Re: Printing of photography
Re: Printing of photography
- Subject: Re: Printing of photography
- From: Ken Fleisher <email@hidden>
- Date: Mon, 20 Dec 2010 10:09:50 -0500
On Mon, Dec 20, 2010 at 9:18 AM, David Ramsey
<email@hidden> wrote:
>
> 2 questions;
>
> 1) I am getting ready to photograph some works on paper for a museum and I
> was asked about including "color bars" in the photos. Because of the nature
> of the materials used in these works I have to adjust specific colors as we
> shoot (Color managed workflow and calibrated display). Colors are adjusted
> individually, for example, purples may go towards blue reds towards magenta.
> So if I place color bars in the frame and will this not create havoc down
> the line since I am moving individual colors around? Also which color bars
> should I use if they are to be included?
I do not recommend including a color target when photographing artwork
for reproduction for the following reasons:
1. The camera's spectral sensitivities are different from a human's.
Because of this, the differences in the material on a color target and
the artwork can result in "observer" metamerism. (i.e. getting the
color of the target correct does not imply that the color of the
artwork is correct.)
2. Because of observer metamerism, the color target is not a reliable
indicator of an accurate color capture of the artwork.
3. As you describe, if you make color edits to the image to make the
artwork correct, the colors on the target can no longer be used as a
reference of any sort, since those colors will necessarily be moved as
well.
4. Trying to match the colorimetry of target colors all the way to the
printed page is an incorrect goal anyhow. If you do this, your
reproductions might be colorimetrically correct (if you are lucky),
but will likely appear dark and flat. Instead, you must try to match
the color appearance, which usually involves opening up the image and
increasing contrast (many perceptual rendering intents achieve this
for us when printing, but not so for image capture).
I recently spoke on this very topic at "Currentl Practices in Fine Art
Reproduction" which was a symposium at the Rochester Institute of
Technology. You can view a video of the talk at
<http://tinyurl.com/3x5rv6v>. This was a panel discussion on
target-based workflows and my part begins at 29 minutes into the video
(though you may find the entire panel interesting…).
Ken Fleisher
Color Scientist
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
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