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print the colors you are seeing on the screen

CS-SignSupply-TT

New Member
+1,000,000

Best solution is to print color charts on the various materials you use and then match the colors you'll need for each job, I've been doing it for years and it works great every time.

Adding to the above, have your customers "finger" the correct color(s) on the selected media. That is, if the customer is in the shop.
 

Terremoto

New Member
I'm with jkdbjj on this 100% of 100%. Color charts are for the uninformed.

Proper calibration/profiling/linearization will also save a bunch on ink consumption. Our ink consumption went down considerably after we set up a proper color managed workflow.

Time savings in design and layout are another huge advantage. No need to constantly refer to color charts and manually enter color values.

I just chuckle to myself when I hear sign guys beaking off about how fool proof their color chart color management system works. It's just proof that the fool that was fooled was not the intended fool but none-the-less the most appropriate fool.

Dan
 

bob

It's better to have two hands than one glove.
I'm with jkdbjj on this 100% of 100%. Color charts are for the uninformed...

Au contraire. Color charts are for those that comprehend that what comes out of the print is the truth. To operate otherwise is to rely on the amusing notion that what you perceive on a monitor is the truth and somewhere, as if by magic, the same thing necessarily will emerge from your printer. The operative word here is 'necessarily'.

There is no causal connection between a monitor and a printer no matter how intensely and devoutly you tend to profiling and calibration and dancing naked around a fire waving beads and rattle chanting "Booga Booga".

...Proper calibration/profiling/linearization will also save a bunch on ink consumption. Our ink consumption went down considerably after we set up a proper color managed workflow...

Please explain just how, exactly, printing from a color chart manages to use more ink than trusting your luck to that last profile job. Feel free to use as many charts and graphs in your response as you might deem necessary.

...Time savings in design and layout are another huge advantage. No need to constantly refer to color charts and manually enter color values...

Being a long time devotee of color charts, I can say with some authority that I might glance at one once in a while. For the most part, I know exactly which colors come out which way. This tends to make the constant color chart referral which seem to bother you rather unnecessary.

...I just chuckle to myself when I hear sign guys beaking off about how fool proof their color chart color management system works. It's just proof that the fool that was fooled was not the intended fool but none-the-less the most appropriate fool.

One can only wonder what the above might say had it been written by a sentient being.
 

Terremoto

New Member
Au contraire. Color charts are for those that comprehend that what comes out of the print is the truth. To operate otherwise is to rely on the amusing notion that what you perceive on a monitor is the truth and somewhere, as if by magic, the same thing necessarily will emerge from your printer. The operative word here is 'necessarily'.

There is no causal connection between a monitor and a printer no matter how intensely and devoutly you tend to profiling and calibration and dancing naked around a fire waving beads and rattle chanting "Booga Booga".

I suppose for you it may be perceived as some sort of magic. When it comes to wide format printers the "truth" is that garbage in = garbage out. If you're comfortable letting substandard work out the door then I guess you don't have too much to get excited about.

Please explain just how, exactly, printing from a color chart manages to use more ink than trusting your luck to that last profile job. Feel free to use as many charts and graphs in your response as you might deem necessary.

With a proper profile you would be laying down only enough ink to render the required color without unnecessary ink saturation. No charts and graphs required.

Being a long time devotee of color charts, I can say with some authority that I might glance at one once in a while. For the most part, I know exactly which colors come out which way. This tends to make the constant color chart referral which seem to bother you rather unnecessary.

So by being a "devotee" magically makes you some type of "authority"? Sorry but you're not fooling anybody except yourself. You're most certainly not fooling me!

One can only wonder what the above might say had it been written by a sentient being.

You know, I have to ask the same question. By the way, are you sure you're from earth? Just saying.

Dan
 

bob

It's better to have two hands than one glove.
I suppose for you it may be perceived as some sort of magic. When it comes to wide format printers the "truth" is that garbage in = garbage out. If you're comfortable letting substandard work out the door then I guess you don't have too much to get excited about...

What does the ancient principle of garbage in-garbage out have to do with the verity of what comes out of a printer? I say ancient because I probably was dealing with computers and color when your parents were making in their pants.

Try to wrap your cognitive tackle around the concept of 'truth' as it pertains to printer output. The notion comes from writing code. The code is the truth. All else is speculation. In the very same way, what comes out of the printer is the truth, not what appears on a monitor nor what you might think should come out.

With a proper profile you would be laying down only enough ink to render the required color without unnecessary ink saturation. No charts and graphs required.

Twaddle. By definition a printer puts down enough ink to create whatever color it might be creating regardless of whether that color was the result of a frenzy of profiling or simply choosing a color from a chart. But even giving your dubious position benefit of the doubt, the difference from one to the other is in pico liters. And that's being generous. Your point here is specious.

