SM print service - Do you use it and for what?

[Mitch]

Simple question. Do you use the printing service offered by SM and if so what do you use it for?

Now the reason I am asking. I recently read the thread started by "andy" "Satisfaction guarantee". In the post from Baldy, he states "I regularly look at the list of top-selling pros and it's amazing how strong the correlation is between top sellers and how few returns they generate (zero, actually, for most of the ones near the top)." Then I noticed that andy does not offer the service on his site. (Not picking on you andy :D. ) Nor did a number of the other sites I looked at. mostly doing art prints.

I may be wrong, but the feature that kind of worries me about the printing service is giving up control of the finished product to the customer. Do I want the customer being able to crop the picture, or choose the color saturation? These features are great for family and friends prints, but are they right for the photographer selling his wares?

After using up this bandwidth watch someone reply that with the pro account you can choose crop and color saturation for the customer.

Thanks all


Mitch

[minoltaman]

Do I want the customer being able to crop the picture, or choose the color saturation? These features are great for family and friends prints, but are they right for the photographer selling his wares?

MitchI will address this part of your statement: NO

I made a request to eliminate or disable the cropping and the color correction feature on pro accounts in the feature request thread about week or so ago. I sure hope this can get done in the future.

Cheers

-don

[onethumb]

I will address this part of your statement: NO

I made a request to eliminate or disable the cropping and the color correction feature on pro accounts in the feature request thread about week or so ago. I sure hope this can get done in the future.

Cheers

-don

Pros can effectively disable cropping now by simply allowing only proper print sizes on a given smugmug photo. Having no other size options that wouldn't fit, there's no point in cropping.

I don't see how we could possibly remove cropping as an option, though, for items which have multiple print sizes that are of different ratios - it's just not fair the consumer of the prints. So we leave that in the hands of the Pros to use the custom pricing options to make this happen, should they want it.

The color correction thing is something we've always wrestled with, and I think we have a solution. There are long threads on the subject here at dgrin, feel free to read them for more information, but the bottom line is this:

- Almost all Pros take gorgeous shots but have poor post-processing skills, and thus, the color correction is way off.

- Their customers then order some prints with no auto-color correction and are upset. They assume it's the printer's (ours) fault, and complain to us.

- We look at the photos, gag at how bad the color correction is, and contact the Pro to show them how to properly color correct their shots, then order re-prints.

- Their customer gets new prints and is thrilled. The Pro now knows how to color correct, so their future orders come out looking great.

Our dilemma is clear: Since we have no way of telling whether a Pro is good at color correcting their photos or not (poor color correction is something like 99% of returns and reprints), we can't just remove the "Auto Correct" type color options for all Pros - it would result in way too much pain and anguish for their customers and my customer service department.

The possible solution we're working on now is to have an approval process whereby a Pro "proves" that not only has he/she read our color correction docs, but that he/she has their photos properly color calibrated. Once that approval process is complete, they gain the ability to "ColorLock" their items to force "True Color" to always be on.

No promises as to if, when, or how this will work, but that's the current thinking around smugmug HQ. Constructive feedback is definitely welcome.

Don

[Andy]

.

The possible solution we're working on now is to have an approval process whereby a Pro "proves" that not only has he/she read our color correction docs, but that he/she has their photos properly color calibrated. Once that approval process is complete, they gain the ability to "ColorLock" their items to force "True Color" to always be on.

No promises as to if, when, or how this will work, but that's the current thinking around smugmug HQ. Constructive feedback is definitely welcome.

Don

this would be marvy. i'd add that you should allow pros to disable cropping as well...

[Mitch]

The possible solution we're working on now is to have an approval process whereby a Pro "proves" that not only has he/she read our color correction docs, but that he/she has their photos properly color calibrated. Once that approval process is complete, they gain the ability to "ColorLock" their items to force "True Color" to always be on.

No promises as to if, when, or how this will work, but that's the current thinking around smugmug HQ. Constructive feedback is definitely welcome.

Don
I think that is a great idea.

It also wouldn't hurt for the photographer to order a print to make sure what he/she is selling is what they thought was uploaded. I just placed an order for some of my pictures just because.

Mitch

[Mitch]

Pros can effectively disable cropping now by simply allowing only proper print sizes on a given smugmug photo. Having no other size options that wouldn't fit, there's no point in cropping.

Don
Don,

I just re-read your post, then went to my smugmug account. Yes, having no other size options would make it so there's no point in cropping, but that doesn't mean that if the button is there that I won't click on it. Once clicked I can crop as I please.

Mitch

[minoltaman]

Don,

I just re-read your post, then went to my smugmug account. Yes, having no other size options would make it so there's no point in cropping, but that doesn't mean that if the button is there that I won't click on it. Once clicked I can crop as I please.

MitchThat, and the fact that you can not offer all products that are available, as I mentioned above with Don's solution. If server side cropping were to be put in our hands, and not the customers, that would be the best option and it still allow all products to be sold on each image, irregardless of image dimensions or size or product. And the best thing is the customers would never be needlesly mucking a crop up.

-don

[flyingpylon]

Hi, I'm one of the morons that has a Pro account but doesn't know a heck of a lot about color correction. I have a Pro account for a variety of reasons and I haven't started selling prints yet so maybe none of this matters to me just yet BUT...

If you didn't take the photo yourself and/or are not intimately familiar with the location/environment/lighting/etc. how can you look at someone else's photos and know that they have poor color correction skills?

[minoltaman]

Hi, I'm one of the morons that has a Pro account but doesn't know a heck of a lot about color correction. I have a Pro account for a variety of reasons and I haven't started selling prints yet so maybe none of this matters to me just yet BUT...

If you didn't take the photo yourself and/or are not intimately familiar with the location/environment/lighting/etc. how can you look at someone else's photos and know that they have poor color correction skills?You can download the photo and open it in an editor. Check to make sure the image is in gamut using a correct soft proofing profile and then make sure the image is in the correct colorspace to be uploaded and printed in. If the image you download is out of gamut, or in the wrong profile, or has any other noticeable color problem, that photo is in trouble when it hits the printer. Unless you are pretty dang good you usually can not just look at a photo and tell, unless the thing glows in deep bright saturated colors like it is nuclear. If you see an image like that, it will probably be tough to print. Otherwise you pretty much need to look at the image in an editor or be an image editor.

I will say that after a while a good image editor can tell what is wrong with many images just by looking at them, but this is not to say that this is skill everyone has or has the time to acquire. I imagine Baldy has a good feel for a few types of problem images just by looking at them. Once you have seen one sort of problem you always are on the lookout for those same preliminary problematic symptoms.

-don

[Nikolai]

this would be marvy. i'd add that you should allow pros to disable cropping as well...
Where is the line to become SM-certified?;-)

I'm not Scott Kelby or Kevin Ames, but I've become pretty fiendly with PS last year (thanks to Andy and his foggy horsie!)

I definitely don't want certain shots to be cropped/corrected.

i also have and idea to add to a common pool (if this feature ever comes to life): if the cropping is locked automatically hide/discard nonmatching formats.

Cheers!:1drink

[cambler]

The possible solution we're working on now is to have an approval process whereby a Pro "proves" that not only has he/she read our color correction docs, but that he/she has their photos properly color calibrated. Once that approval process is complete, they gain the ability to "ColorLock" their items to force "True Color" to always be on.

Sounds like a familiar suggestion :D

[mercphoto]

Pros can effectively disable cropping now by simply allowing only proper print sizes on a given smugmug photo. Having no other size options that wouldn't fit, there's no point in cropping.

I don't see how we could possibly remove cropping as an option, though, for items which have multiple print sizes that are of different ratios - it's just not fair the consumer of the prints. So we leave that in the hands of the Pros to use the custom pricing options to make this happen, should they want it.

I actually agree with this approach, and its very simple really. If the pros don't want consumers to crop, then don't offer a 3:2 ratio image in an 8x10 print.

