Pro-100 Driver now up to date

[mikling]

I have been using the Pro-100 all day making profiles to fully support the inkset.
I discovered that the Pro-100 print driver is now very nice. In addition to the Quick Setup that allows the viewing of print settings at a glance, Canon now allows the use of custom ICC profiles from directly inside the driver. In the past this is something that Epson provided that Canon did not.

GREAT NEWS for those who don't own fancy software.

The significance of this is even if you do not own better photo editors that supports color management like Photoshop, Lightroom, Aperture Photoshop Elements and print managers like Qimage, you can now use the Pro-100 and use custom ICC profiles with ANY standard photoeditors. Even free ones. Canon does one better and can automatically adjust for the embedded color space. Epson's the last time I looked could not do that. So even if you want to use color management on that cute card program, you can do so.

So now can own and use and have high performance printing and not have to own expensive software to go with it.

As best as I can tell it renders colors identical to the Qimage which renders identically to the Adobe engine.

This is significant and few have even noticed this aspect.

I will post instructions on how to do this. It is simpler to use than the Epson driver.

 

[mikling]

http://www.precisioncolors.com/Using EZ Custom ICCs with Canon Pro-100.pdf

 

[The Hat]

http://www.precisioncolors.com/Using EZ Custom ICCs with Canon Pro-100.pdf

Nice one Mike..

 

[borichka]

Hi Mikling,

Thanks for the guide. What happens if I print prophoto image and choose AdobeRGB as input profile in the Canon driver (there is no ProPhoto option)?
It seems this is the only way I can print with correct colors from Lightroom: I tried specifying the ICC profile in Lightroom and disabling ICM in canon driver, but the result was very bad.
Pro-100 + original ink + Epson paper + ColorMunki photo generated profile.

Thank you in advance.

 

[ThrillaMozilla]

Very nice and helpful. Thanks, Mikling.

This helps to straighten out a huge mess at the application level. I haven't tried to implement any of this, and have barely scratched the surface with profiles, but I thought color management is also (and ideally?) handled at the OS level:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_management#Operating_system_level
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_color_management

It looks to me like we have color management in three conflicting places (OS, driver, and application), for three devices (image acquisition, viewing, and printing), for a variety of conditions (different paper, monitor settings, target viewing conditions). Then there is the additional complication of choosing the color space. It still looks to me like an impenetrable mess, which could be clear enough if it were handled in a clear and consistent way (which apparently is asking too much of the software industry). The driver settings have got to be a big advance, but I'm still a little confused. Perhaps the driver settings substitute for the OS settings (assuming there are some?)?

Perhaps I simply haven't gotten into it enough yet, but any attempt to clarify my foggy thinking would be greatly appreciated.

 

[mikling]

Hi Mikling,

Thanks for the guide. What happens if I print prophoto image and choose AdobeRGB as input profile in the Canon driver (there is no ProPhoto option)?
It seems this is the only way I can print with correct colors from Lightroom: I tried specifying the ICC profile in Lightroom and disabling ICM in canon driver, but the result was very bad.
Pro-100 + original ink + Epson paper + ColorMunki photo generated profile.

Thank you in advance.

If you print throught Lightroom, you do not select the EZ method I showed. This is wrong. Let lightroom do the color management. I suspect you are not using a proper setting in the driver or maybe the profile was generated without the proper settings. Another way is to export image to a file with AdobeRGB as the color space. Then use a photoeditor that has display color management and then print through that. For testing, I would export to an sRGB space and then I can use ANY photoeditor and still achieve reasonably good results.

Don't mess with AdobeRGB and other color spaces until you get sRGB down pat first. Thereafter you can explore and see what those other spaces will yield. For most people...very little actually except for the headaches when a setting is missed.

 

[mikling]

It's not an impenetrable mess, well it is, if you become finicky. The display and print is sufficient. The acquisition is important in scanners if you are looking for serious results. For a camera, if the display is correct, the camera errors can be adjusted on the display.

What i will point out is that Color management is not the same as color correction as many many are mistakenly led to believe. Focus on the word "management". This really is a set of procedures that will allow you to gain control of the color output..not necessarily correct it. It will correct a large portion of it as a byproduct. So for example, suppose you had a printer that contained NO magenta ink what so ever. You can create a printer profile with it, despite the missing color, and things printed will be in error and the process is 100% color managed. What the management process allows is that you'd be able to VIEW the output without the magenta in the printer before you print it. So with color management, we are able to "control" the color that will be outputted. This is an important point. Many think that color management will magically fix all printer errors in color. Once you grasp this aspect, then you'll see why ideally you'll need to have as good a monitor as possible that is calibrated so that you can properly see what the output will look like...warts and all. So you see, the output will look horrible but 100% color correct.

 

[ThrillaMozilla]

Thanks, Mikling. I suppose the question was too complicated anyway. I just note that there are very many settings in very many places, and getting any one of them wrong can mess up the prints. If one can simplify everything correctly to one or two places, then everything should be all right.

 

[mikling]

Actually, what was I thinking? You can use the EZ method I outlined as well because I did test the Prophoto rendering within the Canon driver and it is fine. If your results do not come out properly, it is likely that a mistake was made when generating the targets that was measured. It is important to reuse the same setting that created the color samples when printing an image with the profile. The only difference is that when the ICC is used, you have to insert it somewhere in the chain.

It appears that the results you obtained has an error causing you to compensate by doing things are errors themselves like mixing color spaces in the hope it will self correct. You might get something closer but it is still wrong. Rewind and replay and go through step by step in the creation of your profile with your hardware.

 

[borichka]

Thank you for your help Mikling. I started from Canon Photo paper pro glossy II and Canon ICC profiles to verify LR print module: first I printed from LR using "managed by printer" method + Auto settings in driver, got acceptable results with minor color cast. Then printed from LR using GL/PP 1/2 profile and disabled color management in canon driver - got perfect print (PrinterEvaluationImage_V002_ProPhoto.tiff). Then by accident I selected media type "Semigloss photo paper" in the driver and it seemed affected the image even I disabled color management!
If I'm using external profile and disabled ICM in the driver, how exactly media type works in the driver?
When I printed the first color chart from Colormunki application, I selected "Other glossy paper" while printing on Epson Semigloss. I think this is the problem, but what media type should I use? There is no Epson papers in Canon driver