Need to print without color management on Mac, can't with photoshop

[nateStatic]

I need to be able to print color targets for making custom ICC profiles, so I need to be able to print without color management. Photoshop doesn't allow this. I've had to use the old Adobe Color Printer Utility, which hasn't received an update in a decade or so. With each Mac OS system update, it becomes less and less usable. It now takes several attempts to open/print files. Color Sync is *supposed* to be able to do this, but the option to print without color management is always greyed out, no matter the file type. Since making custom profiles is a pretty vital thing to be able to do for people using Adobe products to do professional printing, I figure Adobe has some other solution besides an old, deprecated piece of stoftware... right?

[creative explorer]

@nateStatic you might be the odd one or two who doesn't 'print without color management.' And because of that, my money is Adobe integrate deeply with color management processes. I feel your pain in using dinosaur utilities or the option in looking at third-party profiling software that handles the target printing directly. 

[davescm]

@creative explorer  Anyone who creates their own printer/paper profiles needs to print their targets without colour management. Unfortunately applications and operating systems do not make that easy.

@nateStatic I still use the ACPU here on Windows and I'm told it will still operate on Macs if you can get past the OS security features trying to block it. https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/photoshop/kb/no-color-management-option-missing.html

I'm also told that Qimage One can print targets with no colour management but I cannot directly confirm this as I don't use it.

Dave

[NB, colourmanagement]

@davescm Having solved the "no colour management"  issue by using the ACPU to print from, the user may still find they have issues if using macOS Sequioa because the print pipeline (specifically "printer settings") seems to be broken.

See: https://community.adobe.com/t5/photoshop-ecosystem-bugs/macos-sequioa-photoshop-25-and-messed-up-pri...

It's also possible to print mac targets using the preinstalled Apple Colorsync Utility but that may not solve the Sequoia "printer settings" issue given that the issue seems to be between macOS Sequioa nd the print driver software.

Canon's Pro Print Layout add-on does solve the"printer settings" issue and it bypasses the driver - and also includes a "no colour management" option.

Sadly, Epson's print layout add on does not include a "no colour management" option.

I hope this helps

neil barstow colourmanagement - adobe forum volunteer,

colourmanagement consultant & co-author of 'getting colour right'

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[nateStatic]

I can use ACPU, but I'm finding it freezes/doesn't open files/etc more often... pretty much every time I use it, I end up force-quitting it a few times because it froze. Just had a head replaced, and we use 9 different papers that need custom profiles. I can make it work... I was just hoping there was an easier way/better app. Thanks for the info.

[NB, colourmanagement]

@nateStatic It's also possible to print mac targets using the preinstalled Apple Colorsync Utility but that may not solve the Sequoia "printer settings" issue given that the issue seems to be between macOS Sequioa and the print driver software.

those same Sequioa / print settings  issues very often prevent accurate printing once profiles are made also 

I hope this helps

neil barstow colourmanagement - adobe forum volunteer,

colourmanagement consultant & co-author of 'getting colour right'

See my free articles on colourmanagement online

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[nateStatic]

I tried using ColorSync, but the option to print without color management was greyed out. It would be nice if Adobe could update ACPU, since it is actually useful... or maybe just let us print without color management from photoshop. Hopefully Apple fixes the things they broke. 

[NB, colourmanagement]

@nateStatic "Print as color target" in the Colorsync Utility worked for me in Ventura

however, if "Print as color target" is grayed out for you in the Color: dropdown menu then use this help from Andrew Rodney the Digital Dog. Unfortunately he no longer posts here.

we want to see it in this menu

To enable this menu (make Print as color target option appear), the trick is to select the Color Matching dropdown menu, then in the Profile menu, pick "Other Profiles...". You can pick any profile in the list that follows. What's important is not having the Automatic setting menu on, then, the Print as color target option becomes accessible.

 

I believe Print Tool from Quadtone RIP works too, but I'm unsure whether this too may be stymied by the inability to reliably select and use "print settings" in macOS Sequioa. Of course the Colorsync Utility and the ACPU may also be affected by that Sequia issue 

I hope this helps

neil barstow colourmanagement - adobe forum volunteer,

colourmanagement consultant & co-author of 'getting colour right'

See my free articles on colourmanagement online

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[nateStatic]

Thanks for the info, @NB, colourmanagement , I'll give that a try.

[NB, colourmanagement]

@nateStatic Great. Please report back on your success or otherwise 

neilB

[NB, colourmanagement]

@nateStatic hows it going? did you manage to print the targets?

I hope this helps

neil barstow colourmanagement - adobe forum volunteer,

colourmanagement consultant & co-author of 'getting colour right'

See my free articles on colourmanagement online

Help others by clicking "Correct Answer" if the question is answered.

Found the answer elsewhere? Share it here. "Upvote" is for useful posts

[nateStatic]

@NB, colourmanagement  unfortunately, I haven't gotten it to work.. still greyed out. Had to use janky old ACPU (I did at least get it to work without too much freezing/crashing/etc, this time). I'll give it another try when I get some time. Thanks again for the suggestions.