But I do see one change that SM could make to the crop tool: don't let the user crop in BOTH directions, only in one. In other words, they can't grab the 10% out of the middle, order a 16x20, then be upset with the results.

[cambler]

I'll see that suggestion and raise you a simple fix:

If a picture has only one size available, do not show cropping options.

This is a simple boolean check to bypass the dialog. A single size available, by definition, should never need cropping.

[minoltaman]

I actually agree with this approach, and its very simple really. If the pros don't want consumers to crop, then don't offer a 3:2 ratio image in an 8x10 print.

>>>>This solution is simple but not the best as it eliminates too many potential products from a photographers line-up on any given image as I have mentioned before. This would be eliminating to many potential sources of revenue to the photographer. If the server-side cropping option were available to us and not them, we could still offer all the other odd sized prints and gifts we wanted to and the customer would not muck up the crop, it would be our responsibility to crop the image on the server after upload.

But I do see one change that SM could make to the crop tool: don't let the user crop in BOTH directions, only in one. In other words, they can't grab the 10% out of the middle, order a 16x20, then be upset with the results.

Sorry, I do not care for this second idea at all.

If this would be too complex of a change or too much work, I would settle for my original request to dump the color and crop tools, or at least have the option to dump both. Either way makes butter for me...if I have to, I can always make some extra crops and do some extra uploads from the house.

-don

[onethumb]

Hi, I'm one of the morons that has a Pro account but doesn't know a heck of a lot about color correction. I have a Pro account for a variety of reasons and I haven't started selling prints yet so maybe none of this matters to me just yet BUT...

If you didn't take the photo yourself and/or are not intimately familiar with the location/environment/lighting/etc. how can you look at someone else's photos and know that they have poor color correction skills?

Most (99%?) of the time, I'm talking about skin tones. It's a double-whammy: consumers are most sensitive to their skin tones, and Pros aren't particularly good at correcting for it - it's much easier to make the grass green and the sky blue.

Anyone who knows anything about color correcting for skin tones can tell VERY quickly when there's a problem. Our job is to educate our Pros on how to do that.

Don

[Baldy]

Once clicked I can crop as I please.Hi Mitch,

So one good thing about dealing with smugmug is you often get very honest answers.

My very honest answer is yes, theoretically, a customer could crop the center of a shot and mess it up. But in the last million prints we shipped, no one ever has. If they did, we'd replace it.

In the meantime, we can point to tens of thousands of pro prints that are saved by the crop option, emails by the score saying it's the coolest feature ever, and many high volume pros who came to us from Printroom or elsewhere who depend on this feature.

Color is a very different and critically important issue, and other things like custom watermarks and backprinting are important too. But it's hard for me to internalize that disabling cropping isn't tempest in a teapot, a theoretical more than practical issue.

Honestly, I think if you were to press Minoltaman, who is championing this issue, about whether he's saying this from experience in selling prints off smugmug, I think he'd have to say no.

If you were to press Erik Olsen, who sells a lot of prints, about his experience with the feature, I think he'd quote customers who say it's the coolest thing ever.

It would be hard for us to change because the shopping cart is so involved so you'd be delaying improvements that are really important for this one.

BTW, we demoed a streamlined shopping cart last night at a camera user group in the Bay Area. Three of our customers were there and it was cropping that got the most kudos. One guy made a huge point of why he had to bail from Printroom because they don't have this feature.

I hope this helps.

Thanks,
Chris

[cambler]

To be honest, cropping concerns me only slightly. Since I upload 8x10 crops only and make that the only size available, I can let the issue go.

It's the color that I'd like to bypass, and your requirements for demonstrations of competence are more than fair. Indeed, if I'm doing it wrong, I want to know, so I can fix my workflow, eliminate the confusion, and move on.

I can always add some custom text that tells my audience that their images are pre-cropped for their protection :D

[Baldy]

I can understand the concern for cropping because most labs report it as the #1 issue, ahead of color. It was for us before we added cropping to the shopping cart. But here are the actual proportion of returns we see:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19664442-L.jpg

The bottom 4 items are only seen in consumer shots. Washed out (usually from using Adobe RGB) and unsharp (too little sharpness) are only seen in pro/serious amateur shots.

Note that cropping didn't make a statistical blip.

[Baldy]

I have a few reasons for thisFair enough. :D So I think it's only fair to us and our customers to focus our print-related resources on our print-related customers.

No?

[minoltaman]

Fair enough. :D So I think it's only fair to us and our customers to focus our print-related resources on our print-related customers.

No?:soapbox

I think you know me by now Baldy, I push for every feature my dime or my posts can buy me. I think that is only being fair to myself, my family and my customers. That said....I think you are an you are doing a fine job. Now if you could kick all of these folks that take all of these people pictures out of here, that would be just great!:rofl :wink Kidding....:giggle


I will try not to...:deadhorse on this cropping thing for to much longer.:nono :ear

Don't work to hard Baldy, your return chart was interesting. :jawdrop I wonder how most of those people are doing color, those return percentages seem quite stiff in that area....Color is most certainly the word of the day for you smugs.

Happy shoopting to all.

-don

[mercphoto]

Issues with smugmug
1] Backprinting, I want my name or generic on the back.
2] The cart branding and footer, I don't like it and it will lose me business.
3] The color correction tool, it needs to go.
4] The cropping tool is just in the way for my needs.
5] Low security level on password protected galleries


I have some conerns over cropping as well, but not to the extent you do. If you have a 3:2 aspect ratio image on your site, don't allow a customer to order an 8x10 image. Thus no cropping happens. I think its a reasonable compromise that SM is offerering here.

I have some unsophisticated customers, but have yet to have an issue with the current cropping tool. I post 3:2 images, but have sold a lot of 4:5 prints. I haven't had a customer complain about the cropping tool yet. And its easier than me uploading a 3:2 version and a 4:5 version of the same image. But I certainly could do so if I was concerned about control over the crop.

I guess what I'm saying is that any concerns with cropping that I have are not showing up in the real world. So I write it off as me simply being paranoid over the issue.

For color correction, SM has raised some very valid points about why it is there and their issues with removing it. I think their suggestion to have people prove they can manage color correctly before allowing that option off is a good one. Personally, I'd be willing to go that route.

[minoltaman]

I have some conerns over cropping as well, but not to the extent you do. If you have a 3:2 aspect ratio image on your site, don't allow a customer to order an 8x10 image. Thus no cropping happens. I think its a reasonable compromise that SM is offerering here.

>>>> I would rather do server side cropping myself and offer many products instead of just products that fit the aspect ratio perfectly. I don't see how eliminating other products is a compromise, it is simply what one has to do here to (kinda) eliminate the cropper.

I have some unsophisticated customers, but have yet to have an issue with the current cropping tool. I post 3:2 images, but have sold a lot of 4:5 prints. I haven't had a customer complain about the cropping tool yet. And its easier than me uploading a 3:2 version and a 4:5 version of the same image. But I certainly could do so if I was concerned about control over the crop.

>>>>Cool beans for you, I would like US to be able to do the server side cropping. This would be very convieneient and would only take one upload and you could offer the full product line-up on whatever image you wanted to.

I guess what I'm saying is that any concerns with cropping that I have are not showing up in the real world. So I write it off as me simply being paranoid over the issue.

>>>> I don't have a problem with this statement and I hear you. I just hate seeing that clunky system in the checkout process if it is unneeded or unwanted or can't be taken out of the cutomers hands and be put into ours.

For color correction, SM has raised some very valid points about why it is there and their issues with removing it. I think their suggestion to have people prove they can manage color correctly before allowing that option off is a good one. Personally, I'd be willing to go that route.You will have to stand in line, because I and others hope to be at the exam center door when it opens! Anyway, I mentioned earlier I have bigger wants and needs than solving this particular cropping issue, so I am backing off this one just a bit.:yikes :snore

Have a good day.:beer

-don

[Baldy]

our return chart was interesting. I wonder how most of those people are doing color, those return percentages seem quite stiff in that area....It's a problem that's new to digital and almost no one understands why.

