[Openicc] Introduction / Gutenprint

[Hal V Engel]

On Saturday 09 April 2005 11:12 am, Jan-Peter Homann wrote:
> 2. color-infrastructure, color settings
> ---------------------------------------
> Looking at colormagement-pioneers like Cinepaint or Scribus,
> colormanagement from working-space to the printer is done inside the
> application.
> For the future, this step should be part of the printerdriver.
>  From the view of the user, the printer-driver should be able to
> associate driver-settings with linearization files and printer-profiles.
> If the user chooses e.g. Epson C64 printer, 720 DpI and Photopaper, the
> printer-drives should choose a predifined linearization-file and a
> profile. The user should also be able to print without this files and to
> setup is own lineariztion-file and ICC-profile for this driver-setting.
> The printer-driver should also get the information from the application,
> which RGB- or CMYK-working-space is actually used in the application.
>
> For the user, it is very, very helpful, if he gets in the UI of the
> printerdriver a feedback, if communication between application and
> printerdriver about the RGB- and CMYK-workingspace is really working.
>
> Both in Windows and MacOS X environments, a transparent colormanagement
> from application to printerdriver is often far away from reality and
> causes big troubles during printer-profiling and printing with profiles.
>
> As Scribus and Cinepaint seems to be the applications with best
> implementations of colormanagement yet, it would make sense, if they
> cooperate with the Gutenprint-team on how to implement a communication
> between application and printer-driver about the working-space. Later
> GIMP, Inkscape, CAIRO and other projects can may use the same mechanism.
>
> The mechanism itself should be discussed in the openicc mailinglist. So
> other people can observe, what happens for this applications and
> Gutenprint.

I totally agree and would like to amplify this a little.  On the GIMP 
Developer list I wrote this about two months ago:

"Also printer profiles are very specific to the printer hardware (not 
just the printer model but the specific printer you are using), the 
paper, ink and all of the driver setting (resolution, dither....).  So 
I have more than one printer profile for each printer (typically 5 or 
6).  

When you are in the printer dialog in GIMP you have the ability to add 
a new logical printer and use that to "name a collection of settings 
you wish to remember for future use."  This is the ideal place for 
printer profiles to be specified.  So the user should be able to set 
the default profile and rendering intents for each logical printer 
along with all of the other settings for the driver.  This would be a 
way better setup than how this is handled in photoshop and would be a 
great way to simplify and facilitate the management this part of a CM 
work flow." 

The point is that when you are dealing with devices like printers, scanners 
and cameras significant parts of the color management system need to be close 
to the device.  To my list of CM related items that belong in the print 
driver I would now also include the lineariztion-file that Jan-Peter 
described so well.  This is something that can not even be done in Windows 
with the standard printer drivers but I know in my gut that this would allow 
even better results.  

I think that the "logical printer" stuff is part of the gimp-print GIMP 
plug-in.  Is this correct?  If that is the case then to properly support CM 
system wide the "logical printer" functionality should be migrated from the 
GIMP plug-in to Gutenprint to make this available in other applications.