Calibrating to correct brightness on MacBook Pro

[john_sarsgard1]

I'm tired of my prints always being darker than the image on my MacBook pro screen, and having to trial

and error correct. So am trying to find and examine all the subleties that might be the culprit. yeah, I

know, I really need an external display for critical color work. But the laptop screen, properly calibrated,

ought to at least get me about there, neither too light or too dark. I am using PS CS, epson paper and ink,

and the epson supplied profiles. My current theory is that the laptop lcd display is just too bright. But

maybe I'm wrong.

 

When I calibrate the laptop monitor with my eye-one, it doesn't seem to matter what luminance level I

calibrate to. When eye-one asks me to "match" the screen brightness with the on screen dohickey, I play

with the brightness on the keyboard but none of the dohickeys move at all.

 

Am I on the right track with the screen brightness being the culprit? Any other theories? this happens

with multiple printers, including a new 3800 with epson profiles and an ancient 2000p with custom

profile.

 

Insights gratefully appreciated! John

[shawn_oates]

It sounds like your having the same type of problem as me. My prints have been coming out darker then what is on screen as well. I have noticed something else to though. When I export a project from photoshop and view it in preview, it looks like the print. It has something to do with the color profiles in photoshop and in os x. When you first open the file in preview it will look like photoshop, but after that second, it switches over and it becomes dark. If you find anything out let me know. I'll do the same. It's affecting my job at this point and I need to figure this out.

[J.W. Wall]

The technical head of a college photo lab told me last week that Epson printers just print darker than the screen, period.

[deozmac]

Guys - I have the same problem, although I do very little printing. I post lots of images here on PN and when I occasionally check them on a PC browser, I find the same darkening. I use a Huey colour reference calibration device.

[shawn_oates]

Well, I basically figured it out over the past few days talking to old teachers, friends in the field, and playing around. I read a lot about color management and decided it was time to buy the spyder3 elite when it comes out, actually today.

 

Your never going to get the exact colors on paper as on your screen, a few factors are involved, but the bottom line is, it's not gonna happen. Steps to get the color the closest would be:

Get a screen calibrator, make sure you use it in advanced mode!

 

Buy a Pantone bridge, or book, and use it WHILE your designing.

 

Choose your colors directly from the Pantone book and input the colors manually in the color pallet in photoshop.

*Even with your screen calibrated, the colors are not going to look dead on, but when you send your stuff out for printing, you will get back near perfect color results comparing to the Pantone book.

 

You can go through photoshop and further set options to see what your final project is going to look like by going to view>proofing>custom. In there go and set what color profile your going to use, and click "simulate black" and watch what happens to the dark tones. You can also check to see if your colors are out of gamut by going to view>gamut warning. You will notice that some colors might get dull, those are the colors out of printing range and should be changed.

 

I have learned a lot in the past few days working at this problem. Apparently it happens to every designer and you just need to work through it at one point. I hope this information helps out people that are in the same situation I was in.

 

As for someones comment on viewing your work on someone elses monitor: because yours is calibrated, its going to look better. Your gamma setting along with your color saturation and levels are near perfect using a calibrator, it's going to look real good on yours. You can't help the fact that a lot of people are not going to have their screens perfect. Most of the time your work will look darker on other peoples monitors.