It's simple: with film, it was sensitive to UV but we knew that and placed filters on our lenses. Unlike film, which is not sensitive to near-infrared, digital cameras are and record it as red.

If you use a light source high in near-infrared, like indoor household lighting or on-board flash, welcome to the danger zone and fair caucasian skin going nuclear.

An excellent reference:

http://www.cci-icc.gc.ca/whats-new/news34/science_e.shtml

They had the problem with canvas and Nikon CCD-based cameras, where the problem is least pronounced. Try it with blemishes, surface veins, and Canon CMOS cameras and you'll be shocked.

[mercphoto]

It's simple: with film, it was sensitive to UV but we knew that and placed filters on our lenses. Unlike film, which is not sensitive to near-infrared, digital cameras are and record it as red.

Aha! Now I know why the Canon 17-40/4L has a special coating for infra-red. I think it was done to address this very issue. Wonder if the EF-S mount 10-22 has the same coating?

[minoltaman]

It's a problem that's new to digital and almost no one understands why.

It's simple: with film, it was sensitive to UV but we knew that and placed filters on our lenses. Unlike film, which is not sensitive to near-infrared, digital cameras are and record it as red.

If you use a light source high in near-infrared, like indoor household lighting or on-board flash, welcome to the danger zone and fair caucasian skin going nuclear.

An excellent reference:

http://www.cci-icc.gc.ca/whats-new/news34/science_e.shtmlInteresting read, Baldy, thanks. I can see I don't run into this problem much because a huge percentage of the the stuff I shoot is natural light work. Much of the time not enough natural light, :rolleyes but natural light none the less. I do at times shoot tons of people shots as well, but these be candid street shots and concert shots also under natural light. When I am not shooting in natural light I am shooting African Cichlids under the most extreme lighting conditions and am looking to get all of the fluorescence, luminescense and metallic reflection, and color and pop out of a fish that I can. Something like what you see below on this 2 and one-half inch long male ob peacock:
http://www.pbase.com/minoltaman/image/21356139.jpg
The fish you see pictured is an accurate representation of the actual fish and it does make me remember at at times that I may be at an extreme other end of the color spectrum than some. I am almost always trying to capture an extreme or odd range or spectrum of color and I am almost always looking for the largest colorspace and print gamut I can get. I am an official color freak. :nod And btw, I would not try to print this image at smugmug in this form as it has deep greens and blues that are out of smugmug/ezprints color/print gamut This image would would need some color work done to tone these back without making the fish look signifigantly different for this image to be be printed properly here at smugmug.

Happy shooting.

-don

[DJ-S1]

It's a problem that's new to digital and almost no one understands why.

It's simple: with film, it was sensitive to UV but we knew that and placed filters on our lenses. Unlike film, which is not sensitive to near-infrared, digital cameras are and record it as red.Are you suggesting using an IR cutoff filter for everyday indoor photography to eliminate some of the color tweaking necessary? Or is that for special studio stuff only?

[Baldy]

I guess what I'm saying is that any concerns with cropping that I have are not showing up in the real world.Spoken by a very wise man.

My favorite line in business is, "Profit is accounting opinion. Cash is fact."

I had the undeserved privilege of working with Steve Jobs and the guys who designed OS X and iPod for four years. We believed user interface suggestions are opinion until they face the acid test of real consumers.

It was hilarious watching film from the test lab during pizza parties. The best UI designers in the world would scream as they watched the film, "NO! LADY!! DON"T CLICK THAT! WHAT ARE YOU THINKING!?"

We often hear that we should call a no-crop option (which we're re-introducing shortly) fit. Good idea. It only takes 5 minutes with consumers to see they love the term. It's crystal clear what it means and exactly what they want.

"I always choose it when I watch DVDs I rent from Blockbuster. I like movies to fill my screen without losing anything."

Then try and offer fit in the real world. You get help emails like, "You lied to us. You said it fit, but instead you put two hideous white borders on my prints. You should have called the option 'two hideious white borders.' Fit means fit."

[minoltaman]

Baldy said:

"It was hilarious watching film from the test lab during pizza parties. The best UI designers in the world would scream as they watched the film, "NO! LADY!! DON"T CLICK THAT! WHAT ARE YOU THINKING!?"

and then Baldy said:

"Then try and offer fit in the real world. You get help emails like, "You lied to us. You said it fit, but instead you put two hideous white borders on my prints. You should have called the option 'two hideious white borders.' Fit means fit."

Unfortunately in my earlier life as an electronic tecnicain, consumer electronics retail manager, customer service manager, salesman, installer, systems designer, and troubleshooter, I feel that top statement bigtime!!!! I believe that stuff 300 percent and love to see things like that. Well, not actually love to see it happen, but you know what I mean. :D

As far as that second statement goes I have heard that kind of jazz far to many times myself. The hooha never fits in the thingie right for some customers. That's just the nature of business with the general public.:cry

Interfaces, always a touchy subject, eh?

Cheers

-don

Oh yeah, I forgot, and his line is pretty darn good too...

Baldy said:

My favorite line in business is, "Profit is accounting opinion. Cash is fact."

[minoltaman]

We often hear that we should call a no-crop option (which we're re-introducing shortly) fit.
...and thanks!!!:nod :clap :nod

Cheers

-don

[Nikolai]

Baldy,
would you be so kind to share more info from that event?
How did it go, and such..

TIA

[Baldy]

There were about 30 people, very knowledgeable and full of enthusiasm, who gave us 2 hours of floor time (amazing). Three smugmuggers were in the audience, one of whom is a Star Explorer fanatic who thinks it's the greatest app ever.

We demoed most features, fielded a zillion questions (why don't you support RAW, etc.), and got tons of applause.

Lots of questions on print quality with the usual focus on dpi, jpeg compression, and shouldn't you use tiff files. I pulled out a 24x30 print made from a 600 KB 80 dpi file and everyone gathered around with the lights on high, looked close and gasped.

Someone who really knew printing chimed in and said, "don't try this at home, kids. It looks so great because EZ Prints upsampling is amazing and it was done on continous tone printers. Won't look like that on your ink jet with dithering."

We demoed the new shopping cart and talked about i2e (http://www.colour-science.com/), the new autoadjust software I've spent so much of my life testing over the last 4 months that we're about to intro. It's truly amazing.

[Baldy]

Are you suggesting using an IR cutoff filter for everyday indoor photography to eliminate some of the color tweaking necessary? Or is that for special studio stuff only?We're still weighing solutions, but it's a devil of a problem. In a group shot, you may have two or three (fair-skinned) faces go red and how do you adjust for it? Further, surface veins in the cheeks and blemishes get emphasized.

I'm producing test shots with B+W's 486 filter. From their catalog:

----------------------------------------------------------------

The UV filter 010 blocks ultraviolet radiation which can cause blur or – in color shots – blueness. It is ideal for photos in the mountains, by the sea or in areas with very clear air. Pictures become more brilliant, irritating blue haze is avoided and color reproduction remains neutral. This UV filter is also suitable for use as front lens protection.

The recommended product for digital cameras is the UV/IR blocking filter 486, a steep-flanked interference filter which additionally blocks infrared and prevents blur and color cast with IR-sensitive CCDs.

---------------------------------------------------------------

My studio lights don't produce IR and hence I don't see the problem there. It's most acute under tungsten indoor lighting and on-board flash that isn't bounced off the ceiling.

