Digital Photography Standards and Practices Project: Suggested Guidelines for Buying Photography in the Digital Era: All Text © Richard Anderson Back to the Digital Standards and Practices Working Pages A revolution has quietly occurred that has forever changed the way Photography will be created, viewed, managed and printed. This revolution is similar to the revolution that replaced paste-ups with Quark. It will affect everyone in the chain, from client to photographer, to agency, to designer, to printer. Those who take the time to educate themselves to the new technologies will reap the benefits, and those who do not will find themselves increasingly behind the curve. The benefits are greater immediacy in seeing results, potentially faster project completion, greater interaction between client, designer and photographer, and if managed properly, greater accuracy of color reproduction. In order to achieve these good things, a common set of standards relating to digital photo file management needs to be implemented by the client, the agencies, the design firms, the photographers, and printers. Digital Capture vs. Film: Even though digital capture is still in relative infancy compared to film, it is rapidly replacing film as the preferred medium for many photographers. The instant feedback is particularly useful for corporate and advertising shoots, especially those involving people. Heightened security at airports has made transporting film increasingly difficult and can place entire assignments at risk. Film is risky even after processing in that there is only one original image. Once processed, film needs to be digitized by scanning. This necessarily involves a degradation of quality because the result is now second generation. There exists great deal of confusion regarding file sizes of scanned film vs. digital capture. This is because to get equivalent quality, a film scan needs to be 2 to 3 times the file size of a digital capture. This is partly due to the second-generation nature of a scan, and also due to the fact that a film scan includes edges and spaces between film grain as well as image detail. This means that storing digital capture images is vastly more efficient than storing equivalent quality film scans. If you also consider the fact that the highest quality digital capture images are the so called RAW files, which are usually compressed by a factor of 50%, the efficiency of digital capture goes up even more. These fine points are lost on some people in the industry (especially printers) who insist that digital capture images need to be as large as film scans to be of equal quality. Another piece of misinformation is that a digital capture image needs to be a certain size by 300 dpi in order to be successfully printed. The 300 dpi figure is a legacy of scanned film, which as I have mentioned before is a less efficient means of digitizing a photo. A digital capture needs to be only 1.5 times the line screen resolution. Most line screens are either 133 dpi or 150 dpi. This means that ideal resolutions for digital capture images meant for printing would be in the neighborhood of 225 dpi. Actual tests have shown that there can be a degradation of image quality at 300 dpi vs. 225 dpi. Intriguingly, The default resolution for Adobe's RAW file processor is 240 dpi. There is however an important feature that film has which digital doesn't, and that is the ability of the photographer, client, agency, designer, and printer to judge the intended color of the image accurately, and without special software or equipment. In order for digital to work across all of these levels, there needs to be a way for everyone in the chain to view the image in the same way. The solution to this problem is called color management. Color Management: First some background. Photography, whether it is film or digital is originally in RGB color. That is Red, Green, and Blue. This is also how our eyes see color, (remember the rods and cones?). A transparency on a light table or an image on a computer monitor are RGB images. When computers started to be used to display photos, a system needed to be worked out to translate RGB values into numbers, as computers can only work with numbers. The system involves 3 channels- the Red, Green & Blue channels, and each channel is divided into 256 discreet tones of those colors. By combining those 3 colors in various combinations, millions of colors can be described on a computer screen. When we move on to putting an image on paper, we need to move from RGB to CMYK. CMYK stands for cyan, magenta, yellow and black. Theoretically we would only need CMY, except for the fact that printing inks are not as pure as RGB light is, and if you add 100% values of CMY, you get brown and not black. The black plate is labeled K. The black plate, besides giving us a real black, is useful for printing type, rules and other graphic features without having to worry about CMY inks hitting the same precise spot. The problem is that every RGB and CMYK device translates the same color numbers slightly differently. Skin tone is roughly described as R 220, Green 190, and Blue 165. In CMYK, the numbers might be Cyan 09, Magenta 28, Yellow 33, and Black 0. However, your monitor, if it is not calibrated, very likely displays those values differently from everyone else's' monitor. The problem we are seeing today is that most clients, a majority of Ad Agencies, far too many graphic designers, some photographers, and a minority of printers are not making sure that their monitors conform to any kind of universal standard. If you've ever seen a wall of TV sets at Circuit City all tuned to the same channel, you'll see what I mean. Each