Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
Interview with Stephen Wilkes
ADR:
When did you start using color management?
SW:
We started using color management in about 1998 or 1999 when
we started digital printing using the original Epson 5000, and then I got
very caught up in the technology. From that point I was printing all my
photos for my portfolio on Cibachrome, which was very labor intensive.
I remember going to a lab in New York, I brought my slides and they did
my scans, and then we made this print on this printer (Epson 5000), and
I looked at it and I said “I can't believe what this looks like.” I was just
staggered by it. I had to get one of these printers, which we did.
I think the big thing was the learning curve at that point, especially
with the technology when profiling was a unique process. A very limited
niche group of people knew how to do profiling and they frankly were
not that great at teaching it. If you wanted to print on certain papers you
had to create custom profiles. So much of the ease of the technology we
have today was really far removed at that time. We learned the hard way,
but I recognized through the process that what you want to do with a
digital work flow is optimize your color in such a way that there is some
consistency. We noticed that the monitor looked one way, and of course
we'd get a print and it looked another way, and then the scans
wouldn't look right depending on the number of sources you had to work
with. As the technology developed I began to get more interested in color
management because obviously from a time standpoint, the dream from
the beginning when doing our printing we'd look at prints and say “OK
can we just get it to look like that?” not having to go through 10 proofs.
The really big jump started when we got involved with GretagMac-
beth, working with various profiles: profiling the monitor, developing
profiles for specific paper types allows us to grow into this process. In
2000, the technology made a huge jump and I was fortunate to be part
of the launch of the archival ink-jet process that Epson had developed
using seven inks that would last 200 years. I did this show across the
United States; 52 days photographing America. The most exciting thing
was at the end, looking at these huge prints that Mac Holbert had printed.
I worked with Mac on the exhibition. We were literally beta testing on
the fly and once we saw the process whereby we were getting the results
we wanted and having our expectation met, from that point on I began
to get more and more into color management.
ADR:
What part of color management isn't working?
SW:
Ideally for me, color management needs to start from the point
of capture and as great as it is if you're working from existing film, for
me, working so much now with digital cameras I'm much more inter-
ested in seeing if there's a way to make the digital capture have a similar
experience that I had when I shot film; taking slides out of a box, throw-
