[Openicc] Colormanagement in Gutenprint

[Carol Spears]

On Wed, Apr 20, 2005 at 12:47:08PM -0700, Hal V Engel wrote:
> On Wednesday 20 April 2005 12:03 pm, Carol Spears wrote:
> > On Wed, Apr 20, 2005 at 02:39:39PM +0200, Kai-Uwe Behrmann wrote:
> > > The price for a simplistic and easy setup today - user tells via print
> > > queue what source colour space is used - is a lot of confusion in the
> > > future. If the application is dumb regarding colour profiles, it will be
> > > a hassle and a source of uncertainty to use named queues for source
> > > profile specification.
> >
> > maybe i am completely wrong, but it seems to me that there is
> > uncertainty regarding color profiles now.  meaning, if you are not using
> > a specific chain of software that ends with a printer that has been
> > professionally installed and calibrated you are not getting color
> > management.  and this is a price we are paying because it was not set up
> > simple and easy to begin with.
> >
> > feel free to correct me ....
> >
> > carol
> >
> 
> There is at least a grain of truth in what you wrote.  But I don't think you 
> need to have professionally installed and calibrated profiles/printers to see 
> a significant benefit from using profiles.  On Windows if I use Epson 
> everything (driver, printer, paper, ink)  using the canned Epson profiles 
> with the work flow recommended by Epson I get very good results. But of 
> course the results will not be as good as with a custom profile.  For many 
> users these printer vendor supplied profiles would be a significant 
> improvement over a non-CM printer work flow.   Now to do this users have to 
> do some additional installation steps that are not part of the standard Epson 
> driver installation and also have to read a bunch of Epson documentation to 
> know what the Epson recommenced work flow is.   So this is not something that 
> your average user even knows exists.
> 
> The real issue is, that with current systems and software, setting up and 
> using a CM work flow is difficult enough that most users will find it too 
> burdensome.  In my opinion this is because of flawed software and I think 
> that with a better implementation that CM can become accessable to many more 
> users.  In fact many of the options we have talked about would allow casual 
> users to use a basic default CM printing work flow with canned profiles 
> without their having to know anything at all about it.  They would not get 
> the full benefits but they would still see a benefit. 
> 
the gimp developers do not want their color management to depend on
liblcms.  i think the overall attitude there is that it is easier to
explain to people how to hook their computer up the best way possible
than it is set up these other software chains.  carrying the information
from those same software chains is the same problem only worse because
there is nothing you can do about how the information is made.

when the tiff libraries are broken or the tiff format gets changed,
people blame gimp.  one day, when lcms is converting one profile to
another and all of a sudden there is a difference in one or other of the
profiles people will blame gimp and we will blame lcms and neither is to
blame.

i also admit to the need to justify some of the expensive math classes
that my parents, myself and my government helped to pay for, as well.


> It is not so much that things are not simple and easy it is that the 
> implementations that exist today exposed (or didn't expose) the details in 
> ways that make this appear to be more complex than it needs to appear.  Part 
> of this is because of fragmentation of the functionality that makes setting 
> and using an end to end process difficult.  While at the same time not giving 
> users or administrators a way to hide details when it would be good to do 
> this.  The real issue is how do we correct the flaws that exist in current 
> implementations to take CM out of the realm of experts and make it accessable 
> to others without losing the flexibility that experts need to get the 
> absolute most of the printers they use/support.   I think this is possible 
> but it will not be easy to do.
> 
when you are dealing with volunteers, it is exactly the opposite than
dealing with employees.  an employee can be hired to do dreary
maintenance.  a volunteer cannot always be gotten for this sort of
thing.

i realize that this discussion is about printer software, i am just wary
because the next step is to display what the printer is getting and that
would be where gimp starts.  the developers do not want to depend on
lcms.  how can gimp display what the printer is printing without lcms?

carol