San Diego Padres

Chris Hardy is staff photographer the Padres and uses a Fuji Pictrography 4500 and Epson 7800 for output. The San Diego Padres are a long time client of ours. Here is the profile I built for the 4500 on Fuji Glossy if anyone cares to test it or use it in their system.  1-PG4500-Glossy.icc

The real story is in the path it took to get there – just to make a profile. Chis updated his Dual G4 to Leopard and his Adaptec AHA 2930CU SCSI card which is his primary connection to the Pictrography 4500 lost it’s driver. Because Chris did a complete reinstall of Leopard, the SCSI driver was not installed and destroyed. Unfortunately Adaptec stopped supporting the Mac OX with their SCSI Adapters long ago – so a quick check on the website led me into a dark corner. Luckily a google search of “Adaptec AHA 2030cu Driver for 10.5″ yielded this Adaptec driver from Version Tracker and it worked!

Another mystery solved! Thanks Chris for lunch and your continued support and we will see you next time! I have a good feeling about the Padres this year!

X-Rite Color Services

Color Management
Originally uploaded by colorcritical

The New X-Rite sounds exciting does it not. At first I was shocked to hear the news, but really now – I welcome the change. X-Rite believes in it’s consultants – and I am lucky and grateful to have such a good relationship with them.

This winter we launch Color Control Freak 2008 and Picture Perfect Color 2008. The program is going to be fun and informative like years past. The content will be updated so keep in touch for more details as they will be posted here.

Best Buy Corporate

Best Buy Corporate
Originally uploaded by colorcritical

I trained photo specialists in Minneapolis, MN on the use of a proper color managed workflow from capture to print. Best Buy aims to have imaging labs in their locations all over the country where photographers can get their best work printed to Z3100 and B9180 printers.

Best Buy is serious about photography and want to make sure their associates are trained and well equipped to handle the requests of photographers.

Circa Publsihing / Lapis Press – Culver City, CA

Circa Publsihing / Lapis Press – Culver City, CA
Originally uploaded by colorcritical

Reproducing original art digitally is no small task. Circa Publishing is one of the best at satisfing even the most critical artist. With state of the art equipment and an experienced staff these guys reproduce colors no other shop comes close to reproducing.

I visited Circa for two days of intense training and collaboration regarding thier workflow. Circa has the tools to build RGB and CMYK profiles as well as a print with two different RIPS, Onyx Postershop and Imageprint.

They print to Epson 9600 and 9800′s and are located in the heart of Culver City. Thanks Aaron and Christi for making my visit pleasant, the long Brazilian Food dinner was a treat.

hp Photo Influencer Program

Douglas Kirkland and David Saffir
Originally uploaded by colorcritical.

It is always a pleasure working with hp Photo Influencers Douglas Kirkland and David Saffir. X-Rite and hp contracted COLORCRITICAL services for the purpose of training on the new Z2100 and Z3100 Series Designjet Printers. We all met up at the DFA Lab to discuss digital print workflow with these new printers.

In thi shot Douglas and David were discussing the quality of the black density in David’s image of a night scene in Tel Aviv Israel. Douglas was commeenting on the quality of one his famous images of Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over The Cookoo Cookoo’s Nest.

Thanks Douglas and David for a wonderful day!

Allegra Print and Imaging – Billings Montana

Allegra Print and Imaging
Originally uploaded by colorcritical.

Allegra is on board and sees the immediate benefits of running a color managed workflow. With tools like GMB Profile Maker 5.5 an i1 and a budget for training Allegra is well on their way to being one of the best printers in their part of the world. What impresses me most about Allegra is their commitment to making this technology work and sometimes that is half the battle. In my short two days in beautiful Montana we were able to calibrate and profile their pre-press displays and profiled thier Ryobi Sheetfed Press as well as Designjet 5500 as a inkjet proofer. The results were very good the first run and the proof was withing delta tolerances as a “match”. Thanks to Al, Suri in pre-press and to Mark in the press room and a special thanks to owner Brain McGovern who as an owner I rarely see so much enthusiasm in impletenting a color managed workflow. I am impressed and wish you continued success.