[NB, colourmanagement]

HI @nateStatic if you get time to test the solution I pasted in above for you it would be great - I'm sure it worked for colour guru Andrew Rodney the Digital Dog. I tested the Colorsync utility process here with Ventura and it worked fine just following Apple's instructions, none of the tweaks above needed. 

I hope this helps

neil barstow colourmanagement - adobe forum volunteer,

colourmanagement consultant & co-author of 'getting colour right'

See my free articles on colourmanagement online

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[davescm]

@John_William9936 I don't know which AI system you used to compose that reply but it contains  statements that are way off the mark.
Edit > Colour settings contains the defaults for colour management and as such does not contain a No Colour Management option. In addition changing the default options for new documents does not affect an open document at all.

Photoshop's print dialogue used to contain an option for no Colour management but it was removed years ago, and now you cannot use Photoshop to print a target without colour management.

Dave

[NB, colourmanagement]

@davescm dead right. Sadly the system will not allow me to upvote your answer. 

@John_William9936 "One potential solution is to set Photoshop's color settings to "No Color Management" before printing. This option can be found under Edit > Color Settings, and you can set it to "No Color Management".

that option has not existed in Photoshop for many years. I'm sure you mean well but using AI to generate an answer isn't helpful as is proven by the incorrect info in your post. If you don't know please don't chip in.  

neilB 

neil B 

[ExUSA]

What about setting Color Management Policies to "Off"? With this option, there is no profile used for documents (new documents have none, and opened file profiles are ignored.) 

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/color-settings.html

[gskibum]

Setting color management policies in Photoshop to off does not disable color management, and does not get the ball into the endzone. Color management set to "off" only forces Photoshop to fall back on whatever profiles are defined as default. Not at all the same as no color management.

[Stephen Marsh]

Coming from a proofing RIP background, this is something which is taken for granted.

[Stephen Marsh]

I know that you mentioned the issue with the Apple ColorSync Utility, which is mentioned here with a fix:

https://imagescience.com.au/services/custom-printer-profiling/printing-colour-targets-on-mac-using-c...

[jazz-y]

ACPU does not do any magic, it simply sends the file "as is", delegating all color management issues to the printer driver at the operating system level (like most "dumb" printing programs, which, by the way, can successfully replace ACPU). Here are literally two steps to repeat what this utility does:

1. Open the file without assigning a color profile to it (i.e. untagged mode, in which only the brightness values are important, but not their coordinates in a specific color space)

2. Select Printer Manages Color in the Color Handling section and send the file to print.

You may be concerned about the printer profile specified in the inactive field when selecting Printer Manages Color, but from my observations, Photoshop simply indicates "the printer driver will use this profile when printing. Probably. I'm not exactly sure, but let it be so", in fact, Photoshop does not know which profile the printer will use (i.e. everything depends on its further settings) - to be 100% sure, you can go to the printer settings and disable all automatic corrections, all color management (here it strongly depends on the specific manufacturer, but as a rule, everyone has this option).

I prefer to print via ACPU, but when this is not possible, do it according to the algorithm above. I have checked many times - there is no difference in the shades of color patches, it is literally the same.

[NB, colourmanagement]

@jazz-y "I prefer to print via ACPU, but when this is not possible, do it according to the algorithm above. I have checked many times - there is no difference in the shades of color patches, it is literally the same."

Anyone attempting to do this would need to be very careful to disable printer colourmanagment, because, if not, the printer software will select its ICC media profile based on the media selected there in "printer settings".

Are you doing this on Mac or Windows? It's macOS that’s messed up the relationship between Photoshop and the print settings in the printers driver software. 

you wrote:

"there is no difference in the shades of color patches, it is literally the same."

Have you made spectrophotometer measurements of the colour patches to check that Photoshop with 'Printer manages color' (and printer colourmanagement disabled) exactly matches a file printed from the ACPU? 

I'll be super surprised if what you wrote is correct, because the only reason Adobe released the ACPU was that it was needed to print device characterisation patches without ICC profiles being used, once the vital "no color management" option had been removed from Photoshop. 

I hope this helps

neil barstow colourmanagement - adobe forum volunteer,

colourmanagement consultant & co-author of 'getting colour right'

See my free articles on colourmanagement online

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[jazz-y]

I did not focus on the points that are part of the standard preparation for printing test scales and are described in the ACPU ReadMe:

Select your target printer from the Printer popup menu. The two important settings you need to find here are Paper Type and Color Management (the actual names will depend on your printer driver). These will be in popup menu that is initially set to Layout. Set Paper Type to the paper that most closely resembles the paper you're trying to profile. Set Color Management to Off. Some printer drivers will turn off Color Management automatically. When you have completed the above, click Print.

I'm talking about Windows, but I don't think ACPU works any differently on a mac - it's a lightweight program whose only function is to open a file ignoring all color profile tags in the file and send it in this form to the printer driver via the standard operating system API. ACPU simply doesn't have the ability to communicate with the printer in any other way (like, for example, some RIPs for consumer-class printers that come with a database of compatible drivers that allow you to directly control the ink supply to the printer nozzles).

Yes, I printed the scales via Photoshop using the algorithm specified above, then via ACPU and compared the plates using i1pro3. If you have the opportunity, you can try to repeat this on a Mac, I will be very happy if this trick works there too.