laptop monitor and printer colours

[Ellen]

the colours I see on my laptop screen are different from what my printer ( Canon IP 4300) prints.
however when I send layouts ( like those for a wedding album or my Australia album) to a proper commercial printer the colours are exactly what I see on my screen. Do they transfer the colours???
how can I home print in the right colours , from what I read it's difficult to calibrate a laptop .
would it help to put an external monitor on the laptop?

If there is no solution I may need to reinstall Photoshop on the big computer as I never had this issue working from that.

[Tailz61]

ellen i had a similar problem printing from my desktop, did an album for my mum and the pages looked awesome on my screen but when I printed I found that the darker pages we awful so I had to stick with using lighter colours good job I was printing as I completed each one so I then stuck with the light ones or I'd have been rather annoyed if I'd completed them all. SOrry I don't have a solution but least your not on your own :)

[coppercurls]

One of the NAPP Photoshop guys says a lot depends on your brightness setting. I like a very bright monitor and the newer ones are quite brilliant. He recommended to turn the brightness down one to two notches before printing. The you may need to add a brightness adjustment layer to lighten it up. That has worked for me on most occasions. Once in awhile I'll need to lighten more and reprint. Apparently that is a problem with most everyone. I never had a problem with my 4 year old desktop, but with my laptop I do. When I print from Lightroom however, it works fine.

[coppercurls]

There is also a way to see exactly what it will look like on the paper you are printing on before you print. In Photoshop, Go to View>Proof Setup>Custom. In the dialog boxes set the paper you are using and check the box that says Simulate Paper Color. Sometimes the difference is surprising.

[robyn]

Good tip Roxi...........thanks.

[Tailz61]

thanks for that Roxi....super tips...I think half the time with the laptops the screens are much smaller than most of our desktops are these days and mine is one of the LED and it's lovely and shiney but geez....to I get reflection mainly of myself which is not good...I can always see me looking back at myself lol

[Catherine]

the colours I see on my laptop screen are different from what my printer ( Canon IP 4300) prints.
however when I send layouts ( like those for a wedding album or my Australia album) to a proper commercial printer the colours are exactly what I see on my screen. Do they transfer the colours???
how can I home print in the right colours , from what I read it's difficult to calibrate a laptop .
would it help to put an external monitor on the laptop?

If there is no solution I may need to reinstall Photoshop on the big computer as I never had this issue working from that.

Whatever screen you are using to decide the final colours of your photographs and layouts should be calibrated, so if you attach another screen to your laptop that should also be calibrated. Today's modern screens are usually very good and fairly accurate, but there's no doubt that some are better than others.

There are many articles on the web about colour calibration, here's just one to take a look at:

http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/match_prints_to_screen.html

I use a small device called a Huey Pro to calibrate (it's not as expensive as some of the others) and I use two monitors, but I still find that in some cases I have to tweak an image slightly before printing, particularly if I change to a different type paper.

[Digidonna]

Thanks for that tip, Roxi. I will definitely use that one! I too often have to adjust brightness before printing.

[Ellen]

thanks Roxi, I tried changing the brightness but still I get a different colour . I'll just have to keep on trying