PMA Preview Edition
for EPSON Scanners and Printers
Color Managed Workflow
PMA Preview Edition
for EPSON®Scanners and Printers
Color Managed Workflow
Copyright © 2003 by Epson America, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or
otherwise, without the prior written permission of Epson America, Inc.
Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty
While Epson America, Inc. has strived to be accurate in preparing this book, it makes no representations or warranties
with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaims any implied
warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. The information and opinions stated herein are not
guaranteed to produce any particular results, and the advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for
every individual. In no event shall EPSON be liable for any loss, inconvenience, or damage, including but not limited
to direct, special, incidental, consequential, or other damages resulting from the use of the information contained in
this booklet.
Trademarks
EPSON and EPSON Stylus are registered trademarks of SEIKO EPSON CORPORATION.
EPSON Perfection is a registered trademark of Epson America, Inc.
General Notice: Other product names used herein are for identification purposes only and may be trademarks
of their respective owners. EPSON disclaims any and all rights in those marks.
Printed on recycled paper 2/03
All photographs © 2000 by Stephen Wilkes CPD-16082
Contents
The Art and Science of Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Profiling Your Scanner and Printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Printing the Printer Profiling Target . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Preparing the Printer and Scanner Targets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Scanning the Targets with SilverFast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Building the Scanner and Printer Profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Building Additional Printer Profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Printing the Printer Target from Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Printing the Printer Target from Adobe Photoshop 7.0.1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Preparing the Targets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Building a Scanner Profile for Transparencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Scanning the Transparency Target . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Building the Scanner Transparency Profile in MonacoEZcolor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Building a Display Profile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Configuring Color Management in Your Host Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Configuring Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Configuring Adobe Photoshop 7.0.1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Scanning with LaserSoft SilverFast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Reflective Scanning with SilverFast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Transparency Scanning with SilverFast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Using Color Management with Your EPSON Printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Using the Workflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
T
he EPSON Perfection®3200 scanner and
your EPSON
®
photo printer form an ideal
system for reproducing photography and fine art.
With these outstanding tools, you expect the
highest quality color output. That’s why we’ve
created this booklet. It gives you all the tips and
techniques you need to optimize color on your
EPSON system.
Monitors, scanners, and printers each use different
technologies to reproduce color. Different color
technologies mean that the devices have different
color ranges or gamuts. Each one can produce
certain colors that the others can’t.
The good news is that a color-managed workflow
can help you match colors as closely as possible.
By following the instructions in this booklet, you
can achieve effective color reproduction using
your EPSON Perfection 3200 scanner and
EPSON photo printer.
The Art and Science of Color
Each device in your computer system has a
different color “language.” Color management
translates these languages into a universal form
of communication, or device-independent color
model. By using a common language, a colormanaged workflow lets you convert an image
from one color model to another.
Profiles describe the color gamut of various
devices and the color space of individual images.
With the information in profiles, color management
tools determine the best method for “mapping”
out-of-gamut colors. The result is that you get
consistent, predictable color reproduction.
This booklet provides you with the step-by step
instructions you need to create accurate profiles
for your scanner, monitor, and printer.
All the components you need to build a colormanaged workflow are included in the EPSON
Perfection 3200 Pro software bundle:
MonacoEZcolor offers an easy, effective
means of building profiles for your scanner,
printer, and monitor.
LaserSoft
®
SilverFast®provides powerful tools
to deliver great scans that need little or no
correction after scanning.
Adobe
®
Photoshop®Elements 2.0 lets you
manipulate your images until they’re just
right, then hand off the color correctly to
your EPSON printer.
In this booklet, we’ll walk you through the
process of building the profiles you need,
configuring SilverFast to pass the color along
to Adobe Photoshop Elements, and applying
the profiles to ensure that your prints contain
the color you expect.
Profiling Your Scanner and Printer
The starting point in building the workflow is
to create profiles for your scanner and printer.
MonacoEZcolor lets you build a scanner and
printer profile in a single session. The first step
is to print the printer profiling target from
MonacoEZcolor.
Note: You need to create a separate profile
for each combination of ink, paper, and
printer settings. When you use the profile to
make a print, you need to ensure that you’re
printing on the same paper, with the same
inks, using the same printer settings you
used to print the target.
1
Printing the Printer Profiling Target
1 Launch MonacoEZcolor. The welcome
screen appears:
2 Click Create Printer Profile.
MonacoEZcolor provides you with some
general guidelines to observe during the
profile creation process. If you aren’t sure
how to follow these guidelines, don’t
worry—just follow the steps provided here.
3 Click the right arrow at the lower-right of
the MonacoEZcolor screen to proceed.
The following screen appears:
4 For any EPSON printer, click RGB Printer.
From the Printer Model/Technology pop-up
menu, choose Other for any EPSON printer,
or choose EPSON Stylus Photo 2000P if
this is the printer you’re using.
5 Click the right arrow to proceed. The Print
Target screen appears:
6 Make sure your EPSON printer is selected
as the current printer, and the paper you
want to profile is loaded. Then click Print.
Tip: If you plan on profiling multiple papers,
or the same paper at multiple resolutions,
click Save TIFF to save the target as a file
named “RGB Print Patches.tif”. Printing the
target is always the first step in building a
printer profile. If you have the target saved as
a TIFF, you can print it without having to go
through the introductory screens in
MonacoEZcolor.