TV is describing Connie Chung's Blue blazer slightly differently. If we also consider that many of us are using desktop printers, we see that if they are left as they are "out of the box", they don't even match our own screen, except in a very general way. What to do? Fortunately, the solution is color management. Color management involves "profiling" these RGB devices using various measuring devices and software that allow us to change those RGB or CMYK numbers so that your device and my device, and the graphic designer's device across town all give us the same version of a picture. For monitors, using a device such as Pantone's Color Vision Spyder with its software, http://www.colorvision.com will insure that your monitor is giving you accurate color. Either standard CRT (looks like a TV) or LCD (flat panel) monitors can be used for color critical work. If the output is destined for the Web, a white point of 6500K is appropriate. For print, a white point of 5500K is appropriate. For desktop printers, you can make arrangements to get custom profiles for each type of paper that you are likely to use. There are several Internet services that do this. Visit their web page, read the instructions, down load and print out a color chart, mail it back to them, and they will e-mail you a profile or set of profiles. http://www.drycreekphoto.com is one such resource. In the CMYK arena, we have real trouble brewing. Many printers are still operating under the old paradigm which is that they receive color film, put it on a drumscanner which has been careful set up and calibrated to their press conditions. This scanner converts RGB to CMYK on the fly, and all the pre-press work is done in CMYK. This is called a "closed loop" system, and it worked very well for many years. Since there is only one scanner involved, there isn't a lot of difficulty getting it to match up to they're proofing printer and presses. The difficulty for me as a photographer was that although the results were often quite nice, they were never exactly as I had intended. This is because a technician was the final judge of color and contrast. Another difficulty with this system is that CMYK is not the ideal set of channels to do retouching. Retouching and color correction is much more successfully handled in RGB, where the picture originates. CMYK color is a very small gamut (range of colors) compared to RGB. It doesn't take many color moves in CMYK before unpleasant side effects such as banding; posterization and color clipping start to emerge. Unfortunately, the current crop of pre-press technicians at (most but not all) printing companies are unfamiliar with working in RGB color. Although it would only take a 2-3 week intensive course in color management and RGB Photoshop skills to correct this, I don't see that printing companies have recognized the need to train their people. At this point, we seem to have reached the point of maximum chaos in trying to produce a printed piece. We have digital RGB files being generated by photographers who fail to color manage them. These untagged files are handed off to clients who may not know how to look at them accurately. They are then passed on to designers and advertising agencies who "correct" the color without the benefit of profiled monitors and proofing devices, and then they end up at a printer's shop, usually still RGB, where the printer tries to convert them from an unknown space to his CMYK space. This is where he complains about the "awful" color, and "flatness" of the image, and then tries to heroically correct the color in the worse possible space, CMYK. When the client or designers see the proofs, they may experience "shock" and when they get the printer's invoice they may experience "awe". Recommendations: What to do? First we need to recognize that we are in a whole new ballgame. The methods of the past will only continue to frustrate. If a person's job description involves reviewing and evaluating photography, then they should equip themselves with a reasonably new (fast) computer with the latest version of Photoshop. They should also research, install and learn to use good Digital Asset Management software such as Extensis Portfolio, Canto Cumulous, or iView MediaPro. It is a very good plan to have an external Firewire or USB2 hardrive of some reasonable size (120 Gig for instance) to serve as a back up and quick access storage for digital files. A fast CD burner and a set of shelves where CD's can be organized and stored are also essential. With digital photography, CD's are the current coin of the realm. Photoshop out of the box has default settings that need to be changed. Photoshop color settings are found under the Edit menu (windows) or Photoshop menu (Mac OSX). These settings should be changed from Web settings (the default) to U.S. Prepress Defaults. This ensures that your color space will be Adobe 1998, and that color management will be turned on. A printer I visited recently had complained that my digital files did not "look good" on his monitor. When I asked him to go to his Photoshop settings, he had Web defaults for his color settings. This meant that he was assigning the wrong profile to my files, and then stripping out the correct profile. Once a file is saved like that, the original color can never be recovered. Since that time, I never take for granted that anyone knows how to set up their copy of Photoshop, so I always take them to that menu and check it with them. Next step is to get a monitor spyder and software and profile your monitor. If you have a printer, get at profile for a gloss paper and a matte paper, so you can see the effect of printing on coated or uncoated stock. Advertising