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Colour profiles and accuracy of display


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Apologies - I have placed this in the Beta forum - but it is probably still valid. I have set Publisher and Photo to identical values for colour management; as in this screenshot:

image.thumb.png.3501142865bf5935a381112341246a6c.png

This is the same as my default monitor profile. However, when I place a photo in Publisher (making cards) the image is much duller than the same image when it opens in Photo: the images have been pre-edited in Photo and then saved - so it is the Photo version of the image that I am placing in Publisher. I cannot pass the placed image back to Photo for tweaking (the facility is offered but does not yet work) - and if I simply use copy and paste,  the same problem occurs (essentially, colour temperature, saturation and sharpening level are not the same when viewing the same image in the two programs).

I have managed to tweak output colour profiles so that the screen image is close to the printer image but I would like Publisher and Photo to display the same image identically.

As you can see, I am no expert on colour management - I feel that I am rather blundering around. Any help gratefully received.

Bart

 

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"Duller" implies that the document color formats may be different. E.g, in Photo perhaps your document is RGB/8 but in Publisher perhaps it is CMYK/8.

 

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
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Thanks - but the colour profile for the document was the same as the program default - that is, the same as in the screenshot I supplied. I did some test prints yesterday, and they are as disappointing as I feared: sharp and well saturated screen images printed dull and rather washed out. Interestingly, the output improves (though not to the level I require) if I set the printer to manage colour output (as opposed to leaving this to Publisher).

It's almost as if Publisher is using the wrong lookup table to populate the parameters for colour values (I am betraying my background in relational databasing where tying functions to the wrong lookup table necessarily results in wrong values being passed to a parameter). If I set the rgb colour parameter to the correct paper type (Epson Presentation matte), the screen colours become very dark and, as I mentioned, I cannot edit them...In PagePlus the effect of setting this value is much gentler (and more accurate) - and the image can be tweaked from within the program. In brief, in PagePlus what I see is what I get. Crucially, the printed image is almost indistinguishable from the screen image - setting the paper type to determine screen representation of the colour model is the best solution (for me).

Like many PagePlus users, I am waiting for the day when a Windows 'upgrade' renders the program finally unusable but, until that day happens, PagePlus is more useful than Affinity Publisher in certain respects (though I freely admit that I know PagePlus much better than I know Publisher - my ignorance could well be the real problem - please correct me!). I will persevere with Affinity Publisher because I know that I must - but it is rather dispiriting when hard work will not print accurately and when in-program image-tweaking is imossible.

Bart

 

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Hi @Bartholomew,

Are you working in CMYK or RGB? 

Regardless, you're using the wrong ICC profile. You should not be using a document profile (Epson RGB) as your Display Profile. I suggest you change your display profile to sRGB, or if you have access to, use a colour calibration device to get a proper ICC profile. 

https://affinityspotlight.com/article/designing-for-professional-printing/

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