Smolin:

James Gurney scored a 16.

LOL he must didn't take it seriously! 

joeparis:

Don't worry, there's not a great demand for gradient sorters.

aw dang, there goes that career choice...

damn it all to hell and back, i've just done it again, thinking i mustn't have concentrated last time, and i got a worse score! 43!!!

i give up!

kazky:

damn it all to hell and back, i've just done it again, thinking i mustn't have concentrated last time, and i got a worse score! 43!!!

i give up!

I wouldn't worry too much. Part of this is dependant on your monitor. And none of those with zero took a screengrab to prove it so it never happened.

I did this test a few weeks back and I got 4. I did the same thing about 3 or 4 years back and got 7. An I did a real world practical one for work about 10 or so years back (I don't recall what score I got - about 26 or something, but it was partly scuppered by the stupid woman dropping my trays all over the floor and rushing me to redo the whole thing).

[edited for incompetent use of words that go together good]

yeah that's true banj, no evidence means it didn't happen.

i'm happy with that, gawd why would they make up something like that :))

And there I was, thinking I was doing brilliantly, this is easy, perfect score here I come!...

But no, I was denied.

I got an 8 as well -_-

I just clicked on the score button without any actual sorting and got what seems to be a worst score of 1072. My 44 is marginally less depressing now.

And without going too much off topic... I've said before and I'll say again. I do wish the magazine would do a colour calibration tutorial or something. You know, where they print one of those strange calibration pictures in the mag and have the same image on the disk so we can load it up, compare and then twiddle various knobs to try make them look more similar. It would be rather useful.

Interesting idea, Valence. But in effect, they've done that: look at a picture from the mag & match it up to the digital version on the disk. It's also a good idea to keep a professional color strip on your desk (like a Pantone deal) so you can compare it to your monitor. Not that I do that, but...uh...y'know. In a perfect world and all...

Smolin:

look at a picture from the mag & match it up to the digital version on the disk.

You are assuming that the printed version of the image is identical to the original digital file on the disc, which isn't always the case. 

Yeah but I was thinking about something more standardised (is that a word? is it??) than just a normal painting (that may or may not have been tweaked for print anyway) and something that specifically takes into account the differences between the digital RGB and the printed CMYK (or is it CYMK? I never know which way round those letters go. You can tell I'm an expert on all this?!) in order to make the two images "the same" to an idiot's eye.

And I've read before about some of those online print stores that will actually send you a printed calibration image before you order any photos just to get your monitor "sorted" first before any subsequent complaints about the pictures you get.

(Perhaps all the stores do them but this is sadly the only example my 1:00AM level of patience can be bothered to find.)

Valence:

....I've read before about some of those online print stores that will actually send you a printed calibration image before you order any photos just to get your monitor "sorted" first before any subsequent complaints about the pictures you get.

(Perhaps all the stores do them but this is sadly the only example my 1:00AM level of patience can be bothered to find.)

Yes, that's the general idea. I mentioned Pantone because they are the printing industry standard for color mixing and matching, so I trust them to print out "pure" color strips. I worked in a magazine art department many moons ago and Pantone color swatches were standard kit, just to make sure what was on your screen would generally match what came back from the printer.

To Banj's comment that what's printed doesn't always match what's on the disk, theoretically that should never happen, unless your printers don't color match and calibrate. Theoretically, CMYK formulas should look the same anywhere -- in print or on screen -- provided the colors are mixed properly at the printers and the viewing monitor at home is calibrated correctly.

But naturally, a lot of other factors will change how an image compares, from a bad press run to an improperly tuned monitor. To provide even more movement into this already moving target, even the lighting around your computer will affect how an image looks, which is why industry pros often use monitor hoods along with electronic calibration tools, and never work in natural light. It's mind-boggling and never 100% accurate.