Damien Symonds

If you wanted, you could try to show him 100% crops from your file, and the equivalent pixieset file, and encourage him to look closely and see how the quality is barely any different; but even as I type this I know it's just too much hassle. The customer is always right, even when they're wrong, I'm afraid.

No they're not You only think they're perfect because you've never seen how much better they can be.

Don't even bother, honestly. You can't explain to a guy like that. Just send him the files directly, and move on with your life.

I urge you to consider the Print Sharpening Class. The new "Sharpening Procedures for Digital Files" module will rocket your business to the top of the market.

Can I just check that you've read this? https://www.damiensymonds.net/2011/02/selling-digital-images.html And watched this? https://www.damiensymonds.net/client-photoshop

Yes, there are LOTS of ways. This is a good one to use: https://free.mailbigfile.com/ Yep.

So Pixieset shrinks the pixel dimensions of your files, AND re-compresses them - really aggressively. I've done some file comparison in the past, and even though you can see, when you examine really close, that the Pixieset files are degraded in quality, it's not enough degradation to actually make a difference to the print quality. You may rest assured of that. However, it's DAMNED hard to convince a client like yours that their smaller files will print fine. Clients are funny like that.

On this page it mentions "on upgraded accounts": http://support.pixieset.com/knowledgebase/articles/336833-what-file-sizes-can-my-client-download?fref=gc

Ah, Pixieset. This is a really tricky one, that arises from time to time. It's my understanding that there are different tiers of membership for Pixieset, is that right? I'm told that you have to pay a higher fee for them to NOT resize your images (that is, to host them at the size you upload them). Are you aware of that too? If so, do you know if you've paid for that level of membership?

Yep.

That photo makes it look like the desktop screen is too warm. Is that the case?

How did it look?

I have to leave now, and won't be back online for a while. I'll check in later to hear what soft-proofing showed you.

As you're finding, it's a way to bleed money, sadly. Yes, I know.

My heart is bleeding for you. I'm so so sorry you chose to buy a printer. I wish you'd asked me first

Well, yes, and you also though you should use Export to save ...

If you soft-proof with the printer profile, does it look like what's printing?

This was with "Let printer handle colors"?

Yep, always Relative Colorimetric.

Well, the "s" in "sRGB" stands for "standard", so that might be their way of saying it. Have you tried it?

Whoa. This is a problem, surely? That should be sRGB, not Adobe RGB?

No, we DEFINITELY don't want manual adjustment. We want the profile to do the work. May I see a screenshot from the "Main" tab?

We don't know!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We can't know if you're calibrated correctly if you haven't compared your screen to pro lab prints. Yeah, it does seem like double-handling, doesn't it? The problem lies in there somewhere. Either you need to find how to turn off the printer settings, as it advises ... ... or choose "Let printer handle colors".

Look, until we have a basis for judgement, we can't tell what your prints should look like. We're flying blind here. Please order those prints. Is this the screen you get when you hit the "Print Settings" button?

I have always said this is a foolish course of action, and you're beginning to see why. Printing your own is an expensive, frustrating hassle. I wish you'd asked me before pursuing this. You HAVE to have a set of prints from a pro lab. Without them, you can't calibrate your screen. Prints from your own printer are NOT sufficient for checking screen calibration. Plus, you have absolutely no idea if your home printer is printing correctly without reference pro lab prints. Please order them immediately, and we'll continue this conversation once they arrive. Or, make the break now. Sell your printer to some other sucker, and rid yourself of this burden. Print at a lab, and get on with your business.