Mike Chaney's Tech Corner

I have used Qimage for years and never had an issue -- ALWAYS perfect color match to Photoshop and to what I saw on the monitor and to what printed out.  That changed a month ago and have been printing (GAG) from Photoshop.

I am using a NEC 2690WUXi2 calibrated monitor, HP B9180 printer and Windows Vista 32.  With a fresh calibration of the monitor, the colors printed in Photoshop are an exact match for what I see on the screen -- using Photoshop-managed colors.

In the past, the colors printed in Qimage Pro were equivalent and the detail slightly better than that of Photoshop plus the convenience of selecting a couple of dozen images to print and go off and let the printer do its thing in Qimage.

Now, mainly the reds are an issue -- being dull and more maroon when printed and I can see that color change in the images as shown in Qimage and they print exactly as shown in the Qimage selections on the screen.  
--For Monitor ICC, I have selected the ICC profile for the monitor I have shown above with D65 and Gamma 2.2 as usual.  
--For Printer ICC, I have selected the HP PSPro B9100-Advancced Photo Glossy as usual.
--In Qimage color management, all of the following are checked: Honor EXIF color space tag..., Monitor Profile Enabled, Printer Profile Enabled, Printer Profile Rendering Intent -- Perceptual, Embed ICC profiles in saved/converted images...

In the Printer Driver -- Application Managed Colors is selected along with the correct paper and size

I have even uninstalled the latest version of Qimage Pro and gone back to a much earlier version that worked fine, but the same exact issue occurred -- what I saw on the monitor was what printed out and what I saw for images with bright red on the monitor were dingy maroon.

Also, I RESET ALL program settings and started from scratch on setting up the ICC profiles listed above.

Any ideas as to what I have done different to cause the color shift -- I AM printing what I see in Qimage but what Qimage is seeing is NOT what Photoshop shows or prints.

Suggestions/opinions/ideas???

Thanks,

MikeSp

Hi MikeSp,
Qimage as a program does not arbitrarily change so what else has changed, a setting somewhere, either in Qimage, the driver or any editing software you use? There must be something that has slipped through the net.
Mike recently wrote an article on this very subject, have a look, it may trigger something to solve the problem.
http://ddisoftware.com/tech/articles/may-2011-printing-the-same-colors-in-qimage-ultimate-and-photoshop/

Just to get it clear: In Qimage, the colours on screen look wrong and prints from Qimage match the Qimage screen view, is that correct?
How about posting a screen shot of the Qimage print properties, just in case you have missed something.

If reds are dull, it may be that the wrong profile is embedded in your images, or no profile embedded at all. Hover your mouse over a thumbnail, what does the Exif hotbar below show as the image profile, is it what you expect? Right click on a thumbnail and select Display Image Info so see if a profile is embedded, if not, the usual default is sRGB.

Those are my thoughts for now, I'm sure others will chime in to get you sorted and back onto Qimage quality printing  ;)
Terry
PS.
Mike did an article on the HP8850, the driver is full of bugs like many of the HP drivers. Maybe your HP 9100 has some too that have "come out of the woodwork"  :o
http://ddisoftware.com/tech/articles/february-2010-the-hp-b8850/

Hi MikeSp,

Adding to Terry's suggestion, often reds going to maroon if viewing/printing an srgb (or other) image in argb. It will always print OK (colourwise) in photoshop, if the image was edited in photoshop. It makes no difference there if you 'assign' a colourspace or if you 'convert' to a colourspace. However, before you save the image from photoshop for printing in Qimage, or any other colour managed print or view program, you need to 'convert' in photoshop to the correct colour space. If you have an assigned colour space in photoshop, it may not print correctly outside of photoshop (unless you have assigned the same colour space as is embedded in the image).

I would suggest that you check your settings in photoshop - under the 'Edit' tab, -  'Assign Profile' and 'Convert to Profile' (towards the bottom of the drop down menu), and use a sensible rendering intent, of course.

So, for example, in photoshop you can 'assign' pro-photo to your srgb image, so that you can carry out image editing, taking advantage of the smoother colour transitions obtained in sky and skin tones, and print within photoshop, since photoshop knows you have assigned pro-photo, but if you save the image, it will be saved as srgb. You must 'convert' the colourspace to srgb, or any  colourspace that the other print software can handle _before_ you save the file in photoshop. hth. 

Best wishes,

Ray 

Here is a copy of the basic settings I am using in Qimage:

MikeSp

Here is a screen capture of a red car in the Qimage print queue -- notice how maroon it appears -- and it prints out exactly the same.  The shot was taken in raw and converted into the aRGB color space by Capture One 6 Pro.  In the next posting, there is a screen capture of the image in PS.

MikeSp

Here is a screen capture of the same image in PS CS5 and when printed, it appears exactly as shown below -- bright red.

IF I can provide any other details that would provide the clue as to what I am doing wrong since we know it is NOT Qimage, but ME -- let me know -- I am really missing Qimage Pro as my printing software.

Thanks,

MikeSp

Mike,
Did you check the image profile in Qimage as suggested in reply #1?
If Qimage is printing what you see on the screen in Qimage, then a profile mis-match seems to be the most likely problem.
Terry

WHOA!!!!  I went back and checked the image profiles (as you suggested) from a sampling of images for this year and found that I had (GASP) somehow used three different ICC Profiles: Adobe RGB 1998; sRGB IEC61966-2.1; and CanonEOS5DMk2-Generic.

I assumed (yeah -- I know about how that word "assumed" can be broken down;-) that I was using aRGB.  Now I need to go back and check my workflow and get back to aRGB that I have been using for years.  THAT incorrect profile (color space) appears to be the issue as you surmised!!!

Big DUH!!  on my part -- perhaps I can blame it on senioritis...

