Finally figured out why my screen blues looked like garbage on paper - it was that stupid RGB monitor profile I'd been using for 2 years.

Switched to a proofing profile last week and my latest batch of business cards came back looking exactly like the preview for the first time ever, has anyone else struggled with monitor calibration for cheap printers?

2 comments

2 Comments

wendysmith4d ago

Have you checked if your printer's driver has its own color management settings that might be overriding everything? I fought with this for months until I realized my cheap laser printer had a "vivid" setting turned on by default that was making everything look oversaturated even with the correct profile. Once I turned that off and made sure the application was handling color instead of the printer, things finally matched up.

betty_ward3d ago

Have you checked if your cheap printer might just have a narrower gamut than your monitor's showing? In my experience, even with perfect profiles, budget printers can't match what you see on a decent screen.