Digital BW, The Print

Bob,

The quote from Bruce Fraser was very useful.  I also like a later paragraph after
describing the various Simulate options:

"An obvious question is, which of these three simulations is correct? The truth is, all of 
them are, and none of them are. No proofing system has ever provided a perfect match to 
the final product: We learn to interpret proofs, and therefore, like any other proofs, you 
have to learn to interpret the soft proofs offered by Photoshop. Each one tells you 
something slightly different about the way the image will appear in print. A handy rule of 
thumb, though, is that for glossy stocks, the default view with Paper White and Ink Black 
unchecked will be the closest, while for uncoated stocks, the view with Paper White 
checked will generally be the most accurate." -- Bruce Fraser

I think this is especially important to note -- you must get used to a particular
soft-proofing setup and learn to judge it.  I suspect that I am fairly used to the black
not changing i.e. not dulling down but that doesn't make it more "right".

---------------------

The forward profile I think is pretty fixed -- it has to match white-to-white and black-
to-black.  Its the reverse profile that can be done in various ways.   From reading and
trying variations I think the white end should be "illuminant white" this makes the
default white of the print show as the white of the monitor.  If you were to set it at the
actual white the result would be the same as Simulate Paper White so the checkbox
would do nothing and there would be no way to see monitor white.   The black end
is currently (2.3.2) set at the actual black, but the internal BPC by default maps this to 
monitor black. (Note this is not the BPC you see in the dialog which controls the
forward BPC).   The using of Absolute in the reverse profile would explain why the
two checkboxs Paper White and Ink Black are linked.  Although it seems to me they
could have uncoupled it.  

I also tried mapping the black end into monitor black rather than actual black in the
reverse profile.  This is basically doing the BPC in the reverse profile in the tables.
This allows the Paper White without Ink Black option but of course you can't get the
Ink Black at all since it's already been removed.

Putting the black end somewhere in between the actual and monitor black is an 
interesting idea.   It might be a compromise between the optimistic monitor black
and dull actual black.

Roy


--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Bob Frost" <bob@f...> wrote:
>
> Steve,
> 
> It seems that the look of 'Simulate Paper White' is a combination of the 
> reverse profile and of Photoshop's treatment of it (as described in my 
> previous post). I checked again with my old ProfilerPro manual and it 
> clearly says that editing of the black and white points for softproofing can 
> only be made before the profile is made from the raw measurement data, and 
> from what David Tobie said once, I got the impression that the reverse 
> profile was made with these new white and black points instead of with the 
> ones read off the paper. The ProfilerPro dialog gave you two boxes with the 
> actual white and black points read from the data, and asked if you wanted to 
> edit these. It then made the profile, and these edited points were 
> incorporated into the reverse profile for softproofing, but not into the 
> normal profile for printing. I understand that some of the better profile 
> editors also allow more extensive editing of the reverse profile for 
> softproofing to get a better match, without changing the normal printing 
> profile.
> 
> Bob Frost.
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Steve Kale" <stevekale@b...>
> To: <DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 9:21 PM
> Subject: Re: [Digital BW] Create ICC Soft Proofing question . . .
> 
> 
> I don't know for sure but it should simply read the wtpt tag in the profile
> and then map monitor white to that media white.  There is no "amount of
> simulation tag" that I am aware of so I suspect ProfilerPro simply edited
> the wtpt tag or something similar.  It's not part of the LUTs and so editing
> wtpt may not affect anything else.
>