But I have seen thousands of outdoor shots with a similar problem. Let's take an example from a world-class photographer (Andy) with a world-class camera. Here's what he posted of a fair-skinned caucasian in a forum:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689503-M.jpg

That shot is so far from a legal skin tone it would come straight back to us if printed. The skin at least would have to be much closer to this for any consumer to accept it:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689507-M.jpg

[minoltaman]

We're still weighing solutions, but it's a devil of a problem. In a group shot, you may have two or three (fair-skinned) faces go red and how do you adjust for it? Further, surface veins in the cheeks and blemishes get emphasized.

I'm producing test shots with B+W's 486 filter. From their catalog:

----------------------------------------------------------------

The UV filter 010 blocks ultraviolet radiation which can cause blur or – in color shots – blueness. It is ideal for photos in the mountains, by the sea or in areas with very clear air. Pictures become more brilliant, irritating blue haze is avoided and color reproduction remains neutral. This UV filter is also suitable for use as front lens protection.

The recommended product for digital cameras is the UV/IR blocking filter 486, a steep-flanked interference filter which additionally blocks infrared and prevents blur and color cast with IR-sensitive CCDs.

---------------------------------------------------------------

My studio lights don't produce IR and hence I don't see the problem there. It's most acute under tungsten indoor lighting and on-board flash that isn't bounced off the ceiling.

But I have seen thousands of outdoor shots with a similar problem. Let's take an example from a world-class photographer (Andy) with a world-class camera. Here's what he posted of a fair-skinned caucasian in a forum:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689503-M.jpg

That shot is so far from a legal skin tone it would come straight back to us if printed. The skin at least would have to be much closer to this for any consumer to accept it:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689507-M.jpgWowza, I have taken 5-10,000 candid people shots with my digital and I don't think see this effect outside. This is an extreme example and if I ever see anything like this I would think someone should have set a custom white balance and they did not. Or they shot in the wrong white balance period. This might be a tad underexposed it looks to me as well. It looks like this problem could have been solved in the field by using a diifferent wb setting. I suppose if you don't have live preview you just didn't see this coming though. The only time I see any sort of this stuff is under straight on flash conditions indoors with my hand dandy ef-500 super shot straight on. I only have about 80,000 digital images under my belt, but I dare say I have not seen much, if any of this outdoors. I don't think filters are needed on this one, I think the camera had a problem with the white balance. I just hit this image with one drop of the white eydrpopper and got this:
http://www.pbase.com/minoltaman/image/42080639.jpg

It took me all of a couple seconds. I could do more here but I just opened the image to see what the problem was and could not resist one quick click with one of the levels eydroppers.


Yup, I am pretty sure now, with my cheap camera I do not get this sort of thing on my outdoor shots when I am properly white-balanced. I dunno on this, Baldy. I only see this with flash and other forms of indoor lighting. My question is why would anyone upload a photo like this without doing some simple corrections.


-don

[Baldy]

With your adjustment, the cyan is in range at 24%. The forehead now measures 47% magenta, 41% yellow, not close to a legal skin tone so this print will come straight back to us unless the consumer chooses autocolor.

[minoltaman]

With your adjustment, the cyan is in range at 24%. The forehead now measures 47% magenta, 41% yellow, not close to a legal skin tone so this print will come straight back to us unless the consumer chooses autocolor.phhh...my point was this is a standard color balance problem, I think.

-don

[Baldy]

phhh...my point was this is a standard color balance problemSo your mission is to explain why the T-shirt is now white but the infrared-sensitive areas are not in a range any publication or consumer would accept.

The nose measures 65% magenta 46% yellow.

[minoltaman]

So your mission is to explain why the T-shirt is now white but the infrared-sensitive areas are not in a range any publication or consumer would accept.

The nose measures 65% magenta 46% yellow.No, my point is that the image you presented and corrected is not a very acceptable example of the problem described and the solution in my opinion. I think it is a bit is too yellow-greenish monotonish.
I suppose ezprints won't print this one either? If not, I don't see what good softproofing with the ezprints profile or the CMYK profile does here. Your saying what you see won't get printed. What??? No redheads or sunburn prints here at smugmug? Geesh my wife is a very white redhead for gosh sake! You telling I have to paint her green??

http://www.pbase.com/minoltaman/image/42082487.jpg

My monitor out of cal??? What gives here? I get prints from stuff that looks like this at walgreens and don't have a problem except the fact that they charge me too much when I pick them up.

-don

[minoltaman]

You gonna tell me ezprints won't print something like this either, Baldy?

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/21702494.morefiddle.jpg

[Baldy]

EZ Prints will print it, of course. But no magazine will accept it. Nor any consumer because it's not a skin tone that occurs in nature.

Your adjustment is on the left, below. The same man's photo is on the right, taken under studio lights that emit no infrared. Everyone here, who is looking at the man, says he doesn't look anything like the shot on the left.

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19699291-L.jpg

If you print them, they'll turn out okay unless you choose the true color option. If the lab is faithful to their true color mantra, the left will look nuclear-radiated because the skin measures 7-20% more magenta than yellow.

[Baldy]

I get prints from stuff that looks like this at walgreens and don't have a problemAll Walgreen's prints pass through autocolor. I had understood you were a champion of true color?

[minoltaman]

EZ Prints will print it, of course. But no magazine will accept it. Nor any consumer because it's not a skin tone that occurs in nature.

Your adjustment is on the left, below. The same man's photo is on the right, taken under studio lights that emit no infrared. Everyone here, who is looking at the man, says he doesn't look anything like the shot on the left.

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19699291-L.jpg

If you print them, they'll turn out okay unless you choose the true color option. If the lab is faithful to their true color mantra, the left will look nuclear-radiated because the skin measures 7-20% more magenta than yellow.I don't buy it. The man cleary looks to have a shiney red nose when the outdoor shot was taken. He is full of stubble and has clear signs of reflection and the sun on his forehead. There is no way that gentleman's face looked anywhere near that "studio light " color out on the street. Nobody's face in the sun looks monoyellowtone like that face in the studio shot is. The object is not to try to make the man look studio yellow I don't think. I would think in this snapshot you would actually want the man to look like he did.

-don

[minoltaman]

All Walgreen's prints pass through autocolor. I had understood you were a champion of true color?My bad, for the record at times I use Target's free standing kiosks, not walgreens. I have a walgreens 1 block away and made a misspeak. Target's kiosks let you diasable autocolor when you do the prints yourself. I have done many on-the-spot concert shots on the kiosks. Quick 35 dollar 8x10's to band members and family type stuff.

-don

[minoltaman]

A fair skin person in similar natural sunlight should not be monocolored yelolowgreenish. They should have a more realistic color something like this:

http://www.pbase.com/minoltaman/image/42085461.jpg

[minoltaman]

or maybe somthing like this snapshot:

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/Untitled-3%7E0.jpg

[minoltaman]

Baldy, are you with me here? Is this monitor out of cal or something? What do those last street shots look like to you? Or anyone else? I pulled out my backup monitor and things are looking jacked up. I need to do some checking, it's possible I could be eating some words here tonight...On my backup monitor your edit looks good and mine look like *hit. So the moral of the story might be shut your face if you are not using a calibrated monitor.:flush

-don

[Nikolai]

Looking forward for the new features!
Cheers!:1drink

[Baldy]

Is this monitor out of cal or something?Yes. Here are the measurements on her cheek:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19705866-L.jpg

Consumers will not accept prints where the yellow value isn't at least 3% higher than magenta, especially when cyan is as low as 28% of the magenta value.

Here are the acceptable ranges:

http://www.smugmug.com/help/skin-tone

It's a lovely shot, however, and will print nicely with autocolor on.

[minoltaman]

Yes. Here are the measurements on her cheek:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19705866-L.jpg

Consumers will not accept prints where the yellow value isn't at least 3% higher than magenta, especially when cyan is as low as 28% of the magenta value.