Thanks,

MikeSp

Mike,
I know him/her very well  ;D
Pleased to hear the problem is being solved and that we were able to help  ;)
Terry

write an action for ps to load, 'convert' to argb, and save. Pass all the files through, and let it get on with it. It won't mess up the existing argb files. You most likely assumed, as many do, because you had assigned - assigned is the ps default anyway, sort of.

Good idea -- however, the issue I was having was two-fold: the wrong ICC profile in Capture One AND AND AND the wrong profile in PS too...  I DID make the assumption that once set, they would never change, but with upgrades, they did change.

Thanks,

MikeSp

Mike,
Now we all know the subject of this post is misleading, I think it would be fair/good manners for you to change it and not imply that Qimage had the problem.
Thanks,
Terry

Yes, fixing wherever the profile mismatch occurred (maybe something stripped the profile) is the way to be sure in the future, but you do know that Qimage can override any profile, right?  So on the problem images you have now, just use the "ICC override" filter in the image editor (batch filter in old Qimage versions) and pick the proper Adobe RGB profile for that image.  That should fix it (in Qimage anyway).

Mike

Done!!!! Sorry I did not think of that and thanks for the reminder -- I try to be fair and exhibit good manners, but even at my tender age, need a reminder from time to time -- I don't multitask as well as I used to.

As it turns out, the main issue I was having was NOT at all with Qimage (am happily using it again) but with an icon that was hiding in Capture One which opened up a dropdown menu in which the ICC was set and somehow -- perhaps with an upgrade -- had been changed.

AND, thanks for the help of all who responded to this thread.

MikeSp

The issue with Qimage reading the ICC profile is continuing and it may or may not be based upon Qimage -- probably not, but would appreciate hearing from the experts.

I have two Adobe RGB (1998) ICC's listed in Capture One 6 Pro that I use to convert raw images to jpgs -- it doesn't matter which one I use, because WHEN I convert the same image 8 times with either of the two aRGB ICC's and send the resulting JPG's to Photoshop CS5, where it defaults to Adobe RGB, Qimage will read ~6 of the resulting images as sRGB and 2 as aRGB.  I have Photoshop set to notify me if there is an ICC color space difference and it does not do so and thus, CS5 appears to be reading the converted images ALL as aRGB.

I replaced the Adobe RGB (1998) ICC in Windows Vista 32 with a brand new copy from Adobe -- made no difference.

IF I use Adobe Camera Raw to convert my raw images to JPG's, THEN Qimage will correctly read ALL of them as aRGB.

All three programs (C1 6 Pro, PS CS5 and Qimage Pro) are normally stable, dependable programs.

BTW -- I can visually pick out the thumbnails in Qimage that are in the aRGB color space when testing with 8 of the same exact image with the raw conversion procedure although I still use the "Display Image Info" to verify.

I realize it is possible for color space ICC's to become corrupted and that several different programs can put in their own aRGB ICC.

I also realize it is unlikely that Qimage is the culprit based upon the information given above.

Thoughts/opinions as to what to do next in order to get my workflow back to a dependable aRGB color space????

Thanks,

MikeSp

If you're doing any converting/saving in PhotoShop, this could be the culprit:

http://ddisoftware.com/tech/qimage-ultimate/qimage-exposes-photoshop-cs5-%2812-0-4%29-jpeg-corruption-bug/

Mike

... and Mike SP, after reading Mike Chaney's explanation of the problem in http://ddisoftware.com/tech/qimage-ultimate/qimage-exposes-photoshop-cs5-%2812-0-4%29-jpeg-corruption-bug/


I hope you noticed that he made a fix to prevent the problem, but the fix was incorporated into Qimage Ultimate.


It might be worthwhile to consider the new Qimage Ultimate.

Fred

I hate to admit how many hours I have wasted getting an understanding of what the h*** was going on with my workflow that had taken so long to create but which worked great for several years and suddenly I am getting the wrong colors and JPEGs with sRGB color space when I had processed them from raw into the aRGB color space and had PS set for aRGB and assumed I was still getting files in the aRGB although Qimage indicated that they were sRGB...  Confusing and FRUSTRATING >:(

My work flow will change to use TIFFs for printing (no big deal since I now understand what the problem is) and sRGB JPEGs for emailing -- EXCEPT I just do not have the time or patience to go back and reprocess hundreds of images -- no wonder Adobe is not admitting the JPEG corruption bug.

AND I may very well upgrade to Ultimate and ignore the many things it can do since I will not move away from C1 for raw conversion.  Qimage Pro does EVERYTHING that I need and does it PERFECTLY -- wish that a "Light" version of Ultimate would be developed for those of us that do not need most of the bangs and whistles in Ultimate.

Mike

I DO believe that to be the culprit.  I deactivated CS5, uninstalled 12.0.4 and rebooted, then installed 12.0 x32 from the installation disk and it seems to behave very well in regard to handling aRGB files.  IF I find this to be the case after a few MORE hours of experimenting, I will NOT update it since that seems to fix my problem of aRGB files being improperly saved as sRGB files by Photoshop.

MikeSp

The sad thing is that Adobe has known about the CS5 12.0.4 bug for two months now and they haven't bothered to fix it.  I would have thought that Adobe would have enough respect for their product and their customers to put out a prompt fix when the bug results in a clear case of file corruption.  Now with Adobe giving the boot to 750 employees, I guess I can stop checking to see if 12.0.5 has been released: who knows if it will ever be released!  I had the error correction fix in Qimage Ultimate in less than a day, which detects and corrects the Adobe file corruption.  You would think that if one person can do that in one day, a company who can lay off 750 employees yet still be in business... could at least do it within a week or two.  ;)

Mike