Damien Symonds

Download PSD I experimented with lots of blend modes before deciding that Linear Light looked best. https://www.damiensymonds.net/2011/06/sometimes-you-get-lucky.html The "Levels 1" layer isn't part of the edit, it's just the layer I used to check that I'd completely blackened the silhouette. The Pattern Fill Layer is some noise to prevent banding: https://www.damiensymonds.net/tut_noise.html

No, on the mask. Hold on, I'll upload the file.

How about this?

Can you post this file by itself, so I can see what the best approach might be?

Gee, that's unnecessarily dark, isn't it? Your son is pretty much lost from view because the sky is so dark. May I see the overlay file you used?

Great.

Well, you're welcome to look for free ones, but they're always risky. For this low price, yes, I'd buy it.

Yeah, I reckon the second one looks very promising!

No, it doesn't matter a damn. It's a completely meaningless number. https://www.damiensymonds.net/2011/11/why-ppi-doesnt-matter-yet-another.html https://www.damiensymonds.net/art_resolution.html 4944x3296 is sixteen megapixels. That's plenty big enough to print as big as a truck, as long as your focus is good.

I see that you found those links on istockphoto. Did you actually search there for some starry night sky photos that you could buy and use for this?

The photo looks all kinds of bad to me, not just his skin tone.

If it looks ok to you, then that's super, because if you know that your prints will turn out exactly the same as the screen, you know you will be happy with the prints. Conversely, if it DOESN'T look ok to you, and you know what your prints will turn out exactly the same as your screen, you can adjust it until you like it, and then you know you will be happy with the prints.

It doesn't matter whether it looks ok to me or not. Thankfully, personal taste doesn't play any role here.

If your screen matches your prints, everything is right in the world Once you take the Skin Class, you won't have any worries.

Yes.

They do match after adding magenta? In that case, they must also match without adding it?

Great. So have you talked to them about the collage?

Gosh, adding magenta in editing is REALLY bad. You've gotta get your calibration right. Are these the instructions you're following? https://www.damiensymonds.net/cal_CMD_pc.html Also, can you confirm you're working in the right colour space? https://www.damiensymonds.net/art_tscs000.html

That article references the X-Rite i1Display Pro, which is the big brother of your ColorMunki. Yes, it's better, but there's no reason why your Munki can't do a good job. Put that article out of your mind. Can you clarify this? It's critically important. Are you saying that your calibrated screen matches all your prints, except for the ones that you edit using the new techniques?

No, of course not. In this case, you would drag across the white and first two grey bars all together.

You don't click, you drag. If your version of ACR allows it.

Right. Therefore, they CANNOT be described as "great". Of course.

Then the next most affordable solution is to buy another monitor to plug in to your computer, and edit on that. What??? No they weren't!!!!! They were dark, you just said so.

Ah, crap. Well, it means you'll need to work in much brighter room light (while the screen is at its very lowest brightness setting) to achieve a visual match. Can you increase the brightness of your room lighting? And it also means you have very feeble basis to complain about this recent collage print. If you can't honestly claim that your previous prints match your screen, it's going to be a hard argument to mount. However, you should still contact them, of course, and see what they say.

Crap. So this raises a really important question, and I need you to answer it very honestly: Have you EVER achieved a print match with this screen? A really truly print match.