PULSE Advertising

PULSE Advertising
Originally uploaded by colorcritical.

PULSE Advertising is a premiere agency focusing totally on the film industry. They are also COLORCRITICAL. Color is so important to their success, they have made the investment in color management hardware and software in order to satisfy the needs of their art directors. The only thing stopping PULSE was where to find training and technical implemention. This is where I come in. I worked with the team at PULSE for two full days building profiles for their displays and their output for a seamless workflow and screen to print match. With an entire team spread across the studio, the print viewing conditions varied everywhere except for a uniform balanced lighting source near the large format printers. After the implementation and training the results were instantaneous. In fact the staff was so pleased, I got an email from Lori Dunlop, PULSE Production Manager, “…all we’ve heard today is art directors saying that they LOVE their color. and, it shaves so much time off of what we in production need to do just to get a print ready…kudos to you!”

Thanks Lori for working with me, you are a pleasure to work with. Thanks Scott for having the vision to get this right, and finally thanks to Ginny for being so on top of your operations. It is a pleasure to do business with all of you.

SCR Designs – Colorado

Spectrolino Spectroscan XY Scanning Spectrophotometer
Originally uploaded by colorcritical.

In todays digital printing, weather the inks are water based or solvent based, the importance of color management is one of the most important aspects of your workflow. Shane Reynolds of SCR Design does not cut corners on anything. He is a steadfast perfectionist. He invested in all the right tools, including the new Gretag Macbeth iO automated table for the i1 Spectrophotometer. Running the ever so incredible Onyx Production House 6.5 RIP and printing to a Mutoh Tucan LT Ultra and Ultima Cutter, Shane is totally equipped to attack the market with the digital output. My involvement with Shane includedteaching him everything I could in two days since his brain was a pure spongeand wanted to know the little details in getting the best color possible off his solvent printer. I taught the basics, which Shane if you need a reminder:

Media Optimization -
Head Height
Distance Adjust
Heater Settings
Dot Gain Banding Check

Calibrations-
Dark Ink Restrictions
Linearization
Advanced Greyscale
Total Ink Limit

Characterizations
ICC Profile via i1 XT and IO

Shane, it was great to visit your “shop” and I hope you are a big success. Send me an email anytime you have a question!

Nissan Design – Farmington Hills Michigan

Nissan Sport Concept
Originally uploaded by Abdul R.

This week I had the pleasure to visit and help implement a color managed workflow at Nissan Design America in Farmington Hills Michigan. When concepting a car the fine details are what matters most. The ability for a designer to accurately depict the vision of the design is key to the over communication of the design. The color of the trim, the interior, the paint, the wheels all need to be seen in a similar way to what would actually be concepted later on in production. Nissan uses state of the art techniques to achive a color managed workflow. From leather sample to 3D rendering to large format output the color has to be right. I am proud to say Nissan is a satisfied client in both locations, San Diego and Farmington Hills. I want to thank Nissan for venturing into the world of digital color science and for being patient in it’s implementation. I also want to thank Kevin Arnold for letting me do my thing and to Fred Falting for his words and inspiration. I will see you all soon!

Linderoth and Associates Architecture – Phoenix

Linderoth 3D Rendering
Originally uploaded by colorcritical.

Color management is very import in architecture and especially important for Linderoth and Associates, a full service architectural firm focusing on impact housing in Arizona, California, and Nevada. COLORCRITICAL helped Linderoth this week bet a better control on their printing through a customized ICC workflow to their wide format printing devices. Establishing mixtures of RGB to simulate paint swatches is no easy task but with spectrophotometry the job can be much easier. Thanks Dean for making my visit pleasant and I will fly over for a day anytime.