Customer Reviews

Color Management in Digital Photography: Ten Easy Steps to True Colors in Photoshop

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When it comes to printing the pictures taken with a digital camera, the first question many inexperienced photographers ask is, why doesn't the picture look the way it did on the computer monitor? The answer is almost always color management. Color management is the technique for getting camera image, monitor and output to look alike.

This book presents a simple approach to color management, breaking it down into 10 easy steps, the most significant of which is calibrating and profiling your monitor. If I reveal to you the other 9 steps you probably won't need to buy the book. And there for me was the rub. I know there are many photographers out there who will be happy with the results of following just the first seven steps of the author's ten step process. I know that more advanced photographers will benefit from the last three steps which Hinkel calls "advanced printing". But I also believe that even following these three additional steps, there are other things photographers can do that will enable them to get prints and web pictures that will better achieve agreement with their monitors that I would expect to be covered in a book on color management.

For example, even with a properly calibrated monitor and profiles, blacks and dark grays in a print may block up with certain papers so that they are indistinguishable. One way to deal with this is by adjusting tonal range in the printing process for the specific paper being used. Photographers looking for these more advanced tips should look at books aimed at more advanced color management like Tim Grey's "Color Confidence 2nd Edition: The Digital Photographer's Guide to Color Management".

Even though it doesn't go to the substance of the book, I have to comment on the publisher's graphic content. Rocky Nook's books look beautiful from their calm grey covers with beautiful photographs to their illustrations and generous use of white space inside. On the other hand, even the author tells us that this book will only take a couple of hours to read and digest. At just over 100 pages (which probably could be less if each page did not have a generous outside margin) one feels that the price, even when deeply discounted, may be a little dear.

In any event, photographers interested in learning just enough about color correction will find the information they need here. Those looking for a fuller discussion will have to look elsewhere.

One of the hardest parts of digital imaging for most people to understand is the relationship between the color that they see on the screen and the color that they see on their prints.

In Color Management In Digital Photography: Ten Easy Steps To True Colors In Photoshop Brad Hinkel shows us, in easy progressions, how to understand and use available color spaces to move from digital image, to screen image, to print image.

What I like best about Color Management In Digital Photography is that Hinkel breaks down the basics into easy to understand parts. In the chapter entitled "Select a Color Space", he defines what a color space is. He then shows how it relates between the digital image; the one your camera made, the image as it appears on the screen and the image as it appears on the printer.

This book can take you to that next level, especially if every time you time you try to understand the technical jargon of color space, sRGB and profiling you find yourself confused. If you are new to printing in a digital world or you are always having problems making your screen image and your print image match, then Color Management In Digital Photography is the perfect book for you

What you see is seldom what you get when you make the arduous journey from digital image file to hard copy. It's a royal pain in the ASCII.

Most of us pass off the color difference between what we see on our monitor and what we get in our prints with a shrug of the shoulders. It's just one of those vagaries of computing, right?

Generally, that's a healthy attitude for the casual computer user/digital photographer. There are enough hassles in life without looking for new ones. On the other hand, if you're trying to make a living in graphic arts/photography, color management looms large in your professional life.

Some days, when I'm working on several computers, each with it's own color quirks, it gets frustrating. The book nicely bridges the color management gap with thorough explanations of color space and how to calibrate and profile your monitor.

Obviously, a good monitor is going to be an important component of the management process. Hinckel covers the related subjects as well as making some specific recommendations. He also looks beyond the monitor and discusses a good work environment.

There are specific software packages like Monaco OPTIC and Monaco EZcolor that are more powerful than the color management programs that come with printers and photo/graphic editing software. There is a good explanation of how these work.

Hinkel explorers numerous printing option, tells how to test your system, and then he moves into Advanced Printing.

This book presents a comprehensive, easy-to-understand overview of color management. Hallelujah. This book may actually inspire all of us color-management-procrastinators to jump in and get this vital area of graphic arts under control.

For years I struggled with how to deal with a simple problem of getting what I see on screen to be the same as what I print a photo lab. Color management shouldn't be such a difficult task though it usually is unless you know some preparation and steps you need to take. Most casual photographers don't give a thought, and photo ops do a pretty decent job producing printed photos that make us happy enough that we don't think color management is an issue. But if you're taking photos that include portraits, sunsets, landscapes or any situation where precise colors matter, you began thinking about color management.

Brad Hinkel does a superb job explaining the reasoning and science behind color spaces and how it applies to digital workflow color management. From the beginning to end this relatively short and concise book takes the reader through 10 important steps of not only understanding but how to accurately reproduce your intended photos in all their vibrant color glory. From choosing a good monitor to converting your colors to the right color space for the intended output, when you read this book you will approach managing your photos with a new expert eye.

Beginners might have a bit tougher time with the learning curve of understanding color management even with this well-written easy-to-read title, but an intermediate to advanced user would find it highly educational and a fast read. This one definitely falls in my highly recommended category.

