how to run scripts (not actions) in PSE9 or later

[Paul Whiting]

Woo-hoo! Many thanks to both of you. Worked like a charm, even in PSE9. This is big... much easier than the process I was using for linearization.

Actually I believe I did follow the instructions in the sense I was scanning both the Kodak reference and my printout of a grey scale, in the same scan. The only difference was that my printout was of a 21 step grey file I already had in my computer from my previous method. I thought, heck, what's the difference? I'm scanning a printout - what difference does it make how it was printed. A print of a grey scale is a print of a grey scale. It was physically in the scanner right next to the Kodak scale. (see my earlier screen shot) But as I think as one of you said, it expects a printout of their 21 step file and must want to refer to the one in their zip file.

I am so grateful to both of you... this will save many hours when I create printer curves.

Now I'll hustle on over to the Adobe forum and terminate that thread - but thanking whoever might be there.

Cheers!

Paul

[Paul Whiting]

I think there's another factor in the 21 step tiff that I used... its patches are not all the same size. This may be the issue, according to the directions other step files are acceptable but, quoting from the pdf "There are many 21 step wedges around that have uneven patch sizes - these will not work." Go back earlier in the thread and you'll note my end patches, the white and the black, are significantly wider than the patches in between.

I should've read more carefully.

Paul

[Paul Whiting]

Tom,

Darn ... I'm not out of the woods yet. Tom, when you were able to run through the whole process, did you get A and B values in the Final Data file? I didn't... here's what I got: (sorry, it's not formatted very well. But you can see there's nothing under A and B) It might have something to do with using the right Mode or color space - which I don't understand very well.

Paul

PatchGrayLab A B
0 0.00 96.30 0.00 0.00
1 5.00 93.60 0.00 0.00
2 10.00 91.54 0.00 0.00
3 15.00 88.45 0.00 0.00
4 20.00 85.31 0.00 0.00
5 25.00 82.14 0.00 0.00
6 30.00 78.93 0.00 0.00
7 35.00 75.32 0.00 0.00
8 40.00 71.65 0.00 0.00
9 45.00 67.55 0.00 0.00
10 50.00 63.39 0.00 0.00
11 55.00 58.74 0.00 0.00
12 60.00 55.58 0.00 0.00
13 65.00 51.98 0.00 0.00
14 70.00 47.88 0.00 0.00
15 75.00 45.37 0.00 0.00
16 80.00 41.54 0.00 0.00
17 85.00 37.18 0.00 0.00
18 90.00 33.14 0.00 0.00
19 95.00 26.59 0.00 0.00
20 100.00 21.68 0.00 0.00

[Tpgettys]

Hi Paul,
My results look similar to yours. I think I have gone as far as I can here, as I really don't understand what the purpose of this tool is. The next step is to make contact with the providers of the tool and tell them what you are seeing. Since they understand what this is all about they should be able to quickly identify what the final issue is. Good luck, and let me know how it goes!

[Paul Whiting]

Tom,

Yup, I've already posted a message over in that group... it's a Yahoo! group and maintained by the author of the program. I posted here just to verify you were not getting data under A and B either.

The purpose of the tool is to create custom printer curves for quality black and white photographs, using various dilutions of carbon ink (very black!) in the different printer cartridges. It's pretty arcane all right, and I can't claim to understand all the nuances myself! I believe you asked about the technique earlier and I hope I answered your question. When things are humming the way they should I get prints rivaling traditional darkroom prints in terms of quality and longevity.

Thanks again, with everyone's help here, at least we've got it running!

Paul

[Tpgettys]

You very welcome Paul, it was a fun exercise for me.  Learning a bit about carbon ink printing was a bonus!

[Sepiana]

Apr 4, 2016 11:46:28 GMT Paul Whiting said:

Woo-hoo! Many thanks to both of you. Worked like a charm, even in PSE9. This is big... much easier than the process I was using for linearization.

Paul, you are most welcome! Glad all worked out in the end.

BTW, I ran the script several times this morning and no problem. No crashes in Elements 11 through 14.

EDIT:  I used different files from my previous troubleshooting, even larger ones. No problem! This seems to confirm file size is not an issue.

[Andrei Doubrovski]

I've just tested the script with Photoshop CS6 and it crashed.
Something seems to be wrong with the script itself.

[Paul Whiting]

Andrei,

Maybe I can help... first, are you running the script alone, without any grayscales in your workspace? I think you have to have something for the script to "look at". Also, if you do have items in the workspace, where I ran into trouble is that my printed grey scale did not have steps all the same size. I was using a 21 step grey scale from another source. The one that comes with the script has 21 steps all the same size... when I used that greyscale I did not experience a crash.

This is just my experience, there may be other causes for your crash. I was using a much less powerful software than you are, it was Elements 9.

Hope this helps,

Paul

[Andrei Doubrovski]

Thanks, Paul.
Indeed, I tried to run the script on an RGB image.
With Grayscale images, it seems to work for me
(tested in PSE 14)

[Paul Whiting]

Hmm, I'm not sure that script is intended for color images. You might ask over here: groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/QuadtoneRIP/info

This group is frequented by Roy Harrington, the author of QTR and he probably wrote that script as well.

Paul