new PSD file.
Close the PSD file.
Reopen the new (soft proofed) PSD file.
Still looks good, but.... when you check View > Proof Setup it's now generally set to Custom: U.S. Web Coated (SWOP) v2 instead of to the imported printer profile which was set previously. WHY???? Where did the printer profile go? Is it supposed to do this?
If I then reset View > Proof Setup to the correct printer profile, the image goes to crap again.
Is this me doing something wrong, or is the PSD file not properly remembering the printer profile, or... what's going on here?
Thanks much!

None of what you write makes any sense whatsoever to me, sorry.
Let's start by using correct terminology. For the last time, you are not "importing" any freaking profile. Wrap your head around that once and for all, please.
Let me try once again, totally disregarding the scenarios you were unsuccessfully attempting to describe above. Forget all that mumbo jumbo for now, please.
You have not mentioned what your working space is, so let's assume it's Adobe RGB.
You have finished editing an image, so now you have an AdobeRGB-tagged image. Fine.
Now you want to soft proof it to see what it will look like in that FujiWonderPrinterInAlaskaUsingMatteThaiElephantPoopPaper printer in Anchorage. (Made up names of course.)
So you make a duplicate COPY of your finished image file named BabyPictForPrint.psd. You're still in Adobe RGB, of course. You put the original away in a safe and forget about it—forever. That's like your negative in film days.
Now you soft proof the BabyPictForPrint.psd COPY by using the infamous FujiWonderPrinterInAlaskaUsingMatteThaiElephantPoopPaper.icc profile the outfit in Alaska sent you.
When you soft proof it with that Alaska profile, you have not imported anything. Photoshop is simply using the profile you pointed it to to show you in your monitor what it would look like. Your pixels so far are untouched, yet yo see your image "die" before your very eyes. Ouch! Now you need to compensate for the effect of printing under those proposed conditions, so you set about the task of editing the copy accordingly. Remember, you're still in Adobe RGB.
Once you have the copy just the way you like it, YOU SAVE ALL YOUR CHANGES in that copy. Now you have a fully edited image file in the Adobe RGB space but tweaked to look fine when printed in the FujiWonderPrinterInAlaskaUsingMatteThaiElephantPoopPaper printer.
At that point you are done! Finished!
Now you are faced with two choices:
A) Sending the finished, saved ADOBE RGB COPY to your printer if you consider him capable of knowing what he's doing. (If you think he does not know his business, look for another printer). Or…
B) Assume you're dealing with a moron on the other end who wants the image CONVERTED to his custom FujiWonderPrinterInAlaskaUsingMatteThaiElephantPoopPaper.icc. If that is the case, then open your COPY in Photoshop, go to the Edit menu > CONVERT to Profile… and convert the copy to the infamous FujiWonderPrinterInAlaskaUsingMatteThaiElephantPoopPaper.icc profile. It's critical to use CONVERT TO Profile, not "Assign Profile"!
At that point, under scenario B), you do not EVER want to return to Proof View / Soft Proof mode, ever, EVER again, because then you would be applying the profile doubly and you'd see your image die before your eyes once again, and if you edited it you'd have real elephant poop!
Hope that helps.

LR 4.2 - how to compare master and soft proof copy?

Hello Everyone,
I'd like to use the soft proofing function in LR 4.2 to preview the print output and I'd like to use it to apply some corrections to the pictures before printing them, in order they look like I originally meant them to look like, but I'm experiencing some troubles, possibly caused by the used workflow (I'm not a pro, but my environment is calibrated properly).
My workflow is:
1. I import all fotos and apply some changes so that the fotos look like I want them to be (this is the master)
2. As I want to print them I use the soft proofing function and load the target icc profile with which I create a soft proof copy. Sometimes I notice that the differences between master and soft proof copy are quite drammatic, especially with regards to contrast, vibrance of colors and sometimes also regarding the brightness.
3. My target is now to adapt the soft proof copy so that it looks like the master (as I wanted the foto to look like), but I can't find any proper way to do so, because:
- I can't find a (semi-)automated way to adapt the soft proof copy so that it "looks" like the master copy
- in the Develop module I can't find a way to display both the master foto and the soft proof copy besides each other to compare them, in order to apply changes to the soft proof copy only so that it "looks" like the master.
The only way I found so far is to switch back and forth bewteen master and soft proof copy to compare them (to be able to apply the needed changes to the soft proof copy), but this is pretty painful, as the fotos don't load immediately, but it always takes some seconds and I have to 'remember' how the master looks like.
I'm not sure whether I'm doing something terribly wrong, but unfotunately I didn't find any answers to this specific issue so far, that's why I'm writing here.
Hope you can point me to a solution,
Regards,
Plasma2k

Activate softproofing with your choice of output profile (this can include proofing a web output colourspace such as sRGB).
Press Y to show a split before/after view (if your Toolbar is not open, press T to open that - this gives different kinds of split view options).
You will now see a comparison of the un-proofed and proofed appearances of this current image.
If you then make any develop adjustment from this mode, e.g. to make these two appearances more similar, you are then prompted to create a new proofing (virtual) copy as necessary - which can store these corrective adjustments independently of the main adjustments.
The before/after view then switches to show a comparison between your starting image (shown without softproofing) against your print-adjusted proof version (shown with softproofing).

Why do we need to soft proof?

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