Color Management all the more important when having supply issues

It's no secret that many in the print industry are having problems getting and maintaining stocks of substrate material. Recent surveys show that the industry expects the situation to get worse in coming months. If this hasn't happened to you yet, it probably will! When you have different substrates being pulled from irregular sources, this is a good recipe for color inconsistency and other headaches. This is fair warning to bone up on your profile building. Modern profiling systems do an excellent job of creating profiles that make the most of your print / media /ink gamut. You might be able to profile an inferior grade of paper to look similarly to your regular paper.

What even more important, a good modern profile will accurately portray your color workflow. When it comes time to make one printer look like another printer, that's when you need particularly accurate profiles to pull this off.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention as well that a system of tracking color consistency over time is a life-safer in these unsettled times. We have had Maxwell customers who have successfully kept their supplier's feet to the fire as it were, as Maxwell provided proof that the purchased paper showed a change in quality. Contact us for information about an easy and inexpensive way to start tracking your color, and get started now - before things get busy and before trouble comes.

Color Management conference is ON!

The Color Management Conference put on by Printing United Alliance is full speed ahead this year. This annual (until last year) conference is going to be at La Jolla just North of San Diego - a welcome location in January after a wild winter in North America.

I am happy to be presenting a new session at the conference. Following up on the fun we had last time we met (below) - this year my session is on the Secrets of Color Management. 

January 22 - 25th, 2022

https://color.printing.org

Color Ready 2021

Printing United Alliance is offering a virtual conference coming up Jun 9th and 10th, 2021, called Color Ready!

https://www.printing.org/events/color-ready-2021

This makes for a great substitute for the annual color conference, normally in San Diego.  Instead of sitting in an actual conference hall listening to a speaker for an hour, these sessions are concisely limited to 20 minutes and feature some of the best color geeks in the business.

Steve Upton is talking on "Calibration: It's 90% of Color Management Success."

I am presenting a session on day two for "Assessing and Verifying Profiles."  Perhaps I have missed the enjoyment of presenting and interacting with color people more than I thought over the past year.  I think all of my pent-up presenting comes out in this session!  I know I made a point of making it interesting.

Here's a riddle for you… How will this old, green, electric blanket be used in my presentation to verify profiles?

https://www.printing.org/events/color-ready-2021

Happy Birthday, CHROMiX!

CHROMiX celebrated 20 years as a company by hosting a taste of birthday cake for everyone at the color management conference in San Diego earlier this month.  For those who have never been to this conference, consider going next year - as it's a smaller, more intimate setting where you can learn more about how to improve the color in the print room, the camera, or the display on your desktop.   

Twenty years is actually a long time for a company to be around in the digital color world.  Back when the company started, the Indigo printer was still owned by Benny Landa (before HP), the Apple Studio Display was one of the first LCD displays (a whopping 15") for $1999, and Nikon made a 2.7 megapixel camera that sold for almost $6000!  We have seen a lot of development of the industry over the years and are happy to have had a hand it in.

Profiling Secrets revealed!

Steve Upton, Pat Herold and Rick Hatmaker are gearing up to head to the PIA Color Conference 2019 in San Diego coming up in January 12th to 15th.  Pat will be presenting a session on how to make great profiles. Steve has a couple of sessions on verification & troubleshooting inkjet output, as well as analysis of expanded gamut printing.

CHROMiX will also be providing a 20th Year Birthday Cake during the 3:20 pm afternoon break on Monday the 14th. Come join us if you can!

Last year was a surprisingly great conference in the new location with a lot of new people.   This year promises to be even better!

Color 2019 is back with more than 35 in-depth sessions, featuring four tracks, including Brand & Design, Print Production How-to's, Wide Format Inkjet, and Standards & Research. Whether you're a creative, brand professional, production specialist, or a color management expert, there will be sessions that are well-matched for you at this year's conference. Color 2019 is where you'll find the best, most practical and in-depth information from the best minds in color—and gain knowledge that will strengthen your competitive edge.

Visit www.printing.org/color for more information!

Award-Winning Curve4

 We have just learned that Curve4 has won a software design award!  The Xojo design awards for 2018 have just been announced at the Xojo Developer's Conference in Denver.  The report is that judging the winners was not easy because of a large number of great entries.

Curve4 received the award for Best Specialty App for 2018!

All of you who marvel at the complex calculations and the powerful new features in Curve4, even while the user interface is easy and intuitive - well... you're not the only ones to be impressed.

