Photos have a red cast

shessel said:

4. uninstalled all software re: Epson printing & rebooted
5. Photoshop and Windows Photo Gallery ............ still magenta as before

Well that's certainly disappointing! Unless there's something residually still set in Photoshop from when you had the Epson printer software installed that's the fundamental issue here.

I'm still wondering where you got Windows Photo Gallery in your Win7 32-bit. My HELP for Win7 x64 says it's not available for this version of Windows. Or maybe it's only available in ULTIMATE, and I only have PRO. I wanted to try everything you were seeing it in, but had no way to run this one.

thank you, but now what; got anymore ideas? I hope.

Well, you say that you didn't always have this magenta problem? It used to be "normal" and somehow changed to magenta at some point? That clearly points to some setting you changed (which affects Windows Photo Gallery as well, so you wouldn't think the crucial change was in Photoshop but rather something external to that... something global, like printer or monitor color profile or related).

But just to confirm that your relevant Photoshop settings are "reasonable", here are mine. This is for (a) color (I opened "more details"), (b) proof, and (c) printer. Note that I'm on my second machine right now, and the Canon 9000 printer is not available. But my printer settings are the same on that second machine (and I do "color adjustment for paper profiles" using the Canon printer software and its own provided set of ICC profiles for Canon paper), which is why I tell Photoshop to let the printer handle color.








Also, did you say that you can open the picture in one or more other image viewer apps, and you don't see the magenta shift? These must not be "vulnerable" to whatever global setting/software you've got that is impacting Photoshop and Windows Photo Gallery.

Did you run Adobe Gamma??

mjf, you're not ignored, I've been downloading the CS5 updates for the last 2 hours (wireless connection), with at least another 1.5hrs to go, then will reset Preferences as you suggested. These were good ideas and I will let you know the results later today. Don't give up, please, it takes many hours to fully work through the details of great help from everyone; this has been my No.#1 priority since this post began ... and then there's family & work too. Steve

Kingscurate, mjf,dsperber, & all:
Talk about sloooooooooooooow, I started the (wireless) download of 58MB for the CS5 update about 8:30 this AM, and it just finished at 6:48PM. I totally agree with mjf's recent assessment that something globally has happened, and that resetting all defaults would be an excellent next step.

You have all given me great leads in just the past 24 hours, and since I read the Cambridgeincolor site Monday, I have a much better perspective on what's going on behind these suggestions. No time today to work on this because of the long download, so I am going to devote the entire day tomorrow to carefully apply this latest round of leads. As I said before, this has been a steep learning curve (aka: Computer Black Swan) that was not on my horizon, but you have all provided the right clues to keep this "treasure hunt" going ... and I have had a crash course on Color Management. You're all some pretty smart fellas and I couldn't have gotten this far without you. My deepest fear is that the problem is a software issue caused by non compatible ICC profiles (finding each other incorrectly in the bowels of a memory chip); in which case I am screwed $$$ big-time.

As they say, even a blind pig finds the occasional truffle, and I am motivated to find this fungus. Even if the culprit is not found, I'm sure going to know where it ain't!
Frustrated but wiser, Steve

ALL:
I have now reviewed every single suggestion and tutorial everyone has posted to me above, and implemented whatever was appropriate to fix the subject problem. I posted the exact same question on the Adoble/Photoshop Forum and received 56 reads/zero responses. This review has literally taken 40+ hours and my conclusion is that this problem is not a user setting error, but a Windows/Photoshop software failing or incompatibility. This is not an issue of color correcting individual photographs, or a user color management issue. This pronounced red/magenta color cast is on every photograph as soon as it uploads from Windows into Photoshop. This is, IMHO, a systemic software problem which has apparently not been officially acknowledged by Adobe, from what I see in their Photoshop Forum (Adobe Community: Printing magenta/red with CS5 ). If one Googles, "windows photoshop red magenta cast on photos", there are 9,600,000 posts on this question. The majority of the responses completely miss the larger concern and respond with helpful tips on how to color correct a single picture. Who is going to color correct a major software error on every single picture in an entire photo shoot? It is not even possible.The bigger issue is that there is a systemic color management problem in the software. Once this problem is embed in a computer, the photo processing and printing in that specific machine is completely ruined. Unless someone provides an " update patch" this software error seems to be there in the CPU forever. I did not read all 9,600,000 Google posts, but of the several hundred read there was not one addressing a solution to the bigger underlying issue.
How does one proceed .........
Steve

shessel said:

How does one proceed .........
Steve

Well, at this point I'd definitely try something a bit extreme, and a bit out of the box. I agree with your assessment that it is perhaps a "systemic" issue of incompatibility between Windows and Photoshop, but the fact that MANY of us also have Windows and Photoshop and do NOT have the magenta color shift symptom points to some other as yet not pin-pointed factor(s) as being relevant.

