Having serious gamma issues with 3ds max....please help !

[djwang]

hi all thankyou for reading my thread

 

i have been using 3ds max for about 3 yrs now and have just started using the mental ray renders that ships with max as i mpreviously used vray.

 

i have a tricky problem that when i render my images they look great on screen.

in photoshop they look great on the screen

in print they look dull. in that they do not hold the same colours mid yellows look creamy.

 

i beleive this to be something to do with gamma. so i set my gamma/lut in max to 2.2 affect colours and material editor checked. my input and out put bit maps set to 2.2 gamma

 

alll looks good. i have even tried to overide the gamma setting when i save the image. no luck

i have set the gamma when pre saving the output file (so the files is auto saved when max finishes rendering)no joy either.

 

when i take the image into photoshop CS4 the image is untagged so i have tried to convert the image to adobe 1998 as well as trying adobe srgb, i have also assigned my monitor profile then converted to either srgb or adobe 1999..no change.

 

it seems as if the gamma information is still not stored into the image when rendering. can any body point me in the right direction...

my monitor is calibrated with a spyder pro 3.

i use the canon pixma 9000 pro with the canon paper and inks with the correct printer profile supplied by canon.

 

 

what is also strange and also leads me to a a gamma embedded problem is that i have downloaded a few test cards adobe 1998 gamma 2.2 and guess what ? the print matches my screen. i did an adobe srgb and that was close to my screen but i little duller. so i dont think its the monitor or printer........

 

 

has anybody elese experienced this problem as i have never seen anything like it..

 

 

am at the point of cracking up here.

thankyou for reading my post

 

DJWANG

 

my system is

 

duel xeon 5650

24 GB

nvidia FX4800

pci express OCZ revodrive.

[djwang]

Bump!

[mattclinch]

ok, so you have calibrated your monitor to gamma 2.2?

you are using gamma 2.2, and input and output in max at 2.2?

 

gamma tends to be a brightness/lightness problem, and is usually fairly obvious. is it just the yellows that are a bit off?

is your printer using the same colour profile as your image?

Edited October 29, 2010 by mattclinch

[Crazy Homeless Guy]

What is the brightness intensity level of your monitor? I tend to work around 100cd/m2. Sometimes a little more, but not more than 120-130. The white on your monitor shouldn't really feel much brighter than a sheet of the paper you are going to print onto.

Edited October 29, 2010 by Crazy Homeless Guy

[djwang]

i have adjust 3ds max gamma to 2.2 .....input/ out put 2.2 material and colour boxes both checked....

 

all colours are off . i visualise alot of interior luxury bathrooms i am a villeroy & boch designer. i have to visualise alot of tiles and the tiles can be quite comlpex in their behaviour towards light. a tile that over all looks brown will actually have parts of it that are nearly black and parts that are light brown. in the prints the colours in between are missing (tones) also the specular highlight is blue. . why ? because the environment which it is reflecting is blue , but we see it as white(human eye) because are own eyes cant see colour that bright. this is why i beleive it still to be a gamma issue.

 

 

my monitor is calibrated using a spyder pro 3 it recommeded 180 cd/2 so if i can change it to 100cd/2 i will.

 

i beleive the printer to be fine as i have downloaded a test card in adobe 1998 with embedded gamma of 2.2 from norman koren.com and the image prints exactly as on screen using the printer profile that tells the printer what paper am using . when i apply the same process to the rendered image the colour still lacks the correct gamma.

 

very puzzling as i have used the gamma over ride function when i save the output file to a tiff image. also have tried to set the gamma to 2.2 when i tell the render to save the output file as soon as it finishes rendering. i can tell this in the render dialoge as it says render output is 2.2. but still images print crap.

their is something missing in the colour workflow but identifying it is tedious to say the least.