Color Management in the Cloud

Steve Upton is interviewed by Cary Sherburne of What They Think on how Maxwell is being used to monitor color within companies and around the world.  He describes how Shutterfly is using the Maxwell solution in photobook printing.

How can you describe all that Maxwell can do in only 3 minutes!?

http://whattheythink.com/video/84193-blending-cloud-services-color-management-increased-efficiency/

Looking forward to Color Conference in December!

December 6th - 9th, 2014 - The 2014 Color Conference presented by the Printing Industries of America, the conference will be at the Hilton Scottsdale Resort and Villas, Scottsdale, AZ and is always a favorite stop for CHROMiX to end the year colorfully. Please come on by our booth and say hello to Rick, or attend one of Steve's or Pat's sessions. We'll look forward to seeing you there!

Upgrading to Mavericks?

With the announcement by Apple of their new operating system Mavericks (OS 10.9) - and especially because it's free - and available for upgrade from many older OS's.... it's time to issue our customary warning about upgrading.

We always recommend that people hold off for at least a few days or weeks before upgrading to any new OS release. That just gives some time for the app developers to see what's happening in the final OS release and then come out with an update of their app.

It is tempting to think that since app developers would have access to beta versions of the OS, they should be able to update their software as soon as the OS update comes out. In practice we find that this does not happen in this color management industry. I know of some companies who make a policy of never updating their software until the final release of any new OS update - specifically because they have been burned in the past by (unannounced) last minute changes by Apple.

Concerning CHROMiX software products on Mavericks, we have found no problems.

But for other software, be cautious before you leap, listen to the scuttlebutt around the forums, find out how others are making out on the new OS, see if your favorite apps have updates to handle the new OS, and then make the jump when the water's safe.

Update: X-Rite has found that their XRD software requires an update for compatibility with Mavericks.

You can find out more from this page.

Cadbury loses legal fight over use of colour purple

This is an interesting example of the color trademarking activities we've mentioned in lectures and newsletter articles before.

It appears that both Cadbury and Nestle want to be able to use the color purple for selling candy.

From the color geek point of view it's interesting to note that:

a) the color was specified as Pantone 2865c and
b) Cadbury lost because their "formulation does not comply with the requirements for trademark registration"

Presumably that's color formulation and not chocolate...

Apparently the judge thought that "To allow a registration so lacking in specificity, clarity and precision of visual appearance would offend against the principle of certainty"

I wonder if specifying the color in CIELab would have helped?

We were alerted to the story on the BBC News website but there's a bit more detail on the WSJ website

ICC version 4.3

The International Color Consortium has just released version 4.3 of the ICC specification today.

Information at the ICC website is here:

http://www.color.org/icc_specs2.xalter

We will be looking into what changes are included in this new version, and reporting on it.  New profiles are often a consequence of a new specification like this, but there is no word about when new profiles will be forthcoming.

i1Profiler is still almost here

The latest report from X-Rite is that the new i1Profiler products are expected to begin shipping around the end of January, 2011.

i1Profiler is almost here

X-Rite is almost ready to release their new i1Profiler software. There has been some confusion over what prices and paths will be available for upgrading.

To make it simple, there are only 3 options to consider for people upgrading:

• i1 Publish New Full (Software Only) $999 This version will be necessary for PMv4.x, MPv3.x, and Stand Alone iSis users

• i1Profiler UPGRADE 'B' for i1Basic Pro, i1Basic, i1Design LT, i1Photo LT, i1Pro OEM $899

• i1Profiler UPGRADE 'A' for ANY full version of ProfileMaker v5, All Monaco Profiler 4.x versions, i1Photo Pro, i1Photo, i1Photo SG, i1Proof, i1XT, i1XTreme $499

X-Rite is not taking away or overwriting any existing i1Pro, i1Match, ProfileMaker or Monaco Profiler dongles. Users get to continue using their legacy solutions if desired. However, X-Rite will probably verify that the original dongle is legitimate, and eligible for upgrade.

Dongle Upgrades, and other notes:
X-Rite will upgrade an i1Pro or ProfileMaker dongle through the i1Profiler software interface. Users will purchase either Upgrade A or Upgrade B as applicable, and when they receive the upgrade, the box will include an activation code . X-Rite will not use the existing upgrade paths in i1Diagnostics or License Tool.

MonacoPROFILER users will have to call an X-Rite Service Center, where X-Rite will verify that their existing dongle is valid. They will then receive their new i1Publish dongle by mail within 5 business days.

