User-Configured Monitor-to-Printer Color Reproduction

摘要

Every type of color imaging device has its own color reproduction method, providing color characteristic information. Thus, a color management system with an ICC profile is generally used to reproduce colors between two different color imaging devices, for example, from a monitor to a printer. However, once the ICC profile of a device is measured and stored, it usually remains unchanged. Yet, a user can sometimes control the monitor configuration, such as the color temperature, contrast, and brightness, according to their preference, thereby changing the color characteristics of the monitor. In addition, typical end user's viewing condition is not matched to standard environment. In this case, if the user then prints an image on the monitor screen, the color of the printed image will not match the color displayed on the monitor screen, as the color characteristics of the ICC profile provided by the monitor manufacturer will no longer represent the user-configured color characteristics of the monitor. Therefore, this article proposes a method for user-configured monitor-to-printer color reproduction based on an estimation of the monitor characteristics under user's monitor configuration and viewing condition. First, the color characteristics according to change of monitor configuration is measured and modeled for the red-green-blue (RGB) chromaticity and tone curve. Second, to estimate the color characteristics of the user's monitor, color matching between a printed color chart and a reproduced color chart image on the monitor screen by soft proofing is accomplished. The RGB chromaticity and tone curve models are used in a soft proofing process for adjusting the monitor's color characteristics. After color matching, color characteristics of the user's monitor are then obtained. Finally, the monitor to printer color reproduction is evaluated based on the color characteristics obtained for the monitor. Experimental results using the proposed method show that the printed images have almost the same colors as the images on the real user-configured monitor screen.