ICC Proﬁle Printing Instructions

Getting accurate colours from your printer is easy with our remote ICC Proﬁling Service. Simply print the ICC colour proﬁling chart and mail it to us. Upon receipt of your order we typically email your custom ICC proﬁles in 2-3 business days with instructions on use.

In order to get accurate ICC proﬁle results the provided chart must be printed without any colour management or adjustment by your computer or printer. Follow these instructions to ensure proper printing of the chart.

1. Preparation

Adobe Photoshop Settings

Before opening the chart ﬁle in Adobe Photoshop you must ﬁrst conﬁgure Photoshopʼs colour Settings as illustrated below. This will prevent Photoshop from colour managing the proﬁling chart. (If you are printing from another application, adjust the settings and preferences to disable any colour management.)

Edit > colour Settings... > Custom > colour Management Off (All PC, & Mac Photoshop CS2 or later)

Check Printer Operation

Check the operation of your printer by running a nozzle check, head alignment, and if necessary a self-clean function.

2. Which Chart Do I Open?

In the ICC Profile Charts Folder, you will ﬁnd a CMYK folder, RGB folder, and a test ﬁle called CMYK or RGB Test chart. If you know what type of ICC proﬁle youʼll need then simply open the appropriate chart. Otherwise read on to learn which chart to open.

RGB chart proﬁle: Inkjet Printers using the included drivers. Most people use inkjet printers (including Epson, Canon, HP, and Lexmark) with the printer driver that came with the printer. Regardless of what you print, these printers actually think in terms of RGB, so the RGB chart proﬁle must be used.

The chart should open in Adobe Photoshop without any dialog boxes presented. If Photoshop does ask what to do with a proﬁle or missing proﬁle, choose Leave as is (donʼt colour manage) or Discard the embedded colour proﬁle (donʼt colour manage).

Skip ahead to Step 3. Print RGB Chart.

CMYK chart proﬁle: RIP (Raster Image Processor). If your inkjet, laser, or copier printer came with a RIP, such as a stand-alone printer server, or you bought RIP software, then you should use the CMYK chart. Open one of the following ﬁles directly in your RIP program. Make sure you have calibrated your RIP before printing this chart.

If you are using a RIP on a small desktop printer, open the CMYK Desktop Inkjet ﬁle, which contains 2 pages. If you are imaging to a printing press or a wide printer format (such as the Epson 4000 or greater), open the CMYK Wide Format Inkjet and Press ﬁle.

Skip ahead to Step 4. Print CMYK Chart.

3. Printing RGB Chart

Settings

Before printing, you must disable your printer driverʼs current ICC proﬁle and choose the Print Settings below in order to avoid any printer colour management on the chart.

Scale: 100% Center Image Source Space: Document: Untagged RGB Print Space: Proﬁle: Same As Source - Hit “Print” .

Individual Printer Settings Copies & Pages pull-down menu > Print Settings > Advanced Settings

The following illustrations show printer settings for Epson printers. Your own printer setting windows may differ but the content and choices are similar. For additional help, refer to your printer manual to turn off colour management and colour adjustment.

Select your media type, colour ink, and print resolution (dpi), and other settings according to how you normally print.. If you are unsure which paper setting to choose, print a few times with different paper settings. Select the paper setting that yields the most pleasing results.

Print Settings pull-down > colour Management > No colour Adjustment Under the “Print Settings” pull-down menu, choose “colour Management.” Make sure that “No colour Adjustment” is selected.

Save Settings

You need to record these settings exactly for use with the proﬁle we send you. So under the “Presets: Standard” pull-down menu, choose “Save As” to record these settings. It is good to name the ﬁle something descriptive, like “Proﬁled_printer name_paper name”.

Check Summary & Print

Under the “colour Management” pull-down menu, select “Summary.” Make sure all the settings are correct. The settings in the image on the right are not necessarily the ones you will use. Check that you are printing with no colour management, at 100%, with the paper type, resolution, and print speed that you want an ICC proﬁle for. Then print.

4. Printing CMYK Chart (Using a RIP - Raster Image Processor)

Before printing the CMYK chart proﬁle, disable your RIPʼs colour management and colour adjustments. If available use the Linearization and Total Area Coverage settings to minimize ink pooling. If you are using a common paper and a calibration template is available for that paper, then use that setting. If your RIP came with a colour measurement device you may update the calibration settings or create a new calibration ﬁle. Refer to the RIP manual on how to proceed with creating a new calibration or updating a supplied calibration template.