How to properly apply an ICC profile has long been a subject of much conjecture. Should you apply your profile in an application ? Should you apply it in the print driver ? Is my profile really getting used ? Ask 5 different people and you will probably get five different answers since Photographers are using different applications to print with. Things can also differ because of operating systems.

Below is a rock solid method to properly color manage on Mac OSX regardless of what application you are using or what Mac OS you are using. In this method if you application has an option for PRINTER MANAGES COLOR, that is what setting you should use. If your application does not have an option, that is what is happening by default so you do not need to do anything (Apple Preview would be a good example of this).

Step one: Open the ColorSync Utility. It can be found in applications/utilities (of course it is a lot easier just to spotlight it)

Step two: Select the Devices icon at the top of the window and then expand the profile view for the printer you wish to configure ICC Profiles for

Software RIP ImageNest

Step Three: Select the paper that you wish to assign a custom profile for. Some manufacturers use abbreviations for their paper types. In this example Pro38 PLPP is selected. This is an abbreviation for Epson Stylus Pro 3800 Premium Luster Photo Paper. Remember, profiles are always made for a specific printer and paper combination

Step 4: On the right side you will see the Current Profile. Click on the Down arrow and you will be able to change this profile to whatever custom profile you wish.

Mac RIP

Step 5: Navigate to the folder that contains the profile you wish to use. Generally, when you create a custom profile it is saved to the ColorSync folder but it can be in any folder you wish.

OSX RIP

Step 6: Now your default profile for the Epson 3800 has been changed so every time you choose Premium Luster Photo Paper the custom profile that you set will be used.  In addition to being able to use your custom ICC profile with ImageNest Printing Software

We are currently planning a December release of version 1.2 and will be including a ton of new features as well as a redesigned interface:

New Features:

Batch Image Sizing on Import: YES,  you will finally be able to automatically size your images to your desired output size with just a single click !  We will have pre-sets for all the standard sizes and you will also be able to customize the pre-sets to any sizes you want.   This give you the ability to make picture packages very, very quickly and efficiently.   Creating a picture package with 4×5’s, 8×10’s, 5×7’s, and any other size from a single or multiple image will be a few short clicks.

Fit to Fill and Fit to Size Import Features: When sizing a file, if your image is not in the same aspect ratio as your desired size you will be able to “Fit to Fill” which will fit your image in your desired aspect ratio and you will be able to position the image to crop out the edges.   The “Fit to size” feature will fit your image inside the size you have desired.  If the aspect ratios are different it will shrink one size to fit so no amount of your image will be cropped out but it will not be the exact size you specified.  You will always have the choice to manually crop or crop to size.

Integrated Page Setup: For those who filled out our survey thanks !  We made these changes based directly on your feedback.  The page setup and all the layout controls are now in a panel that is always visible and available to users.  This should make things more straight forward.  We where shocked when we kept getting requests for features that we already had.  We had them,  they where just not up front in the interface where they are easily accessable.  Now they are !

Improved Image Memory Handling: Problems with very large file sizes (300 megs or more) where seen in version 1.1 so we went back to the drawing board and re-tooled our image handling.  Huge files should no longer be a problem

Improved Nesting: We are always striving to improve the efficiency of our nesting.  It was long and hard but we have improved our nesting efficiency again.  If that doesn’t sound impressive consider this,  we where already more efficient than every single one of our competitors.  Now you will be able to save even more paper, and in this economy, greater savings will pay off bigtime and make you much more competitive.

There is more !   and of course this update will be free to all !

We are also looking into improved DNG Printing for version 1.2