As of Friday Nov. 5, X-Rite has confirmed the above information is correct and reflects their new policies. We will post any new or relevant information here as soon as it is confirmed or is official from X-Rite.

Link to the i1Profiler product page:
http://www2.chromix.com/colorgear/shop/productdetail.cxsa?toolid=50136&pid=10449

Thanks to Rick Hatmaker of CHROMiX for tracking down this information.

New Epson 4900 gets 98% Pantone gamut

Recently announced at Photokina in Germany, the Epson Stylus Pro 4900 has just been launched in the United Kingdom. Apparently it uses 11 UltraChrome HDR inks to provide a gamut that encompases 98% of the Pantone colors. This is pretty impressive. Designers are often wondering why the printer can't match the color they are looking for, and the answer is that it is hard to do! Pantone presses will run up to 16 different inks on press in order to produce all the colors in the Pantone books - that's how wide a gamut these colors encompass. To get this kind of gamut in a single printer would be impressive indeed.
http://www.epson.co.uk/Printers-and-All-In-Ones/Large-Format/Epson-Stylus-Pro-4900

Also announced are the new Stylus Pro 7890 and 9890:
http://www.photographyblog.com/news/epson_stylus_pro_9890_and_7890/

X-Rite standard for Graphic Arts

X-Rite announces a new graphic arts standard called "XRGA".

Since the merger between GretagMacBeth and X-Rite, the company has maintained the original products in the product lines pretty much as they were. For the pressroom, X-Rite continued producing the X-Rite 530, 938, 939 and the GretagMacbeth SpectroEye, and the i1Pro, etc.

However, each of these two camps of instruments was designed with slightly different calibration standards, and there were enough differences between the two types of instruments that there would be discrepancies when trying to compare the same colors measured using different instruments. To solve this, X-Rite has come up with a matrix of transformation calculations that can be used so that the output from these different instruments will be much more in alignment with each other and provide inter-model agreement. This new standard is called "XRGA".

They are rolling this out in new instruments starting in September 2010. For customers using existing instruments, X-Rite will make available firmware and software updates free of charge to allow your instrument to output the new XRGA standard measurements. This applies to currently-sold instruments only - they will not support instruments that have been discontinued.

In addition, there will be a new version of Colorport (version 2.0) available in or after October, 2010, which will allow you to save data from any of these instruments in either the XRGA standard or the original measurement response.

I have to note also, that the discrepancies we're talking about here are (depending on your perspective) not too large. We're talking about delta E differences of between .6 ∆E to 1.6 ∆E (dE76) or so.

This provides a needed correction for anyone using multiple spectro's. It is unfortunate that X-Rite's testing and the XRGA standard does not cover the iSis chart reader. Since the release of Rev E of the iSis, customers have reported a significant change in the calibration white point of this new rev of the instrument and it would have been good to have a means of making legacy versions of the iSis consistent with the new Rev E version.

We hope to see more from X-Rite on this in the future.

For more information on XRGA see the X-Rite webpage:

http://www.xrite.com/XRGA

USB 3.0 Explained

Here's a great write up of the new version of the Universal Serial Bus standard: USB 3.0. This new version of USB will enable much faster transfer of information - to the tune of about 5 gigabytes per second. This is 10 times faster than USB 2.0. Right now you can buy adapter cards and cables to enable this on your computer, and there are a few external hard drives that are available. In the near future, computers will come with USB 3.0 built in. This is backwards compatible, so you can continue to use your current USB devices on the new systems with no problems. If you start seeing USB cables and jacks with a blue plastic inside - that's 3.0!

This is a very understandable overview and it does not take too long to read:

http://www.datapro.net/techinfo/usb_3_explained.html

iPhone 4.0 supports ICC profiles...

It looks like the newly-announced iPhone SDK 4.0 will support ICC profiles in some manner.

Thanks to Ray Maxwell for pointing this out. Check out this link. Look in the bottom left corner of the image for the words "ICC Profiles".

Any more information is not available at this time due to the non-disclosure secrecy surrounding the SDK.

If we told you, we'd have to kill you (or, worse, take away your iPad!).

It's good news for the fledgling platform. We will let you know more when we are able.

X-Rite Edges Into Black

Returning to (slight) profitability for the first time since 2007, X-Rite books $0.1 million in profit for Q4 2009.

Read the Press Release

Where's Geeves?

Mark Geeves is an industry veteran in the classic sense of the word. He has the experience and the scars. He's co-founded a new company to supply "special effects" to the print industry. Good luck Mark!

Color-Logic provides special effects to the print industry