What is Soft Proofing?

Soft proofing is a mechanism that allows you to more accurately preview (on screen) what your photo will look like on paper (a specific paper).

Colour representation varies in the printed photo depending on several variables including: ink, printer type and paper used. To prepare your system for soft proofing, you will need the manufacturer defined printer-ink-paper profile* (for each paper type), as well as a calibrated monitor.

*These are profiles supplied on paper manufacturer websites, e.g. Ilford.

(See also Soft Proofing article on Luminous Landscape, and monitor calibration article for further reading.)

Setting up Soft Proofing in Photoshop

In Photoshop, click on the "View" menu, then "Proof Setup" and select "Custom".

The "Customize Proof Condition" dialog will appear.

Select the profile for your printer/paper combination from the "Device to Simulate" list.

(Paper manufacturers provide paper ICC profiles for specific printers on their website. When you download these profiles they will appear in the "Device to simulate" list.)

Set the "Rendering Intent" to Perceptual and tick "Black Point Compensation". "Simulate Paper Colour" should be ticked so that Photoshop represents the paper colour on screen. All other values should be unticked.

When done selecting the profile, click "OK". Photoshop will show you the soft-proofed version of photo.

Using the "proofing view" in Photoshop

To change between proofing view and normal view, either click "View" menu and select "Proof Colors" or press CTRL-Y.

Printing

In order to print with the correct paper/printer profile from Photoshop, you'll need to let Photoshop manage the colours.

 In the Photoshop print dialog, under "Color Handling" changed this "Photoshop Manages Colors".

Select the correct paper/printer profile from the "Printer Profile" list and ensure "Rendering Intent" is set to "Preceptual".

"Black Point Compensation" should be ticked.

In your printer settings, you should disable any colour management the printer may have.

In this dialog for the Epson R2400 printer, the color management is set to off.

Different printer manufacturers will have different dialogs and options for color management, please refer to your printers manual for more information.