2
Click here to proceed
MonacoEZcolor advises you to record the
settings you’ll make in the printer driver, so
you can apply them when you use the
profile. When you click OK, the print
window appears:
7 Choose Print Settings from the options
pop-up menu. The print settings appear:
8 Choose the paper type you want to profile
from the Media Type list—for example,
Enhanced Matte Paper. Then click
Advanced Settings and choose your desired
print settings. Most of the time, the default
settings work well.
9 Once you’ve made your selections, choose
Color Management from the Options
menu. The color management settings
appear:
10 Click No Color Adjustment to ensure that
the driver doesn’t alter the colors in the
profiling target. Then click Print.
Once you’ve printed the target, you’re ready
to proceed to the next part of the process:
using SilverFast to scan both the scanner and
printer targets.
Tip: For an accurate printer profile, make sure
you let the printer target dry for at least an
hour to reach its final, stable color. Some
paper-and-ink combinations take longer to
dry than others. If you wait until the next day,
you can be sure the target has reached its
final color.
3
Preparing the Printer and Scanner Targets
The next step is to scan the printer and scanner
targets in a single image. MonacoEZcolor will use
this scan to build the profiles.
1 In MonacoEZcolor, click the right arrow.
The following screen appears:
2 Follow the on-screen instructions to attach
the reflective IT8 target included in the
MonacoEZcolor package to the target
you printed.
Note: If you use tape to attach the target,
make sure the tape doesn’t cover any of the
color patches on the IT8.
3 Click the right arrow to proceed.
Follow the on-screen instructions to place
the printer and scanner targets on the scanner.
4 Click the right arrow to proceed. The
following screen appears:
Caution: On some operating systems,
MonacoEZcolor lets you scan directly into the
application using the EPSON scanner plug-in.
Do not use this feature. To create a profile
that LaserSoft SilverFast can use correctly,
you must scan the scanner and printer
targets using SilverFast, as described in the
following section.
4
Scanning the Targets with SilverFast
To build profiles, you must use special settings in
SilverFast that are quite different from the ones
used in normal scanning. You must scan the
profiling target with all color management and
color correction features turned off, following the
instructions in this section.
1 Launch the standalone SilverFast
application. You’ll be prompted to import
the SilverFast (Epson) plug-in, as shown.
You can find the plug-in inside the
SilverFast application folder.
Note: Your scanner must be connected to
your computer and turned on before you can
successfully import the scanner plug-in.
Next, you’ll be prompted to enter your
name, company, and serial number
information. You’ll find the SilverFast serial
number on the back of the SilverFast
package. Once you enter this information
and click OK, SilverFast opens.
Before you scan the target, you need to
make sure that SilverFast is configured
correctly for the profile scan.
2 On the main SilverFast screen, click the
General tab, and make sure the Scan Mode
is set to Normal (File), Original is set to
Reflective, and Pos./Neg. is set to Positive,
as shown:
3 Once you’ve confirmed the settings, click
the Options button. The SilverFast Defaults
screen appears:
4 For Gamma-Gradation, enter 1.80. Check
for HDR output, then click the CMS tab.
5
The CMS Defaults screen appears:
5 Turn off all the color management options
for the target scan. You need to do this
whenever you scan a profiling target.
In the Color Management section, set
Scanner->Internal and Internal->Monitor
to <NONE>, and set Internal->Output
to RGB.
In the Profiles for ColorSync section, set
all profiles to <NONE>. You can leave
the other settings at their defaults.
6 When you’ve completed all the settings,
click OK.
7 On the main SilverFast screen, click the
Frame tab. Set the Scan Type to 48-bit
HDR Color, and set the resolution slider to
150 dpi, as shown:
8 Once you’ve made your settings, click
Prescan. The prescan image appears in
SilverFast’s scanner window:
6
9 Crop the prescan, using the dotted line
surrounding the target as a rough guide.
Don’t worry if the scan is slightly skewed.
But if the scan is more than 10 degrees or so
from square, reposition the target and redo
the prescan.
10 Click Scan RGB to make the final target
scan. SilverFast prompts you to choose a
location, file format, and file name for the
scan, as shown:
11 Save the scan in TIFF format.
We recommend that you include the printer
and paper type in the file name. If you
profile multiple printers, or multiple papers
on the same printer, you’ll end up with many
scans that look very similar. Including this
information in the file name makes it easy to
identify which scan belongs to which paper
and printer combination.
Once you’ve entered the information, click
Save to start the scan. SilverFast scans the
target and saves it in the specified location.
You’ve completed the scanning process.
Now you can return to MonacoEZcolor and
build the profiles for your scanner and
printer.
Building the Scanner and Printer Profiles
The final part of the profile-building process is
loading the target scan into MonacoEZcolor, then
naming, building, and saving the profiles.
1 Return to MonacoEZcolor. If necessary, use
the navigation arrows at the lower-right of
the MonacoEZcolor screen to navigate to the
screen shown below. Then click Load an
Image, and load the target scan you created
in the previous section.
The target’s file name is displayed below the
button, as shown:
2 Click the right arrow at the lower-right
to proceed.
7