Here are the acceptable ranges:

http://www.smugmug.com/help/skin-tone

It's a lovely shot, however, and will print nicely with autocolor on.Glad to see you are still up, Baldy. So you are saying the girl would not like this print? I looked at smugmug auto adjust and autotan and she turns unnaturally yellow. She was in the late may sun and had a slight reddish glow to her when I photographed her. This photo looks exactly like she did then. I am looking at 5 monitors here and she looks good on 4. I also asked nik and to his untrained eye and uncaled monitor he says she looks nice and pale. He also printed it on a simple inkjet and he said she looks just like she should after getting a little late spring sun. After a long winter indoors here in Illinois, all the fair skinned girls that don't go to the tanning booth during the winter and go straight out into the late spring or early summer sun get that nice soft reddish hue for a bit here.

Now I have not printed the girl myself but I have printed the bandshots. Did you say those bandshots would print and be acceptable, or not?

As far as the edit you did that I was jumping on you about it does look better on 4 of my 5 monitors here. Probably acceptable and I apologize. The monitor I was using here to do the edits and view your edit is acting very strange. However, it does still look a bit unnaturally yellowgreenish to me on the other monitors, probably because of the surrounding grass in the shot. It does still look better than my edits however, and I will recalibrate my ps rig later tonight.

The shot below is a little dark, but I would like to know what you think the customer would say on the fleshtones on this one along with those other two band shots I posted earlier.

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/24595125.wildeyes10x8forKj.jpg

Now I think I know what you are going to tell me and this should be interesting. :D

Once again, sorry for dogging your edit so bad, that junk monitor I was using(my main) was mucking me up. I'll fix that...

-don

[minoltaman]

Baldy, I would like to hear if you think snaps like these would print acceptably as well.

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/original%7E52.jpg[/url]

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/street2.jpg

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/street3.jpg


http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/street1.jpg[url="http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/street1.jpg"] (http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/original%7E52.jpg)

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/Untitled-5.jpg

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/Untitled-2.jpg

Thanks

-don

[Baldy]

I don't buy it. The man cleary looks to have a shiney red nose when the outdoor shot was taken. He is full of stubble and has clear signs of reflection and the sun on his forehead. There is no way that gentleman's face looked anywhere near that "studio light " color out on the street.Here is another shot of the same man in the same location, taken about 5 minutes later with another Canon. This one had an L lens with anti-infrared coating.

The T-shirt is equally neutral.

Which camera produced the correct skin tone?

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19712190-L.jpg

[minoltaman]

Here is another shot of the same man in the same location, taken about 5 minutes later with another Canon. This one had an L lens with anti-infrared coating.

The T-shirt is equally neutral.

Which camera produced the correct skin tone?

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19712190-L.jpgCome again, the dudes hair is green on the pic to the right!?! And the lighting conditions are not nearly the same. The first pic clearly has some bright stuff hitting his head and many other lighting differences. And you can still see the guys nose was/is reddishpurplish like I mentioned before.

-don

[Baldy]

? I see a green leaf in the sky behind his head. The one on the left is the one you adjusted. His hair is being dyed on the right one.

The light is the same. One camera is pointing down (the one on the right) while the one on the left is pointing up towards the sky.

[minoltaman]

? I see a green leaf in the sky behind his head. The one on the left is the one you adjusted. His hair is being dyed on the right one.

The light is the same. One camera is pointing down (the one on the right) while the one on the left is pointing up towards the sky.
I fixed it, the other left!! duhh..

[minoltaman]

? I see a green leaf in the sky behind his head. The one on the left is the one you adjusted. His hair is being dyed on the right one.

The light is the same. One camera is pointing down (the one on the right) while the one on the left is pointing up towards the sky.ok, I can accept the green dye as I have seen it around anyway...It's still not a good comparison because the lighting is much different. The camera either did, or should have done at least few things differently when exposing those two shots. No way that is fair comparison for much, I don't think. You can't shoot one shot into bright light and expect it to look like a shot not shot into bright light. And don't forget the edit on the left was done on a bunk monitor, I mentioned that earlier.

-don

[Baldy]

You can't shoot one shot into bright light and expect it to look like a shot not shot into bright light.The skin tone changes as the light behind the subject gets brighter?

— Actually, I can see how that would happen if the camera had auto white balance on. It would be influenced by the sky.

But the point remains, the customer will accept the skin tone on the right because it's in a legal range of skin tones. On the left, you have to choose autocolor for them to accept that shot.

[minoltaman]

The skin tone changes as the light behind the subject gets brighter?The color temperature and metering information the camera was seeing and trying to capture in those two shots is quite different. The shot into the shadows is balanced nicely because it is an easy shot. The other one, with the backlighting on the top left, combined with grass on the bottom left, and the reflection and glare off of the glass on the right, and then mix that with the rest of the darker stuff on the right side of the image and in the shadows caused the camera to have a problem with the color/white balance and exposure, it looks like to me. It's a much tougher shot for the camera and/or the photographer to get correct. I say metering and white balance and the exposure differences caused this problem. That's still the way I see this one. Show me a shot with that same lens and same camera settings shot into the backlighting, then we have a real discussion here, I think.

[minoltaman]

The skin tone changes as the light behind the subject gets brighter?

— Actually, I can see how that would happen if the camera had auto white balance on. It would be influenced by the sky.

Yes, that and other reasons...and
let's quit talking about crappy photos and crappy edits for a bit

Now, if you would please, start giving me your opinion on the 3 concert shots and the 8 streetshots I posted. Will customers accept them, or do you say they are too crappy?

Thanks

[Baldy]

Now, if you would please, start giving me your opinion on the 3 concert shots and the 8 streetshots I posted.The band member you posted is fine. The others are red x's.

[minoltaman]

The band member you posted is fine. The others are red x's.refresh your browser once or twice, the images are there, well at pbase I mean...I gotta get the rest of my stuff off pbase, you just can't trust that place anymore...I'll start moving the links to somewhere else.

[Baldy]

Red x's. PBase must not like me tonight. But you have exactly the same tools I do: the eyedropper tool and the legal range of skin tones (http://www.smugmug.com/help/skin-tone).

Scott Kelby and Dan Margulis talk of skin tone ranges in their books if you'd rather take it from them (they list the same values we do, except Scott doesn't mention cyan, which is critical).

[minoltaman]

Red x's. PBase must not like me tonight. But you have exactly the same tools I do: the eyedropper tool and the legal range of skin tones (http://www.smugmug.com/help/skin-tone).

Scott Kelby and Dan Margulis talk of skin tone ranges in their books if you'd rather take it from them (they list the same values we do, except Scott doesn't mention cyan, which is critical).I moved all but one of the images to one of my servers. I have made my last direct link to pbase. I am asking you if you think these prints are acceptable by your standards.... You still have not addressed the sunny pink issue on the very first image I posted way back when yet either. The girl did have that skin color and tone. I use 5 monitors and my printers and my eyes and memory to get the colors correct. I do not usually go by any standard anything to make adjustments by. I do not want my sun soaked ladies and girls to get the jaundice!! I say that system is not foolproof and works for many folks, but not all folks on all images all of the time. It just makes some images look unrealistic at times when they don't have to look that way.

I don't mean to be knocking the gurus, but blanket techniques are hard for me to get used to and I don't always trust them. So if you would, you can use the dropper and charts and I will use my eyes and we will see how many images we come to the same conclusion on. Fair enough? Then if there is a big discrepancy I will print them (some again) and we can see how they look and what is up.

I'm out for the night, it's sleepy time and then taxola time for me.:rolleyes :uhoh :cry

Thanks for the discussion.

-don

[Baldy]

http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/24595125.wildeyes10x8forKj.jpg
I hope others are reading this because I'm spending a lot of time not writing help sections to do this for a guy who doesn't order prints. :D

This is a lovely shot and I'm disadvantaged because I don't know her. Having seen so many of these go through and and a few just like it be returned, my guess is 49 of 50 customers would accept it.

