Monitor Calibration

[PaulW]

Hi
Yes, I have always had to add between 20 to 40% when making prints, but I shouldn't have to should I ? I have also always has problems with getting prints made, they come back to dark. My monitor is a Dell ST2420L 24" (Digital), and I always use custom paper profile in LR4. I am a bit puzzled, I had hoped the calibration tool would solve these issues.
Paul

[Mike Farley]

The calibration tool will certainly help and it looks as though your monitor is now set to the correct brightness and contrast levels, but that alone will not fix the fundamental issue with printing which will be unaffected by any changes to the monitor settings. The obvious question is whether your images are too dark to start with. Do you use levels to assess exposure or do you do it by eye?

[PaulW]

Hi
I had reduced the brightness on my monitor, to 40/75 because it was painfully to bright to view for any length of time. I only use my sight for the brightness as I only use LR4 for processing and printing the raw files. But this must be ok, because they are correct or sometimes a bit to bright for the DPI comps.
Paul

[Mike Farley]

If you are adjusting exposure by eye on an incorrectly adjusted monitor then you will not get an accurate result, which is why your images are coming out too dark without being adjusted at the printing stage. Do you know how to use Levels?

[PaulW]

Hi
Levels doesn't exist in LR4 only ToneCurve, I always try and get the histogram balanced, so it is not clipping on blacks or whites. I have now re-calibrated the monitor at 5800K instead of the recommended 6800K, and the analyser is reporting 96% of sRGB, this has allowed the brightness to be reduced to 42/75. I will do a print later and see if that is the difference.
Paul

[PaulW]

Hi
I have tried an experiment, if I print from LR4 without any print adjustment, then view my image with the free Epson software it is as dark as the LR4 or CS5 print. Maybe this is why they give you the ability to adjust contrast and brightness on the print module.
If there was a problem with my monitor the images would be no good for the DPI comps, the only problem with the DPI's has been colour, greens and blues. I have also re-calibrated again, with the same results.
Paul

[Mike Farley]

Paul

You should not be getting these problems. You say that you are "viewing prints with your free Epson software", which makes no sense to me. Are you referring to the preview option in the print driver? If so, it will not be correct as Lightroom will have applied the adjustments specified by the print profile and the image will look radically different. The only way to tell is to produce a print and then compare it against what is on the monitor.

I'll send you a PM with my e-mail address so that you can send me one of your problem images, if you wish. That way I can see how they appear on my own system.

[PaulW]

Hi
That maybe difficult, as I am printing straight from Raw (70MB), I don't do jpg's except in low res for DPI comps. As this happens in CS5 as well as LR4, and has always been like this in LR, even when I was using my laptop. I think I will just be satisfied with the colour correction and just use the LR4 print module adjustments for my prints. Many thanks for your assistance.
Paul

[Mike Farley]

OK, although I remain firmly of the view that there is a fundamental issue somewhere in your workflow which might have an adverse impact on the technical quality of your images due to the amount of adjustment you are having to apply when printing. All I am looking for is a processed file exported as a JPEG out of LR so that I can get a better idea of what is happening, but it's your call.

[PaulW]

Hi
I would like to thank you very much for your efforts in trying to solve this issue, but I think I have slightly mis-communicated my problem. It is not how dark my image is, that can be solved, it's that no matter how bright or dark the image is on the screen it will print 30% darker, if you compare the print with the image on the screen. So I have to increase the print adjustment brightness slider by 30%.
Paul