Not all images are showing up when clients go to print their images, what'd I do?

[MitchellPhotog]

I'm a total armature just shooting for good friends, not even charging. I would like to go pro eventually and my friends are nice enough to let me learn with them.
I use the current photoshop, shoot and edit in RAW and RGB, then convert to CMYK and JPEG, burn to DVD through Nero. The images transfer as they are supposed to from DVD to "client's" computer. The problem I'm having is when they take the DVD to a store to have them printed, not all the images are showing up. I've now had this happen with 2 different ppl, I'm now wondering if other recipients of my DVDs are having the same problem but are to nice to say anything since I did it all for free experience. What could I be doing wrong? Are some images somehow becoming corrupted?

Any guidance or even your best guess would be greatly appreciated

 

[binga63]

do you check the burnt disks after the burn?

 

[bratkinson]

Using Nero to burn the DVDs...what options are you choosing? You should be selecting DATA DVD or something like that. I can't remember the exact terminology as I am at work.

Like CDs that can hold DATA or MUSIC information, DVDs can be used for DATA, MUSIC, or VIDEO. Each of the formats is completely different in how they are recorded. Choosing DATA format and recording the JPGs there should do the trick.

Also, select 'verify after burning' option to ensure it's not something in your computer causing the problem.

 

[KmH]

Why do you convert them to CMYK? JPEG is ok but print stores generally want JPEG image files to be sRGB instead of CMYK.
It may be that the stores device cannot 'read' the file type of those few photos that don't show up.

Why aren't you using Photoshop to burn the DVD? What version of Photoshop do you have?

There are also many other aspects to getting prints made, if print quality is something you want to control:
Tutorials on Color Management & Printing

The Digital Print: Preparing Images in Lightroom and Photoshop for Printing

Part of the reason for not giving people photos on a DVD is that they generally know less about how to get prints made than the photographer does.

 

[astroNikon]

Are you using dual layer DVDs

When I give people stuff - music, pictures, videos, documents, etc I always use a single layer DVD (4.7 GB) versus the dual layer DVD
as you NEVER know what type of equipment they are going to use it for and whether it is compatible or not.

 

[MitchellPhotog]

When I researched RGB and CMYK I read that RGB is what the average computer monitor views photos at best and CMYK is what most print companies print by. I even have several books that have state you should always print CMYK and for web display use RGB.
I do convert from RAW to JPEG every time, even though I would prefer to make then TIFF as that is a "lossless" transformation.

I didn't know you could know you could burn DVDs from Photoshop, I edit in Photoshop CS6 and burn through Nero and a Data DVD. I verify the cd after I burn it, even try uploading from the cd as if I were the client and they all work and load perfectly. It's when they take the cd to a store, not all the pictures show up for the print shop people.

 

[MitchellPhotog]

Thank you very much for these links! I'm at work now but I will dive into them once I'm home.

 

[robbins.photo]

Thank you very much for these links! I'm at work now but I will dive into them once I'm home.

One other thing, there are several different methods to "burn" a DVD - one of them opens the DVD to write to like USB device which is not a format that can be read on all systems. Another issue might be that you can burn some images to a disk, then come back and burn some more before finalizing. Again this creates multiple sessions on a DVD that not all systems can read correctly.

Your best bet is to take all the images and create an ISO image, then burn the image to disk and finalize it all in the same step. That will give you maximum compatiblity across systems. Also, don't use RW (read/write) disks, again not all systems can read them properly (though this is not as much of an issue as it was a few years ago).

Last, always have your burning software run a crc check and have it verify the cd/dvd after it is burned.

 

[KmH]

CMYK is used for offset press printing. CMYK has a very small color gamut compared to the RGB family of color spaces.

Inkjet and chromogenic photo prints are made using the sRGB or Adobe RGB color spaces. But the printing process does use the subtractive color model that is CMYK to reproduce images that are in the additive color model - RGB.
Not all print labs can print images accurately that are in the Adobe RGB color space, but all of them should be able to print from the sRGB color space.

How to Burn a CD From Adobe Bridge | eHow