For one thing, she's not fair-skinned and it's fair-skinned caucasians who generate most returns. But her face is on the red side, something everyone is usually hyper allergic to, and saturation is high. We didn't shoot Fuji Velvia films for people for a good reason. When magenta saturation gets to 50%, you're flirting with the nuclear zone.

i2e, of course, would take no risks with this shot because commercial labs don't want risks, so it would reduce skin saturation especially in the magenta. It takes away some of the character of the shot, but this one will never come back from the client (unless it was a fine-art photographer who did the buying, and they would choose true color and get the deeper saturations).

To your eye, it will no doubt look sallow but if she was the buyer, she would probably consider it more flattering.

The main thing I don't like is it took the red out of her lips.

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19725971-M.jpg

[Baldy]

I can't check this thread anymore today because stuff is piling up on my list, but you still have to explain why, it it were a white balance issue with the man Andy shot, your adjustment has skin so out of range.

The definition of white balance is the white is balanced, which it is. The T-shirt is white.

i2e also made the shirt white but didn't kill the skin:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19725970-M.jpg

This thread has made a very compelling case for the dangers of true color.

[minoltaman]

I hope others are reading this because I'm spending a lot of time not writing help sections to do this for a guy who doesn't order prints. :D

This is a lovely shot and I'm disadvantaged because I don't know her. Having seen so many of these go through and and a few just like it be returned, my guess is 49 of 50 customers would accept it.

For one thing, she's not fair-skinned and it's fair-skinned caucasians who generate most returns. But her face is on the red side, something everyone is usually hyper allergic to, and saturation is high. We didn't shoot Fuji Velvia films for people for a good reason. When magenta saturation gets to 50%, you're flirting with the nuclear zone.

i2e, of course, would take no risks with this shot because commercial labs don't want risks, so it would reduce skin saturation especially in the magenta. It takes away some of the character of the shot, but this one will never come back from the client (unless it was a fine-art photographer who did the buying, and they would choose true color and get the deeper saturations).

To your eye, it will no doubt look sallow but if she was the buyer, she would probably consider it more flattering.

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19725971-M.jpgI hope people are reading this thread too. This gal at one time was one of the hottest young fiddle players in the nation for the all girls act out of Nashville called Mustang Sally. She was very tan and had a ton of makeup on her face and in real life she looked a little sun basted (reddish) in the face. These two prints were sold to her and her mother and they just loved them as I even got an extra card in the mail thanking me on these two.

Yup, this one is not a fair skinned example. I have posted many of those as streetshots later in the thread. I say without being there when the shot was taken, a third party has no real clue as to what the actual skin color and skin tone was like and to him it is only a guess as to what the real tones are supposed to be. So the third party editor then sets up the image to colors and tones that he prefers and not to how the image or person really looked when the image was captured.

BTW, from the looks of it, a few people are following this thread.

Cheers

-don

[flyingpylon]

I hope others are reading this because I'm spending a lot of time not writing help sections to do this for a guy who doesn't order prints. :D

I'm reading, but it's a little confusing and I really want to see those help sections... I need help!


Note to self: Don't ever take pictures of people! Especially fair-skinned ones! :D

[Mitch]

Ok...I'm going to jump back in here.http://dgrin.com/images/smilies/icon10.gif

First I want to say...Your guy over at SM are awsomehttp://dgrin.com/images/smilies/clap.gif.

The new cart looks great and works as well as it looks, I've already ordered some prints. Among the prints I ordered was the 8X10 Calibration print, if your going to do something might as well try and do it right.

My monitor is calibrated, color space for any images destined to be uploaded to SM are in sRGB, and I download and installed the ICC for ezprint. So far so good.



Ok so what should I do with the ICC. I seem to remember SM removes the ICC from the .JPG file for the thumbnail (I believe). Should I still imbed the ezprint ICC into the .JPG file or is the ICC only for proofing?



Thanks





Mitch

[minoltaman]

Ok...I'm going to jump back in here.http://dgrin.com/images/smilies/icon10.gif
First I want to say...Your guy over at SM are awsomehttp://dgrin.com/images/smilies/clap.gif.

The new cart looks great and works as well as it looks, I've already ordered some prints. Among the prints I ordered was the 8X10 Calibration print, if your going to do something might as well try and do it right.

My monitor is calibrated, color space for any images destined to be uploaded to SM are in sRGB, and I download and installed the ICC for ezprint. So far so good.

Ok so what should I do with the ICC. I seem to remember SM removes the ICC from the .JPG file for the thumbnail (I believe). Should I still imbed the ezprint ICC into the .JPG file or is the ICC only for proofing?

Thanks


Mitch No don't embed it. Just use the ezprints profile to soft proof with and then convert the image to srgb and send it up and you will be good with one notable exception. Smugmug peeps (as do some other experts) say you should do some CMYK proof work on heavy fleshtone scenes to avoid nuking the faces. Other than that just use the exprints profile to soft proof with.

-don

[minoltaman]

I can't check this thread anymore today because stuff is piling up on my list, but you still have to explain why, it it were a white balance issue with the man Andy shot, your adjustment has skin so out of range.

The definition of white balance is the white is balanced, which it is. The T-shirt is white.

i2e also made the shirt white but didn't kill the skin:

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19725970-M.jpg

This thread has made a very compelling case for the dangers of true color.#1 First off I told you a few times already the monitor I used on the edit was whacked. I don't know why you keep referring to that example?
#2 the original is so far from a good capture that, well you know what I mean...auto does work on some images best, especially ones where you don't have clue as to where to start, some images are just are that bad
#3 YUp, I agree most people should not use true color, as one kink in the editing chain may cause major errors.
#4 I still don't have my ps box recalibrated again yet. I will take another editing wack at it later.
#5 I am no skintone guru by any means, I rely on the capture to get things right when it comes to people shots. I can do some editing on somethings but people are not my favorite by any means. Luckilly, I can usually print people shots straight up with no substantial edits, other than maybe a clone or a heal and a slight levels boost. I tend to underexpose things, so I am pretty used to my processes on this stuff. My point here is, with autocolor it is easy to get something in range, but it won't neccesarily be an accurate reflection of what reality was or what you or anyone else saw on that day.
#6 You have to remember that almost everyones monitor looks different calibrated or not. The key is to get the white balance/color temperature and exposure correct in the field and all of this editing stuff becomes mute. At least on properly expoosed natural light outdoor shots, that is.
#7 Again, true color isn't for everyone and someone who thinks it is may be might be asking for trouble. However, I say it is the best way to go about processing ones own images when done correctly.

-don

[Baldy]

Among the prints I ordered was the 8X10 Calibration print, if your going to do something might as well try and do it right.

My monitor is calibrated, color space for any images destined to be uploaded to SM are in sRGB, and I download and installed the ICC for ezprint. So far so good.Great, Mitch!

From the more-than-you-may-want-to-know department, here's a great reference on getting prints and monitors to match:

http://hutchcolor.com/PDF/Soft_Proofing_tips6.pdf

There are 3 big problems with doing it:

1. You're seeing reflected lights from the prints but transmitted from the monitor. Are your customers opening their prints at work (fluorescent = green), home (tungsten = yellow), or inside during the day (sunlight = more blue).

2. The monitor tends to look brighter, depending on the ambient light, because monitors are getting brigther all the time. At work, maybe not.

3. The words of death: "it looked good on my calibrated monitor."

A critical point is you can't calibrate your eyes. They are self-calibrating, meaning they remove color casts. Stare at a lone photo on your screen for 20 seconds and you lose the ability to see its color cast.

That's why I was placing photos side-by-side in the thread above.

Not so in a room where you view prints. You have your hands, other reference points, etc.

You quickly learn to ignore what people think they see on the monitor. It's what you measure with the eyedropper tool that matters.

