Convert to Profile - Pro lab conflicting advice

[Amanda C]

Damien has answered some of my questions in the Print Sharpening class, so I will try and make this more of a general question, that will help anyone with similar problems.

 Conflicting pro lab advice is still causing me a lot of headaches.

I am testing four pro labs in order to choose one regular lab, so I won't be using them all; but in order to choose my favourite by sending the same two photos for each lab to print, obviously I need to be using the correct setting for their lab, otherwise the comparison test prints are useless.

All four are all highly respected pro labs in the UK, widely used by professional photographers.

Two labs tell me that I must go to Edit>Convert to Profile and choose the Destination space as their print profile for the paper that I want to print on.

On the other hand, two other labs tell me that Edit>Convert to Profile Destination space should only be on sRGB.  And in one lab, two different tech support guys told me these two conflicting settings for their lab!

I have read some of Damien's articles, so all this conflicting advice is really confusing me.

Do I follow each lab advice (and change the Destination space in Convert to Profile to their paper profile with the ones who recommend it), or ignore their advice and ONLY ever have it set on sRGB, regardless of what they tell me. My monitor is calibrated.

Here is a link to the video from one of the labs with instructions on setting Convert to Profile. It's 3mins 54 seconds into the video.

And another one from one of the most well known pro labs.

https://www.theprintspace.co.uk/PhotoshopAndColourManagementTechniques

[Damien Symonds]

I cannot stress this enough.  If a lab asks you to convert to their profile, RUN AWAY FROM THAT LAB AS FAST AS YOU CAN.

Lab profiles are for soft-proofing, NOT for conversion.

[Amanda C]

Thanks Damien,

The lab in question is The Print Space, which is the most expensive one that I tried with a test print (in order to chose a regular lab). They have a very good reputation and have won a lot of awards, and strangely when I phoned again today and challenged him on their recommendation to Convert to Profile issue, he told me that if people don't do it or forget and leave on sRGB it doesn't make any difference to the final print. Der! I quizzed him further, mainly because i would just like to understand a bit more about colour space and he just said that's how their machines are set up.

The test prints I had already sent off before raising this issue, arrived today and to tell you the truth nobody but me could see the slightest difference between the three different labs. And I could barely see any difference (and certainly not £3.50's worth of difference!). If I had to choose one, money no object, I would say that The Print Space actually gave very marginally the best result (on skin tones), but I knew which lab was which, and I wonder if I got someone to mix all three labs prints up whether I'd be able to tell the difference.
AND I'm taking your advice and 'running away as fast as I can'. If only I could damn well run - I am a paraplegic, so it's wheels, not legs for me!

The good news is that all three labs gave good (and very close) results. They all matched my monitor pretty accurately.
However the price of a 7"x5" (ex postage) from the 3 labs varied enormously -  18p (DS Colour), £1.56 (OneVision) and £3.60 (The Print Space).

I am waiting for the last test prints to come back from Loxley (91p for 7x5), but they are the Lab (which I mentioned to you in the Sharpening Class)  that tell me I must select ‘Convert to Working RGB' next to RGB under Colour Management Policies' in Edit>Colour Settings. Loxley are the only lab with this instruction and all he could tell me was that if I didn't change that setting they wouldn't be able to print my images.
The up side is that they say Profiles are just for soft-proofing and Convert to Profile must be on sRGB. 

Of the two cheaper labs, OneVision follows your advice and says NOT to Convert to their Profile; it's purely for soft proofing . DS Colour recommends Converting to their Profile.
So maybe OneVision is the one to go with. They sponsor and print about 90% of the competition photographs at the annual SWPP event in the UK, which I went to last weekend and the prints looked pretty good, especially the large ones. 

The last lab I am looking at is The Print Foundry. I talked to them at the convention and their prints looked amazing and they have fabulous customer service. Bit pricey and they don't print smaller than 10x8 (£6) and adhere to all your rules i.e. sRGB RULES!
 They don't even have profiles for soft proofing, as they said they don't find them to be that accurate. They check every single print that comes to their lab.

When I have all the results in, would you like me to post in the Lab Review section (I think there are already reviews for Loxley and Ds Colour)?

[Samantha LaRue]

1 hour ago, Amanda C said:

I am waiting for the last test prints to come back from Loxley (91p for 7x5), but they are the Lab (which I mentioned to you in the Sharpening Class)  that tell me I must select ‘Convert to Working RGB' next to RGB under Colour Management Policies' in Edit>Colour Settings. Loxley are the only lab with this instruction and all he could tell me was that if I didn't change that setting they wouldn't be able to print my images.

That's absolutely silly. The only time that setting would matter is if you were editing an image that wasn't in sRGB to begin with. But since you are working in sRGB from start to finish, it doesn't change anything!

[Damien Symonds]

2 hours ago, Amanda C said:

When I have all the results in, would you like me to post in the Lab Review section (I think there are already reviews for Loxley and Ds Colour)?

Oh, yes please!