Written by photographer, software designer and teacher Brad Hinkel, Color Management in Digital Photography: Ten Easy Steps to True Colors in Photoshop is a methodical, full-color guide to making the most of digital color photography using Photoshop software. Numerous computer screenshots illustrate the step-by-step instructions, and the straightforward text is written to be accessible to digital photography novices as well as seasoned digital photographers who are relatively unfamiliar with what Photoshop has to offer. Steps range from the most basic "Select a Color Space" (such as RGB or Adobe RGB) to "Profile Your Monitor" to "Advanced Printing" and "Adjusting Your Color for Printing". Enthusiastically recommended for any Photoshop user interested in improving the quality of their digital color photographs.

I found "Color Management in Digital Photography" by Brad Hinkel to easily be the BEST book on he subject for the digital photographer whose goal is to get your monitor to match your prints.

It is written in a clear, straightforward manner, in a way that is understandable and applicable for the typical digital photographer.

It provides sufficient background on the topics, without going into unnecessary theory. Brad is one of those rare teachers with a knack to get the reader to understand concepts that others cannot explain successfully.

Brad offers good, solid suggestions on selection of various pieces of hardware and software - something many other similar books lack.

Topics covered in this book include:
* Selecting a good monitor, along with some excellent monitor recommendations.
* Proofing lighting - again with some excellent lighting recommendations.
* Monitor calibration. Here Brad recommends booth hardware and software. He also makes excellent recommendations on how to calibrate a monitor. His recommendations include some of the latest thinking on this topic, something I have not seen in other books. Following the recommendations from others drove me nuts for months trying to get a good monitor to print match.
* Printer recommendations.
* Rendering intents. Brad's description of Perceptual versus Relative Colormetric rendering intents is the first one that I have found easy to understand.
* His section on Soft Proofing, out of gamut colors and fixing color shifts is both easy to understand and easy to follow.

I also own the following books on color management:
* "Real World Color Management - Second Edition" by Bruce Fraser, Chris Murphy and Fred Bunting. Considered by many to be THE bible on the topic of color management. It is a fine book, but at 582 pages this goes WAY beyond the needs of a photographer, and in many ways is not organized or presented in a way to be most helpful to the photographer.
* "Color Management for Photographers" by Andrew Rodney. A very fine book that I feel is more useful to the photographer than is Real World Color Management, but at 461 pages also is too heavy on theory unnecessary to the photographer, and what it does present is not in a concise, straightforward manner that would be useful to the digital photographer.
* "Color Confidence - Second Edition" by Tim Gray.
* "The Photographer's Guide to Color Management" by Phil Nelson. A worthwhile read.
* "Practical Color Management" by Eddie Tapp.
* "Fine Art Printing for Photographers" by Uwe Steinmueller and Jurgen Gulbins (a very fine book on that specific topic).

I also own various books on color correction - which is really a different topic. Although these books cover color management superficially, their real goal is the use of Photoshop to modify colors.

If your intention is to become a master consultant in color management you certainly will want to invest in many other more detailed books on the topic. If you are a photographer and your goal is to get your monitor to match your prints you will not find a better book than "Color Management in Digital Photography" by Brad Hinkel.

As the author stated at the beginning of this book, I was able to read the whole book in less than 2 hours. The material in the book gives a fast introduction/overview of the subject but certainly leaves one lacking for more detail more often than not. The text, particularly in the charter on color spaces is quite repetetive, to the point that I from time to time felt the editor has mistakenly repeated a section of text.

The author offers, throught the text, references to the books website which usually is an enhancement to a book. In this case, the web site is diffinately lacking. The only available item is the PDI target. The Macbeth color checker is NOT available as advertised (p.72). When I attempted to download the document on multiple exposures for the web site, I ended up at a broken link. The about the author section came up in Japanese when I tried it. A complete web site is the expected way to add to technical books these days and if one is offered it should work (especially since the book was published in 2007, but probably written in 2005-2006, and the equipment recommendations in the book have become rather outdated.)

I also agree with one of the previous reviewers that the price is a bit high for the content. Other books, such as Fine Art Printing for Photographers, offer more in depth information. For example, the chapter in this book on monitor profiling is a scant 3 pages plus the intductory paragraph. It takes more than this to cover this very important topic.

The beginner may get some information out of this book, but I think they will be left with the need for a more in depth treatment in order to really apply the 10 steps to their own digital printing. A person with more experience with the subject willI think be left with the impression that they didn't get their moneys worth here.

My color experience is from being a long time film photographer. Digital color management principals were new to me before this book. Having completed it, I feel that I understand the fundamentals and have made some excellent color prints using Photoshop CS3 on my Intel MacMini printing to my HP B9180 archival printer. These prints are as good or slightly better than any I've made using traditional chemical color printing processes. If you want to make better prints on any inkjet printer, this is a great handbook!

This book is short, and is mainly information that is better explained in other books. See the Rocky Nook book about photographic fine art prints. The material is sound, but should represent one chapter in a bigger book about printing.

I am a member of Livermore Camera Club in the San Francisco Bay Area and I borrowed this book from the club's library.

It's a great book with fairly detailed color management on every step of the Workflow--from capture to print. The only thing is that it's from 2006 and some technologies have changed quite a bit and some information (i.e., printing, resolutions, etc.) have been considerably improved since then. I don't see any other newer color management books, though, so it will be good if the author would update this book.