But calibration prints have a massively useful function because it gives you a qualitative feel for how monitors translate into what a customer is really going to hold in their hands. Try as we'd like to make it an exact science, I'm afraid that understanding how people's eyes really work is far more important.

For example, on large prints they'll believe they are more saturated. It's the paint chip effect.

When their blood sugar's highest, they'll see the most vibrant colors.

Pinkish fair skinned caucasians don't want to look like they really are. They want to look like Indiana Jones.

It's a people business and just like the like certain poses and smiles which you quickly learn from experience, they have tastes in how they should look in print.

The normal tastes are undersharpened skin but sharp eyes and lips, possibly hair. Undersaturated skin.

More than you wanted to know? It's intersting to me, anyway, to check out pro galleries that do a high volume of print sales without returns. They tend to look like this:

http://erikolsenphotography.smugmug.com/gallery/124050/2/5217155/Large

[gus]

I had one of my shots printed directly onto canvas yesterday.. some type of printing machine handles the material ...just a thought if anyone at SM wanted to see the result i can take a shot of it & post it.

Looks great. Feels like an oil painting...quite hard to tell its not.

[Andy]

I had one of my shots printed directly onto canvas yesterday.. some type of printing machine handles the material ...just a thought if anyone at SM wanted to see the result i can take a shot of it & post it.

Looks great. Feels like an oil painting...quite hard to tell its not.

was it a velvet elvis?

http://www.velvetpaintings.com/Velvet/Elvis/ElvisRedTunicRedLite.jpeg

[gus]

was it a velvet elvis?


Didnt know elvis was a boxer ?

[Andy]

Didnt know elvis was a boxer ?

naw yer thinking of dogs playing poker:

http://www.pokercardgames.com/Dogs_Playing_Poker_Waterloo.gif

[minoltaman]

Many people are having good success printing to canvas, that's great.

Ok Baldy, I tweaked that junk monitor a bit and in a very quick minute or two came up with this. Top is andy's shot, your autofix is in the middle, and my edit on the bottom.

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689503-M.jpg
http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689507-M.jpg
http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/edit2.jpg

[Nikolai]

##2 & 3 are plain washed out...:-(

Again, I may not have a good monitor, but it does look washed out on all 4 I have access to (21" nokia crt, 20" dell WS LCD, two 19" ELOs).

Baldy's face may be less red, but at this point who cares about the skin if you can't see 25% of his face..:dunno

[onethumb]

Many people are having good success printing to canvas, that's great.

Ok Baldy, I tweaked that junk monitor a bit and in a very quick minute or two came up with this. Top is andy's shot, your autofix is in the middle, and my edit on the bottom.

http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689503-M.jpg
http://cmac.smugmug.com/photos/19689507-M.jpg
http://www.fixthingsnow.com/gallery1/albums/userpics/10001/edit2.jpg

I've found this thread to be vastly interesting, but I have some concerns about that bottom shot.

- the trees in the background are bright yellow, rather than green/yellow as they should be
- the skin tone looks like death warmed over.
- lots of detail loss in the background, entire trees are missing
- the black smugmug writing now looks green

Maybe there's some sort of colorspace mismatch going on or something? Certainly doesn't look well-calibrated from where I sit - Andy's version looks more accurate, even.

Don

[Andy]

I've found this thread to be vastly interesting, but I have some concerns about that bottom shot.

- the trees in the background are bright yellow, rather than green/yellow as they should be
- the skin tone looks like death warmed over.
- lots of detail loss in the background, entire trees are missing
- the black smugmug writing now looks green

Maybe there's some sort of colorspace mismatch going on or something? Certainly doesn't look well-calibrated from where I sit - Andy's version looks more accurate, even.

Don

the interesting part, is, the shot of "that man" is totally unprocessed... i dumped 'em off to you guys and that was that....

[minoltaman]

I've found this thread to be vastly interesting, but I have some concerns about that bottom shot.

- the trees in the background are bright yellow, rather than green/yellow as they should be
- the skin tone looks like death warmed over.
- lots of detail loss in the background, entire trees are missing
- the black smugmug writing now looks green

Maybe there's some sort of colorspace mismatch going on or something? Certainly doesn't look well-calibrated from where I sit - Andy's version looks more accurate, even.

DonI'll be back later.

Trees are not missing, they were quiclky removed as they were distracting as were other parts of the image. Andy's image is not even presentable as it is terrible as it is. Baldy's auto fix has bad shadow detail and the eyes look terrible. And no, the monitor is nort dead on. I'll be back....

[minoltaman]

##2 & 3 are plain washed out...:-(

Again, I may not have a good monitor, but it does look washed out on all 4 I have access to (21" nokia crt, 20" dell WS LCD, two 19" ELOs).

Baldy's face may be less red, but at this point who cares about the skin if you can't see 25% of his face..:dunno

Ouch, that means both Baldy's auto correct and my hack job...

interesting....

[Andy]

I'll be back later.

Trees are not missing, they were quiclky removed as they were distracting as were other parts of the image. Andy's image is not even presentable as it is terrible as it is.

well, smugmug tried to get you, but evidently you weren't available, so they settled for the "second-rate photographer..."

:nod

[onethumb]

the interesting part, is, the shot of "that man" is totally unprocessed... i dumped 'em off to you guys and that was that....

Yeah, it's been mentioned in this thread before, but let's be clear: Andy's an excellent photographer and truly excellent at color correction, too.

This is a completely unprocessed shot right of the camera, and thus, perfect for these comparisons and the near-infrared problem.

Don

[minoltaman]

Yeah, it's been mentioned in this thread before, but let's be clear: Andy's an excellent photographer and truly excellent at color correction, too.

This is a completely unprocessed shot right of the camera, and thus, perfect for these comparisons and the near-infrared problem.

DonI would like to see you prove this is a special case of a near-infrared problem. I'm betting it's not anything any more special than a regular old run-of-the-mill difficult exposure like some of us encounter every day.

It was just tough exposure for the camera/operator, and was improperly white balanced it looks like to me. I never, ever, have seen anything like this from my digitals when I am shooting outdoors and properly set-up. Properly balanced and reasonably exposed outdoor shots will not look like that example with any lens that I know of.

-don

[Mitch]

Note to self: Don't ever take pictures of people! Especially fair-skinned ones! :D I'm right there with you flyingpylonhttp://dgrin.com/images/smilies/15524779-Ti.gif

And to think this all started because I asked what I thought was a simple questionhttp://dgrin.com/images/smilies/lol8.gif

[minoltaman]

well, smugmug tried to get you, but evidently you weren't available, so they settled for the "second-rate photographer..."

:nod
Not me, I'm just a hack with an old point and shoot.

[Mitch]

Minoltaman,

Thanks for the info

Mitch

[minoltaman]

##2 & 3 are plain washed out...:-(

Again, I may not have a good monitor, but it does look washed out on all 4 I have access to (21" nokia crt, 20" dell WS LCD, two 19" ELOs).

Baldy's face may be less red, but at this point who cares about the skin if you can't see 25% of his face..:dunno
That means both Baldy's fancy autofix and my quick hack job...

Interesting, Nik.

Are you on a Mac?

-don

[Mitch]

From the more-than-you-may-want-to-know department, here's a great reference on getting prints and monitors to match:

http://hutchcolor.com/PDF/Soft_Proofing_tips6.pdf

There are 3 big problems with doing it:

1. You're seeing reflected lights from the prints but transmitted from the monitor. Are your customers opening their prints at work (fluorescent = green), home (tungsten = yellow), or inside during the day (sunlight = more blue).

2. The monitor tends to look brighter, depending on the ambient light, because monitors are getting brigther all the time. At work, maybe not.

3. The words of death: "it looked good on my calibrated monitor."

A critical point is you can't calibrate your eyes. They are self-calibrating, meaning they remove color casts. Stare at a lone photo on your screen for 20 seconds and you lose the ability to see its color cast.