Agencies: Ad agencies are notorious for employing front line people who have little knowledge about technical issues. Once again, although it would only require a few weeks of training, agencies seem to be reluctant to spend the time or resources to ensure that their art directors have a working knowledge of Photoshop and color management. I have gotten some of the strangest and most inappropriate photo files I have ever encountered from ad agencies. Although Photoshop supports almost every file type known to man, I have received files from one agency that had to be run through a hardcore program called "Graphic Converter" before they could be opened. Needless to say, these files were untagged and I had to interpret the color based on sky being blue, grass green, etc. A client should not accept this from any agency because it costs them extra time and money for someone down the line to sort this out. A file like that sent to the average printer is a recipe for disaster. It would be prudent for the client to at least have a discussion with their agency rep about some of these issues. A proactive approach might be to send a letter to the agency requesting that people working on their account use profiled monitors, and use only Tiff. or Jpeg. files in appropriate sizes, resolutions and quality. I would also recommend that Adobe 1998 color space be used as the standard color space, and that all digital files be tagged in that space. Photographers: The center of the storm. A minority is very much on top of the digital revolution. Many others are using digital cameras without really understanding the workflow. Some are in total denial that film is over with. Much progress is being made, however, and a few questions by a savvy client or designer can separate the wheat from the chaff. Because of the current lack of RGB support by printers, it is my recommendation that photographers should be chosen not only for their "eye" but who can also handle color management, retouching and prepress. There are service bureaus emerging that may come to replace the "color lab" with retouching and prepress services for those photographers unable or unwilling to do it themselves. Like I said, there is maximum chaos at the moment. The good news is that almost all manufacturers' resources are going into new digital products. (Only Kodak in their infinite wisdom has introduced any new films in the past 3 years!) New cameras with increased resolution, full frame chips, new kinds of chips, and improved software for decoding RAW files, are being announced every few months. It's only going to get better for photographers, if, and only if, they have already invested in a digital infrastructure. Unfortunately, getting into the digital photography business will be increasingly difficult as the cost of admission now includes very expensive cameras, laptops, storage media, computer workstations, printers, etc., all of which need to be color managed. Printers: I feel that printers should be chosen on their ability to print. As long as the client has good support from their designers, photographers, and agencies, delivering good CMYK files to their printer should not be a problem. Every printer that I have worked with has been willing to e-mail me his or her printing profile. I have found that the best piece of information is to get them to send to me their Photoshop custom file settings (.cfs), which includes the press profile as well as their Photoshop settings. This clues me in to whether they have Photoshop set up correctly to preserve the embedded profiles, and also tips me off to their RGB color space, which may be Color Match RGB instead of Adobe 1998. This is important, because then I know that I need to convert the RGB files to Color Match before converting to CMYK. These nuances can make all the difference in the quality of the output. That being said, color management will only get you so far when it comes to offset printing. Offset presses can only be profiled up to a point. After that, the skill of the pressman, the paper choice, and even the humidity level the day of the press run become more important. Our goal is to give the pressman the very best file going in so he only needs to adjust for press conditions, and not try to make major color shifts due to problems in the CMYK files. Summation: Despite the rapid changes occurring in the photography, design, and printing workflow, there exists now a set of standards that can and should be applied: Monitors: Monitors whether CRT or LCD needs to be profiled with a spyder. White points of 6500K for web and 5500K for print are good standards. Desktop printers: Desktop printers should be profiled so that what you see on screen prints on paper. Digital photography: There are currently 2 types of digital cameras, which are professional grade. These are Digital SLR cameras, and Medium Format Digital Backs. Both of these professional camera systems produce the high-resolution wide gamut files necessary for high quality reproduction. Whichever type of system is used, they should be set on Adobe 1998 or equivalent color space. Whenever possible, the RAW file format should be used for maximum quality and color correction capabilities. File types: Two file types should become standard, TIFF and JPEG. TIFF (tagged image file format) Files are the most universally recognized industry standard image format. TIFF files can be compressed, but it is generally preferred that they be delivered in uncompressed form, usually on a CD. Since they are not compressed, TIFF files can be large, but they can be saved over and over without degradation. Since they are uncompressed, they should be only the size and