June
 2004

Good evening ladies and gentlemen. My name is John and I’m an accuracy addict.

For years I have looked with disdain on those who would claim that they were able to use their monitors to perform critical color and density evaluations. All this while I’ve held fast to my belief that the only way to guarantee accuracy was to create a traditional hard-copy contract proof.

Oh, my friends, this concept of softproofing tried to lure me in with the siren song of cost and time savings. But I resisted, knowing in my heart that nothing could match the accuracy of my expensive contract proofs - they were still the best, weren’t they? Well sure, if I were being honest with myself, these proofs often didn’t really look like my original transparencies and the proofs themselves didn’t really look like what I saw coming off the press but so what?  After all, they were accurate.

Ladies and gentleman, others will claim that I’m just behind the times; that the future has arrived at last. They will state flatly that accurate softproofing is here now and my craving for accuracy has me wondering. Is it true? Has softproofing finally been perfected to the point where it is a valid workflow option? Or is it simply an over-hyped, oversold, unrealized concept promoted by vendors in an attempt to sell high-priced monitors, software and the newest color management gizmos? Can a softproof be used as a contract proof?

Ready for prime time?

Like many color management related questions, the answer is a qualified “yes.” The final results may be subject to interpretation, certainly nothing new for graphic artists. But the truth is that softproofing has come of age and is ready to take its place as a major time and cost saving tool for the graphic artist. The challenge is to select the right components, set correctly any software options and implement the proper workflow processes.

Free visual monitor calibration utilities that come with many computers and Adobe Photoshop can provide some level of image improvement but never be a part of a contract proof-quality softproofing system.
Photos: Chromaticity

We begin with the basics. What exactly is softproofing and what is it supposed to do? What equipment is needed to do softproofing?

Simply put, softproofing is the process (or maybe the art) of using the computer monitor to make color and density decisions that will accurately reflect what the image will look like when proofed or when printed on press.

Notice that I used the term “accurately reflect” and not “match.” The reason for this is twofold. First, if I claimed to be able to perfectly match a monitor to a proof or printed sheet, one of my clients may actually make me do it!  Second, the human eye sees light reflected off of a proof differently than it does the light transmitted through a color transparency and yet again differently when it is the light emitted off the screen of our monitor.

There is nothing new here and this should come as no surprise to anyone who has compared a transparency to a proof or press sheet in the past. Our transparencies never matched the proofs either in saturation or dynamic range.

Closer than you think

In a softproofing situation, the monitor-to-proof match will be much closer than the transparency-to-proof match. Detractors will still point to the fact that it is not a perfect match or to the results from a poorly implemented softproofing system as the reason to avoid the technology in the first place. But if we accepted a transparency-to-proof match in the past, we should have no trouble accepting a more accurate monitor-to-proof match.



Software and hardware tools such as Optix from Monaco allow the user to not only calibrate and profile monitors to a given standard, but also to verify the accuracy of the process. This is vitally important for contract softproofing.
Photos: Chromaticity

A recent study has shown that the great majority of graphic art professionals, when shown a properly constructed softproofing setup, would accept the quality and accuracy of the softproof.

Softproofing can also be a boon to the graphic artist when used as a remote proof.  More than 95 percent of all proofs are delivered by a courier. Imagine the timesavings if the client and prepress professional could simply e-mail files back and forth to each other and view these files accurately on a monitor. Specialized systems are available that provide this capability plus allow for users to annotate documents and even digitally sign off on a job.

So how do we attain this high level of accuracy? You can’t expect to take any old monitor, run a monitor calibration wizard, check a few boxes in Photoshop, and start throwing pixels around. No, softproofing takes thought, and probably an investment in instruments, software and maybe even a new monitor. Let’s start our investigation with an examination of the monitor itself.

LCD vs. CRT

Today, monitors come in two flavors: traditional cathode ray tube monitors and the newer liquid crystal displays. CRT monitors have long been king of the hill as far as color accuracy is concerned. LCD displays, after all, are prone to color and density shifts if your head moves at all off of the central axis of the screen. Make that, were prone to these shifts. Nowadays, you can use an LCD display without the use of bungee cords to keep it in alignment with your head.  But are they accurate enough to use for softproofing? As a matter of fact, they might be the ideal choice.

A CRT monitor varies the intensity of the light that it is emitting by varying the flow of electrons that strike phosphors on the front of the screen. More electrons mean more light. The problem is that phosphors age and they don’t age gracefully.  This causes the color of the white point to change over time even as the luminance level decreases, resulting in darker, more yellow monitors.

On the other hand, LCD displays contain an actual light source, one that can be chosen for accuracy and longevity. Of equal importance is the fact that many LCD displays are much brighter than CRT displays. This is important when trying to match the white of the monitor to the white of the proof.

Proper selection of a monitor to be used for softproofing defines the concept of “you get what you pay for.” If you received your monitor for free after 10 fill-ups at the corner gas station, you probably can’t use it for softproofing.

If your monitor is more than three years old, you probably can’t use it for softproofing. If your monitor is in a very brightly lit office environment, if the walls are painted with bright colors, or if it is located near windows, you may not want to use it for softproofing.

What does work? Try these: The Sony Artizan Color Reference System, Barco Personal Calibrator V and other high-end CRT monitors, along with LCD displays such as the Apple Cinema displays and the Eizo ColorEdge make ideal monitors for softproofing.

Viewing conditions

Proper conditions for viewing proofs have long been acknowledged in the graphic arts industry. Most prepress departments and pressrooms, as well as many ad agencies and photography studios, have a booth or an area lit with 5000K lamps.  But when we look at setting up a system for contract softproofing, we need to raise the bar a bit.

You can’t simply go down to the neighborhood hardware store and pick up some daylight fluorescent tubes, light ‘em up and start judging proofs. The lamps used in proofing need to possess the proper light qualities, referred to as the lamp’s color rendering index and its spectral power distribution. To keep things simple, just purchase your proofing lamps from a reputable graphic arts supplier who understands your requirements.

For contract softproofing, of course, the color of the light is only half the equation. The other half is the light intensity. To do contract softproofing, we need to match the intensity of the white point on the monitor to the intensity of the white point on our proofs, original transparencies or original artwork. In almost all cases, the viewing lights will be brighter than the monitor.

The poor man’s approach to fixing this problem would be to shield a portion of the light from falling on the proof. An easier and arguably more accurate way would be to use a light booth or light table with built-in intensity controls, such as those manufactured by GTI. Advanced control circuitry is needed to ensure that the lamps maintain daylight output throughout the intensity range.

Editor’s note: Next month in Part 2, Nate will examine some of the software needed to properly calibrate and profile monitors and he will explore the settings in Photoshop, the most commonly used app in softproofing. Part 3 of the series will examine some commercially available softproofing systems.

John Nate is a color specialist for Chromaticity Inc., an integrator of color technologies for the newspaper and other industries. He can be reached at 616.361.7773 or via e-mail at jnate@chromaticity.com.