That's why I was placing photos side-by-side in the thread above.

Not so in a room where you view prints. You have your hands, other reference points, etc.

You quickly learn to ignore what people think they see on the monitor. It's what you measure with the eyedropper tool that matters.

But calibration prints have a massively useful function because it gives you a qualitative feel for how monitors translate into what a customer is really going to hold in their hands. Try as we'd like to make it an exact science, I'm afraid that understanding how people's eyes really work is far more important.

For example, on large prints they'll believe they are more saturated. It's the paint chip effect.

When their blood sugar's highest, they'll see the most vibrant colors.

Pinkish fair skinned caucasians don't want to look like they really are. They want to look like Indiana Jones.

It's a people business and just like the like certain poses and smiles which you quickly learn from experience, they have tastes in how they should look in print.

The normal tastes are undersharpened skin but sharp eyes and lips, possibly hair. Undersaturated skin.

More than you wanted to know? It's intersting to me, anyway, to check out pro galleries that do a high volume of print sales without returns. They tend to look like this:

http://erikolsenphotography.smugmug.com/gallery/124050/2/5217155/Large
Thanks Baldy for the info. May be more than I want to know but I would bet it is something I may need to know. But I am having a little trouble with the link, will try again when I get home.

Most of the prints I have sold so far have been finished prints. I do understand most of the short falls of displaying images on the internet, so I am going to do all that has been suggested plus I will be purchasing a samplings of the images I post just so I can see what the purchaser will be getting.

Thanks again

Mitch

[minoltaman]

Minoltaman,

Thanks for the info

Mitch
No problem, Mitch. Some tough issues to tackle when you get technical about things. Good luck.

-don

[Nikolai]

That means both Baldy's fancy autofix and my quick hack job...

Interesting, Nik.

Are you on a Mac?

-don
I'm known locally as "da wintel zealot"..
Don't do macs, sorry..

[minoltaman]

I'm known locally as "da wintel zealot"..
Don't do macs, sorry..Kick me in the head then, oooops :): I still use 98se around here. :D

It sounded like a gamma setting issue to me. Those bottom two pix are light but not really, really washed out. I got mine a little lighter than I wanted to, but for the sake of quick fixes I did not redo. This also caused me to lose a bit of contrast and skintown that I could have had, but don't. I dont think many people are seeing those images as really washed out (other than the blown sky and a trace of forhead), but I could be wrong. And if they are, it would mean smugmug has a big problem with the new autocolor rig and I have a big problem here as well. The are just sorta low contrast on the 4 cheap rigs I have here. In my opinion neither correction is that good, but passable I suppose. It is strange that you are seeing them as completely blown out. Must be gamma, anyone else?? I assume you have a fairly good contrast/brightness setup?

Thanks

-don

[Nikolai]

Kick me in the head then, oooops :D I still use 98 all around. :uhoh

It sounded like a gamma setting issue to me. Those bottom two pix are light but not really washed out. I got mine a little lighter than I wanted to but for the sake of quick fixes I did not redo. This also caused me to lose a bit of contrast and skintown that I could have had but don't. I dont think many people are seeing those images as really washed out, but I could be wrong. There just sorta low contrast on the 4 cheap rigs I have here. In my opinion neither correction is that good, but passable I suppose. It is strange that you are seeing them as completely blown out. Must be gamma, anyone else?? I assume you have a fairly good contrast/brightness setup?

Thanks

-don
It's been discussed heavily here recently.. Safari/Mac honors ICC profiles, IE/Win ignores it and assumes sRGB.
My monitor setup is relatively fresh (bought it this January), so far I did not have any reason to think it's way off. And that print of yours that I did last nite came out pretty close to what I see on the LCD (as close as you can expect on a cheapo HP Deskjet 6800 and a plain paper:-), so I guess it's more-or-less OK..

[minoltaman]

It's been discussed heavily here recently.. Safari/Mac honors ICC profiles, IE/Win ignores it and assumes sRGB.
My monitor setup is relatively fresh (bought it this January), so far I did not have any reason to think it's way off. And that print of yours that I did last nite came out pretty close to what I see on the LCD (as close as you can expect on a cheapo HP Deskjet 6800 and a plain paper:-), so I guess it's more-or-less OK..Yeah, I know, I have been a part of some of it recently:

http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=9657

So what do you think it is? Especially if not many others report those pix as badly washed out?

-don

[ian408]

This has been a fascintationg thread.

Baldy, I very much appreciate your effort to educate. The reference
links you've provided throughout the thread are greate. I wish more
people would take a few moments and look at them.

Minoltaman, I'm surprised your computer equipment isn't up to snuff
calibration wise as well as from an OS perspective (I say this as
more modern versions of Windows are generally better at dealing with
color profiles and because you say you are a pro doing edit work, etc.
and I would imagine you'd want your edits to be as close to the final
print as possible.).

Ian

[Nikolai]

Yeah, I know, I have been a part of some of it recently:

http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=9657

So what do you think it is? Especially if not many others report those pix as badly washed out?

-don
I'm not a color expert:dunno . SM guys have WAY more expertise in that.
I just see it's overblown against the original image. Why - no clue...
Ask me about win32/win16/dos, I'll be much more helpful:-)

[ian408]

Are you saying you see a problem with the color on my own images that I have posted to this thread?
No, I never said that. Stop trying to change the context of my comments.



As far as using an old operating system I like it because I know exactly what it is going to do. I have accessed files through dos and I like that when needed. My stuff is running stable so I don't like to change. Plus I have thousands and thousands of dollars of software I have purchased that runs on 98. I have tons of freeware and shareware programs that run on 98. All of my systems run on 98 and I don't have to worry about any jacking around when I swap drives etc. I have the same platform on all of my systems. My network and firewall is like I want it so I keep it like that. I understand my system as it is and I think I want to keep it that way.
Easily understandable.



I have been dealing with color all of my life, as an electronic technician, television business, video camera business, satellite business, and the photography business. I have learned to trust my eyes to some degree as I have feel for color balance, hue, saturation, brightness, black levels, and contrast that some may have a hard time easily understanding. My camera makes excellent color shots so adjustments on color is something I very rarely have to do.

Baldy used ratios to express color correctness where as you're relying on
your eyes to achieve the same result.

There was a time when I would have agreed that your corrected image
looked better but I've learned to look for the subtle problems. Much like
onethumb's observation of the color of the trees in the background of
that guy's picture you corrected.

I have some experience in video editing and ENG as well. You may have
seen my work on a major sports network. I have also produced several
PSA like pieces for various employers.



Again, which of my own photos that I have posted here do you have a color problem with anyway? Now I am just a small time hack here but if you are in the Youngstown, Ohio you can stop by the Butler Museum of Art-Beecher Center and check my work on one of the video screens there. If you are in college you may cross a picture of mine in a textbook. I did get 6 million page views at one of my galleries last year, so a few people must think I do ok. Please point out some some specific problems you see with the color on my work and show me what you would do differently please.

Again, I never said anything about your photos. I wrote about
your process.

If I do make to Ohio this summer, I'd be happy to swing by the museum
and see your stuff.



And to conclude, I have no clue why you are attacking my operating system, but oh well. Now if you want to send me about 15 grand to upgrade my hardware and software to something newer, reinstall it all and debug it for me, come right on over, I won't stop you. But I certainly don't want to do a piecemeal upgrade. And yes, I do want my edits to look like my prints. That's why I am the colorfreak that I am. It's what this thread has been all about. Geesh

I asked the question about calibration and OS because of
your stated commitment to color and your comments to Baldy about
monitor calibration after your adjustments to that guy's picture.

You addressed the OS question with a valid reason why you're not willing
to change and I accept that. You've explained the calibration question
and I can accept that too. I may not agree with your position but I did
not attack you.

I think my questions were valid given the importance of color, color
profiles and printing. Don't you agree?

Ian