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Why not activate a soft proof layer from the get-go?


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Hi everyone,

I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea of soft proofing, or, rather, I feel like I'm missing some obscure nuance on it.

I've read all of Affinity Photo's help files and watched all its videos AND spent hours bouncing around the web trying to come to grips with the subject.

But here's the thing: as near as I can determine, soft proofing is always presented as something that you do after having processed the photo to what you want it to look like. So, by definition you're telling yourself, "all right! That's what I want my print to look like. Let's soft proof it... uuuhh, no, that's not it".

Should this not be the other way around?

That is, if your goal is to print a photo, shouldn't the very first adjustment layer be the soft proof adjustment layer, with the pertinent icc file and rendering intent chosen, and THEN you do all your other adjustments on top of that to get the photo how you want it to look?

Also, let's say that you can do things in that order; when I'm done with all the other various adjustments, should i still deactivate the soft proof layer before sending the photo to the printer?

I thank you all in advance for any light that you can shed on this subject.

Happy post-processing to all!

 

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7 minutes ago, Kerwin said:

should i still deactivate the soft proof layer before sending the photo to the printer?

Yes, you would still deactivate the soft-proof layer before sending the file to the printer. Otherwise, there are adjustments (e.g., the printer profile) that will be applied twice, and will therefore give incorrect results.

-- Walt
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Hi Kerwin :)

Most users tend to use soft proofing after applying edits, as far as I am aware this is usually done in this order so that you can edit your original image until you are happy with it, duplicate the file, then use soft proofing set to the correct profile and edit the copy to visually match to the original as possible.

I've had a quick look online and I can't see any users who apply soft proofing before applying their edits. Provided it is disabled before being sent to print, I cannot see an issue with this workflow, but I'm more than happy to be corrected if this is not the case as I've not had to use the feature for any professional printing projects personally! (alliteration is key B|)

Please Note: I am now out of the office until Tuesday 2nd April on annual leave.

If you require urgent assistance, please create a new thread and a member of our team will be sure to assist asap.

Many thanks :)

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4 hours ago, Kerwin said:

Hi everyone,

I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea of soft proofing, or, rather, I feel like I'm missing some obscure nuance on it.

All soft proofing does is temporarily adjust the image you see so that it matches the final print better. If you did it from the beginning, you permanently alter the image.

Soft proofing compensates for the fact that you monitor cannot match the output from a professional printer. Lots of reasons for that.

However, because the soft proofing layer matches by distorting the colours in your image, you do not want to send the distorted image to be printed. 

e.g. if your monitor made the image on your screen look too blue. a soft proof layer would reduce the blue in the image so that it looked better (less blue). But, because the soft proof layer has removed blue from the image, if you sent the altered image to the printer, there would not be enough blue in the image any more. So turn the layer off.

As I said, it is purely a temporary method of adjusting what you see locally. 

Windows PCs. Photo and Designer, latest non-beta versions.

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Hi to all and just a post to say thanks to all those who responded!

So the take home message:

  • adding the soft proof layer is usually done after, but can de done at the start as long as...
  • it stays on the TOP of the stack...
  • and one remembers to deactivate it BEFORE sending the file to the printer

Again, thanks for helping me see all that more clearly and à bientôt!

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