Color correcting by numbers for giclee printing

Color correcting by numbers for giclee and other digital printing methods

Color correcting images on screen for digital output is one of the most problematic issues in digital imaging. What was a task left to pre-press professionals in the past and something of no concern with the general public using film cameras, has now become a must for anyone using a digital camera. Over the years there have been a number of companies offering color calibration hardware and software to match what is seen on screen to the actual printout. Soft proofing (the ability to see an image on the monitor and being able to make a pretty good judgment about how it is going to look when printed) is definitely of big help.

This said, the only sure way to be able to precisely color correct is done by numbers. To make a comparison, take a pilot for example: when visibility is low pilots rely on what the instruments say to navigate. No matter if it is day or night, they can navigate without having to see where they are and where they are going.

The same can be applied to color correction. Depending on a monitor to apply color changes, especially when subtle modifications need to be made, is not the best way. All computer screens shift in color from the moment they are turned on. Numbers do not change.

Photoshop makes it very easy to see what the color measurements are for any given area in an image. The eye picker will read the quantity of red, green and blue when passed over the chosen area. For the purpose of this article we will stay with the RGB primary color space. When looking at a pure black the reading will be R=0, B=0, G=0. A pure white will be R=255, B=255, G=255, 255 being the maximum amount in the scale. What is between pure white and pure black' Grey, which can be any equal amount of these 3 colors, would be for example 122, 122, 122. A lighter grey is 180, 180, 180.

Why is this important' Simply put, very! Let' s go into something practical: You are working on a picture of your toddler taken with that high-resolution camera you got for Christmas. It looks good on the screen but when printed the skin tones make your child look like he is blushing under 110 F heat. When going over the skin with the picker the reading is R=200, G=140, B=139. Immediately the red reading of 200 pops out as a lot compared to the fairly equal and lesser quantities of green and blue. Without looking at a proof you can see how that skin will be primarily red. It is OK for skin tones to have a mix of colors and for a Caucasian complexion to have a higher level of red. A difference of about 60 between red and the other two primaries may be excessive. Also, a warm skin tone requires a little bit of yellow to be present. In our case the initial reading for B and G is about equal, meaning they neutralize each other and make the red stand out as the preponderant color. To add a little yellow we need to decrease the blue (Blue and Yellow are opposites). In this case a good mix for such skin tone could be R=190, G=140, B=130.