resolution required to conserve disk space and to speed up Photoshop operations. TIFF files can be either RGB or CMYK, and they should always be tagged with a color space. TIFF files delivered to a printer should be accompanied by an "aim" or "match" print. Remember that the printer does not have the advantage of having a transparency for reference. The Guide Print or match pint should come from a profiled printer, and should be printed using the CMYK file, or from the CMYK proof color space to mimic the offset press. TIFF files can be delivered via the Internet using FTP (file transfer protocol). Files delivered his way can be zipped or stuffed depending on the receiver's platform. These files will not have the benefit of a match print, however, so the state of the receiver's color management needs to be determined. The other file type that is standard is the JPEG (joint photographic experts group) file. This format provides the most dramatic means of file compression, which is why it is a standard Web file type. This file compression, however, comes at a price. The higher the level of compression, the more 'lossy' or subject to image degradation the file becomes. An 18 MB file can be compressed to around 1 MB with very little loss of quality, however compressing it much more than that will start to create jpeg artifacts. Also, opening a JPEG, making any changes to it, and then resaving it as a JPEG will result in file degradation. Therefore, JPEG files can be used to good effect as long as you don't go too far with the compression, and plan to convert them back to TIFF files before doing any retouching or color correction. Saving large TIFF files as high quality JPEGS is a reasonable storage strategy as long as these rules are respected. As with TIFF files, JPEGs should be tagged with a color space. One other file format bears mentioning, and that is the PDF (portable document file) file format. PDF files are excellent for showing layouts to someone by e-mail, or for showing photos to someone who doesn't have a copy of Photoshop on their computer. Almost all computers sold today have a copy of Adobe Acrobat installed. PDF files are small (easy to e-mail), and can reproduce documents created in Quark, InDesign, Illustrator, as well as Photoshop. A PDF sent by e-mail and printed out on a profiled printer gives the recipient a color correct hard copy of a layout. File storage: Digital photo files take up lots of disc space. Digital photography could not take off until hard drives got really big. 10 years ago, a one Gig hard drive was almost unheard of. Now 120 Gig drives are routine, and the match book size compact flash cards used by digital cameras are available in 256 MB, 512 MB, even 1 Gig sizes. Sizes up to 6 Gigs are under development. Graphic Designers running Quark on old Power PC's will find their systems brought to their knees trying to open the average digital camera file. Optical storage media such as CDR and DVD are probably the safest media for long term storage. External hard drives are the fastest and most convenient, but not the safest. A combination of the two methods is probably best at this time. The client needs to develop a strategy for storing and accessing digital files. Is the Photographer going to do it, or is the client going to be responsible for it? Unless specifically spelled out in a contract, the photographer is not necessarily archiving clients' digital files. In order to realize one of the major advantages of digital, namely exact duplicate searchable files, someone needs to create, store, and manage this resource. Probably the quickest and easiest storage method at this time is to archive all digital files on CDR, label the spines, and store in some kind of order in a specially designed shelf unit. A more flexible system is a set of external hard drives containing a catalog to all the digital files contained on that drive. Digital files have built in to them so called exif data, which can be used to sort and find specific files. It is probably an excellent idea for the client to develop a set of "file info" standards to be used by all contributing photographers. There are programs available such as PhotoMechanic, which will insert into every photo file a complete dossier of information. At the very least, that information should include the date and time of the shoot, the location and project, a description or caption of the picture, the photographer, the copyright information, and any other keywords or categories that can be used by a search engine to locate a specific shot on a computer disc. For convenience, it might be a good idea to standardize the file renaming protocol. Digital cameras automatically name every file, but those file names are not particularly informative. Programs such as PhotoMechanic or iView Media Pro allow you to rename files in a more descriptive way- such as Glenelg sports 001.jpg- for instance. Once the file information and naming parameters have been agreed to, the resulting database practically builds itself. This can be a huge advantage in choosing which pictures should be used for various advertising, brochure, annual report and web projects. Conclusion: Although hardly exhaustive, I hope the points I have made help make the advantages and challenges of the digital photography revolution a little more clear. I hope that others involved in this creative process will weigh in with information that I have missed or failed to make understandable. I am confident that two things are true, this revolution is here to stay, and everything will get better and easier as time goes on. All Text © Richard Anderson Back to the Digital Standards and Practices Working Pages