[Madpup]

i use Windows Picture and Fax Viewer to print my pictures,
the problem is that they print a lot darker than what i see
on the preview, is there anything i could do to cure this?
thanks for looking.

[Steve]

This is the old colour profile problem and it can relate to all the elements in your workflow. Basically your photographs are embedded with a colour profile when you take them, you then work with them in windows or an image editing software package and print them out from there via your printer, so your pictures are going through several different stages to get a final output and each of those stages could have a different colour profile from the original camera, the colours and brightness that your computer monitor is showing, the software that you may be using to edit, the printer driver itself and also the output from the printer onto different types of paper that it may be using could all be set up differently which will change the output that you are seeing at the end. To get perfect prints all these elements have to be in sync and matched and that is called colour profiling.

It all sounds complicated but we can help you step by step to sort it out. You may just have one part of the whole setup slightly wrong and it will affect the final print. What we need to know is what equipment you are using, your camera, your software, your printer and the make/type of paper you are using for a start. From there we will give you help and advice.

Oh and by the way, just about everyone of us have been in the same place you are at currently, this is one of the areas of photography that we all seem to fall victim to at some time or another.

I was attempting this all evening yesterday.

It took me ages to mess about tweaking the gamma on my monitor to get it right.
I then gave up and left it at 2.2 (the default) which seemed fine (bangs head on brick wall).

I then tried to go through pook's tutorial about how to print from photoshop the proper way.
For ages I hunted and hunted and hunted down the correct ICC profiles.

I have an Epson 830 printer.
It was no problem finding a generic ICC profile for the printer.
It was also no problem finding profiles for said printer, and the various epson papers.
Could I find ICC profiles for HP Premium Photo Glossy Paper (what I have), for use with Epson 830? Not a chance.
I did find some last year that someone had made, not any more, they seem to have disappeared into the ether.
So I tried using the similar Epson printer paper one....
...printed my image out....still too bloomin dark It's still not what I see on screen.

I'm ready to kill someone very shortly The fact I have a bunged up nostril too....so bunged up it's throbbing.....


Oh and this was after spending about 5 hours trying to unblock my print heads yet again.

[Matty]

Marcel you can buy inkjet head unblocking flumjummock, Jetec do it in little bottles, couple of drips down print head, leave to simmer for 5 mins, sorted. I will be getting some myself as my Red carttridge seems to have expired....

[Matty]

also marcel, have a look at the printer settings, go advanced, and select either colour controls or colour inhance, both have adjustments on them, i found that i was getting a dark image from that too

Aye I found this last week. There are now cleaning cartridges for sale which are reusable.
I do intend to get some.

Originally Posted by EosD

also marcel, have a look at the printer settings, go advanced, and select either colour controls or colour inhance, both have adjustments on them, i found that i was getting a dark image from that too

In the printer control panel? I have colour management turned off. It's supposed to be done in Photoshop.
So if I am correct I can ignore the printer colour management, and just use that for media type and print quality, and for colour matching, I can turn my attentions to photoshop, and thus the ICC profiling, which leads me to think I need a proper ICC profile for my paper and printer combination, which I think is going to prove difficult.

I could throw another spanner in the works, and suggest ICC profiles for the ink I'm using as it's non Epson, but would that be taking things too far?

[SammyC]

There's a simple solution to this that you are all missing! Print in black and white!

:coat:

[Steve]

Originally Posted by SammyC

There's a simple solution to this that you are all missing! Print in black and white!

:coat:

Ahh but all my pictures look un saturated and gray

Seriously, even printing in black and white needs to be colour managed to get good results. It is just a an evil part of the workflow that us photographers are bound to be plagued with for as long as we live.

[Madpup]

Thanks Steve,
The colors seem fine if i use poster7 or adobe photo shop6 its only when i try and print using Windows Picture and Fax Viewer,
my printer is a Epson RX500 camra gear below, computer AMD64 3500mz, 2gig memory,
1 terrflop HD, Gforce 78000 250meg, paper= i used most papers to solve this but they all come out dark.
Thanks guys

If you print using Photoshop, is it currently set for Photoshop to handle the colour management, or the printer driver?

[Madpup]

I havent used to PS to print my pics in the the past, but i might now if it will cure this problem, iv always used Windows Picture and Fax Viewer to print my pics.

[Steve]

If you have the images looking right in PS then I would also complete the process by printing from there. There is no real advantage in then using a different piece of software to print when PS is more than capable of handling that task. Like Marcel says, allow PS to handle the profile and see if the output is as you would expect, generally it will always be slightly darker as it is not illuminated as when it is viewed on the monitor. This can be adjusted for in PS once you know the difference and get a feel for how your output looks.

[Madpup]

Thanks Steve i'll give it a go

[Steve]

No problem, let us know how you get on and if you need any more help just ask