...So by being a "devotee" magically makes you some type of "authority"? Sorry but you're not fooling anybody except yourself. You're most certainly not fooling me!...

Can't get anything by you, eh? I never claimed to be an authority, I'm a pragmatist. As well as a minimalist. I cleave to the principle of spending the least amount of resources to do anything. Anything at all, including printing.

If I should ever need the services of an actual genuine authority, which as yet has never been necessary, a couple of guys with whom I used to work are packing Phd's in areas dealing with digital color.
 

rjssigns

Active Member
I too will be living the "color lie" as soon as I get some cash together for calibrating equipment. I feel so dirty.



p.s.
According to the Color Nazi the i1Publish is the rig to get. Are there alternatives within X-Rites array of products? Older models perhaps? It's a chunk of change and I still have to pay for my last bit of school.
 

cgsigns_jamie

New Member
One advantage of a properly profiled system is the ability to print raster images. I'd like to see your magic color charts help you print a photograph properly.
 

Terremoto

New Member
Quit being a knob Bob!

If a proper ICC color management workflow is somehow offensive to you then go ahead and do things your way. I'm not forcing you to use a proper ICC color management workflow but I will tell you that the way your doing it now is most certainly NOT color management now matter how hard you try to mangle the English language in a pathetic effort to make yourself heard.

You make it annoyingly clear that you don't have a clue about color management yet you insist the masses bow down before you and take your "Color Mismanagement Sermon" as gospel. My answer to that is you can kiss my petunia. You are clueless!

How somebody as excessively verbose as you ever ended up in the sign business where the message should be as clear as possible with as few words as possible is somewhat astonishing if not somehow perverse. Are you really in the sign business or do you do this merely for your own entertainment.

As for your extensive experience with computers let me tell you one thing. I have children that grew up before computers when your parents were still finding their way to earth.

You should most definitely have a little chat with your PhD Digital Color experts before you chime in here pretending to be an expert in color management.

Dan
 

ForgeInc

New Member
Bob, I watch you argue often and get the impression you revel in imparting your views and knowledge unto others, whether oftentimes appropriate or not. It's often entertaining and you obviously enjoy it.

But this time I have to step in. You said color charts never change and are the cheapest, easiest way to address proper color.

I disagree. We have found our printers change output color often, even on the same media. In fact, we have 2 identical printers that output the same exact file differently. I can't imagine having to constantly run and keep track of color charts for every type of media we run, on every printer. Also, sometimes a media has different white points from batch to batch, sometimes humidity or weather affects prints.

We have a client where their color accuracy expectations are "extremely high" to put it mildly. We have found we have to adjust our workflow just for this one client. They have a custom color palette we have to hit that is far from any standard PMS color. Much of their art is vector driven, which granted can get us a good starting point with charts but as others have pointed out, how does that affect raster? We can set up our profiles and workflow to nail their vector all the time, but then that throws off their raster imagery if both are on the same graphic, which happens often.

We are far from experts and still fine tuning our process (which sometimes involves charts,) but to say charts is a quick, consistent way to get accurate color without also constantly using calibration, custom profiles, linearizations and other workflows is simply short sighted and thinking small. It might work for a small shop with lower expectations but at any kind of larger scale where highly accurate, consistent color is desirable it's simply impractical.
 

bob

It's better to have two hands than one glove.
Quit being a knob Bob!

If a proper ICC color management workflow is somehow offensive to you then go ahead and do things your way. I'm not forcing you to use a proper ICC color management workflow but I will tell you that the way your doing it now is most certainly NOT color management now matter how hard you try to mangle the English language in a pathetic effort to make yourself heard.

You make it annoyingly clear that you don't have a clue about color management yet you insist the masses bow down before you and take your "Color Mismanagement Sermon" as gospel. My answer to that is you can kiss my petunia. You are clueless!...

Did it ever occur to you that I might feel as I do because I do understand color management? Further, that might you feel as you do because you don't fully understand what you advocate?

What I advocate is not color management, it's the antithesis of color management. It's a method for getting consistent output from a machine without a lot of fuss.

No one denies that doing it your way is a viable approach. It's merely that my way is every bit as valid and a whole hell of a lot simpler. If gratuitous complication is what gets you off, then break out your spectrophotometer and have at it. I have horses to ride and roses to smell and little time to waste on methods that produce no better results than other, simpler, methods.

...As for your extensive experience with computers let me tell you one thing. I have children that grew up before computers when your parents were still finding their way to earth...

Ah, they reached their majority before 1946, the year Eniac was introduced? Or did you merely mean pre-PC? I have socks that pre-date PC's. The computers to which I refer, sometimes affectionately know as the 'big iron', pre-date PC's by decades.
 
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