Les Jones

Make sure your color spaces (sRGB v. Adobe RGB) match and you aren't doing double conversions.

Not sure where to check that in Picasa. Under the View menu there's a Display submenu with choices for 16 and 24 bit, Mac and linear gamma, and some others. It's set to "automatic."

Don't know about Picasa settings, but it is my understanding from some other comments that it does not have color management.

This means it probably uses the default "sRGB" color space that is standard for monitors.

It is also probably "enhancing" the images with the "auto" setting. Maybe it is possible to turn all that off until you can at least get images looking the same in Picasa as they do in Photoshop, then work on matching your printer output.

If you want to use Picasa or some other non-color managed software, and if it uses the sRGB color space by default, you also need to then make sure your camera is recording images in sRGB. Some have options for sRGB, Adobe RGB, or proprietary color spaces that use manufacturer provided profiles. Check the menus and make sure you are recording images in sRGB.

Most printers have a driver setting to use the sRGB color space, or will use it by default, but they also tend to have options to further "enhance" your photos. See if you can turn off all those settings and tell it to just use the "sRGB" image as is. This is what happens when you upload images to most online digital photo labs for processing. This lets you get close to what you want the printed output to look like on your screen.

Finally, you will need to get your monitor at least somewhat calibrated so grey is grey and white is white. There are some freebie profilers that show you a series of images that let you eyball it, or you can get a fully automated system with a colorometer such as the Gretagmacbeth Eye One.

Even then it is difficult to match print output because of the complicated conversions most consumer printers use to make things "easier", and the fact that ink on paper is "reflective" as compared to images on a monitor which are "emissive", and because there are so many variations in inks and papers.

Better printers will provide profiles for each type of paper supported and driver settings to allow the printer to color manage or to turn it off and allow the software to do it (which if you are using non-color managed software is maybe your best bet).

Pros color manage the entire workflow, using camera profles, even profiles for different lenses, calibrated monitors and custom printer profiles for each type of paper and ink. This is a complicated and expensive proposition, and all the software and gear can be upwards of $3000.

You can get very close to this with something like an Eye One (or even just an eyeball solution), color managed software such as Photoshop, and printer manufacturer's paper profiles.

Anyway, the most common problem (other than different software and printer drivers "enhancing" your photos in different ways) is to record an image in one color space, then display or print it in another color space without converting it.

Untagged images are assumed by web browsers and OS display utilities and digitial print labs to be sRGB. If they were taken or edited in some other space, such as Adobe RGB, and saved as JPGs without the color space tag and without converting to sRGB, they will look "washed out". Even if tagged, you should always save them as sRGB for web/monitor display, because browsers do not have any way to do the conversion - they can only display sRGB.

For prints, you can work in Adobe RGB (with color managed software such as Photoshop that can simulate what the final output will look like using "soft proofing") and achieve slightly better output owing to the Adobe RGB color space's (and the printer's) wider color gamut. For most applications such as vacation and family photos, though, very few people will be able to tell the difference from sRGB as long as you maintain the proper color managed workflow.

It sounds like Picasa may be part of your problem. You said you have Photoshop, maybe you should just use Picasa for organizing, but Photoshop for processing and printing. Even the Photoshop Elements version has basic color management to let you accomplish everything mentioned above.

Are you sorry you asked yet?

Instead of this:

"Better printers will provide profiles for each type of paper supported and driver settings to allow the printer to color manage or to turn it off and allow the software to do it (which if you are using non-color managed software is maybe your best bet)."

I meant to say:

"Better printers will provide profiles for each type of paper supported and driver settings to allow the printer to color manage (which if you are using non-color managed software is maybe your best bet) or to turn it off and allow the software to do it."

i.e. let the printer do the conversion to its color space if you are not using color managed softwtare.

"Are you sorry you asked yet?"

Not at all. Thanks for all the help. It sounds like sRGB is the easiest route to follow for what I do, which is mostly Web with the occasional print job at Wal-Mart or our home inkjet.