So, I ask again which image apps on your system DO exhibit the color shift, and which other image apps DO NOT?

Also, I am using a 64-bit version of Win7 (Pro) whereas you are using a 32-bit version of Win7 (Ultimate). Is that relevant? Don't know.

But as for my "solution", well not so much that yet as much as one more fact finding adventure that only costs a few hours of your time:

(1) preserve the folder(s) with your data (i.e. your images and anything else) to some backup which is easily available for a restore of that data, unless you already have a normal backup procedure for safeguarding your data from which that data can easily be restored

(2) take a "system image" backup of your current C-partition so that you can restore it later if you have to

(3) wipe the C-partition and perform a brand new completely from-scratch Win7 install to "start over", into which you will possibly reinstall all of your 3rd-party application software, customizations, etc., if it comes to that (you must be willing to do that if necessary). Install video driver, and other necessary hardware software, BUT DO NOT INSTALL EPSON PRINTER SUPPORT... which means DO NOT POWER ON THE PRINTER.

(4) Apply all Windows Updates and basic minimal customization. You want to expend minimal energy to do this Win7 reinstall for the experiment.

(5) restore the image folders from your backup storage to whatever hard drive location you can easily access them from, just so you can experiment with this

(6) if you say Windows Photo Gallery (which again, is NOT AVAILABLE on my own Win7 Pro x64 system, but which you say IS AVAILABLE on your own 32-bit Win7 Ultimate system) currently exhibits the magenta color shift symptom, see if it still exhibits this symptom when now running on the brand newly reinstalled from-scratch out-of-the-box Win7.

(7) install Phototshop from scratch, and once again repeat the test on your images, and see if it still exhibits the magenta color shift symptom.

Depending on the results of (6) and (7) and anything else you might care to try, your next course of action is either:

(a) if the magenta problem has disappeared with the brand new cold from-scratch Win7 reinstall, then your current problem can only be attributed to something that's become permanently corrupted or imbedded in your current Win7 Registry or system environment due to user settings of other installed software. Obviously you have not [yet] repeated that action if (6) and (7) do not [yet] fail again.

Then proceed with the rest of the complete software reinstall into your brand newly reinstalled win7 WHICH WORKS FINE FOR COLOR. At the other end you'll have "emerged victorious", with just some probably long overdue "cleaning house" performed.

==> at each step of your software reinstall, keep repeating the image tests to see if the magenta problem has finally reappeared (or not). I'd certainly take a "system image" backup before finally powering on the Epson printer and installing the Epson software, just in case it turns out to be "the culprit". Having the backup available allows you some options to decide how to react, if it is the Epson software which is at fault. But... maybe it will not be "the culprit". In fact, maybe the magenta problem will NEVER RETURN AGAIN (which is my prediction), in which case again we can point to a somehow corrupted current Win7 system where the only "solution" is a complete Win7 cold reinstall from scratch.

(b) if the magenta problem still appears (which quite frankly my own intuition tells me WILL NOT BE THE CASE), we can talk about it. Since you've not solved the problem, you might as well just restore the "system image" backup you took at the start, to get things back the way you started and with just the loss of a few hours of your time.


I myself would not give up without trying the "clean reinstall of Win7" approach effort, since my own feeling is that it's tied to your Epson printer software... or some other system corruption.

It is virtually guaranteed (in my mind) that a complete reinstall of Win7 will see you come out the winner.

King and dsperbr ...
I've been in Chicago for 2 days and just back. I'm impressed you have more good suggestions. I need to re-compose after escaping the city, and tomorrow, Sunday, I begin going through your ideas. This looks like a lot to consider so I expect it could take a day or two, and I'll get back to you asap. This also looks like another mind bending journey into unfamiliar computer space (for me). Cheers, Steve