 

i will describe the process i use in photoshop also

 

open file the program ask what to do as the image is untagged. so i say dont colour manage.

i assign my monitor profile to the image (spyder pro 3) then convert to adobe 1998

 

then print

 

print preview dialogue appears

 

allow CS4 to manage colours

 

enter printer preference disable printers ability to manage colours

 

then back to the print preview

 

select the printer profile

 

press print

 

colours bad.

 

thanks for your help guys am preying you guys can help me solve this

[mattclinch]

i will describe the process i use in photoshop also

 

open file the program ask what to do as the image is untagged. so i say dont colour manage.

i assign my monitor profile to the image (spyder pro 3) then convert to adobe 1998

 

then print

 

print preview dialogue appears

 

allow CS4 to manage colours

 

enter printer preference disable printers ability to manage colours

 

then back to the print preview

 

select the printer profile

 

press print

 

colours bad.

 

thanks for your help guys am preying you guys can help me solve this

 

I can only describe my process and hopefully try and figure out where you are going wrong.

 

- firstly, i reset my monitor to factory defaults - most importantly brightness and contrast adjustments, preset mode to sRGB (which is the colour space i work in - perhaps yours may needs adobe RGB?), and also the kelvin value to 6500k.

 

- calibrate my monitor to 6500k, 2.2 gamma and apply the profile.

 

- open the saved render and convert to sRGB profile in PS.

 

- print, using color management from the document (sRGB), but allow the printer to manage colours by using the working profile from the document.

 

works fine for me. colours end up perfect.

[djwang]

Thanks matt

 

i have done exactly as you said when i calibrated my monitor. though i convert my images instead to adobe 1998. my reasoning for this is that i printed a perfect match from a downloaded test pattern from normankoren.com so i thought this is the way to go. i have converted to srgb before but the colours seem dull so i thought why use that profile when adobe 1998 looks and printed better(something to dowith having a wider gamut) i use mental ray and have heard that it does nt apply the gamma from the frame buffer so you need to do it manuelly when saving the output file(gamma overide) but when i do that it still looks crap

 

could it have anything to do with the fact am using a 8 cartridge printer in stead of a standard 4 cart printer.

 

very puzzled.

 

but appreciate your advice

 

thanks

[djwang]

What is the brightness intensity level of your monitor? I tend to work around 100cd/m2. Sometimes a little more, but not more than 120-130. The white on your monitor shouldn't really feel much brighter than a sheet of the paper you are going to print onto.

 

i just checked and my monitor is calibrated to 120cd/2

[mattclinch]

Thanks matt

 

i have done exactly as you said when i calibrated my monitor. though i convert my images instead to adobe 1998. my reasoning for this is that i printed a perfect match from a downloaded test pattern from normankoren.com so i thought this is the way to go. i have converted to srgb before but the colours seem dull so i thought why use that profile when adobe 1998 looks and printed better(something to dowith having a wider gamut) i use mental ray and have heard that it does nt apply the gamma from the frame buffer so you need to do it manuelly when saving the output file(gamma overide) but when i do that it still looks crap

 

could it have anything to do with the fact am using a 8 cartridge printer in stead of a standard 4 cart printer.

 

very puzzled.

 

but appreciate your advice

 

thanks

 

provided your mointor, ps and printer are all using the same colour profile it wont matter which one (adobe 98, srgb etc) you use. the only time you get results that differ from what you see on the screen is when you have a point in your workflow that changes or uses a different profile.

 

i dont understand your gamma point. mental ray saves the gamma that you tell it to. so if you are using 2.2, with input and output set to 2.2 also, then any images brought in (maps etc) will be treated as having a gamma of 2.2, and anything output (saved images from the frame buffer etc) will also be saved with a gamma of 2.2. you shouldn't need to change that. if when you save with gamma as default and open in PS it looks wildly different from your render, i would suggest that the problem is likely to be that your monitor is not using the right gamma.

 

strange problem. perhaps some screen grabs might help us diagnose the problem?

 

m