Working Space

On Thu, 24 Dec 2009 09:15:01 -0800 (PST), RDOC wrote:

necessary adjustments. The lecturer stated that the home printers convert your photos to sRGB before printing them so why not just use that as your working space.

Just my $0.02, but anyone that says ‘They, or them’ as one of their facts I’d say you need to take them with more than a grain of salt.. It’s been called racial profiling, racist, discrimination…etc.. And what it all boils down to is using an expansive generic to apply to a large group to make their opinion seem like it has some credence. When in effect, if you did a poll on THEY or THEM.. the majority might go the complete opposite. ….
My HP can do all sorts of things, use it’s own profiles, use none, use the profiles set by the programs. But the one I found that works the best for me, is the DEFAULT profile set in PS, and the DEFAULT set in the printer. Which don’t necessarily agree.
Tell your lecturer to see what THEY think about that ?
FWIW: PS on my machine works with monitor color.
The HP works with disabled.
How it would work printing peacocks under a rainbow at sundown on the beach is anybodies guess. But what I create myself it works fine with..

RDOC wrote:

I know this is a subject that is very argumentative but let me get your opinion that I value very highly. I keep changing back and forth between a working space of Adobe RGB (1998) and sRGB IEC6 1996 and would like to know in your opinion which one should I really be using. Last nigh I attended a lecture and the lecturer said unless you are a real way out photographer blending colors than stick with sRGB and I have heard that many times before.

Even if you heard it a thousand times, it’s still wrong. If you use an online print service, sRGB is often what you need to send them. But even then you could always use AdobeRGB as the color space of your master images, and convert only the JPEG’s you send to the printer to sRGB. If you print at home, AdobeRGB is the better choice, but you do need to read a little bit about printing with color management. Epson printer drivers have a special AdobeRGB color space setting, though, so for Epson printers AdobeRGB is defenitly recommended.

I am just a regular person that does photography for the fun of it, shoot jpegs and yes take my work into ACR and than CS4 and do the necessary adjustments. The lecturer stated that the home printers convert your photos to sRGB before printing them so why not just use that as your working space.

This guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Home printers do *not* convert your photos to sRGB before printing! They convert the photos to the printer color space (or you let Photoshop do that if you use color management from Photoshop). Because that printer color space is much lager than sRGB, it’s not a good idea to use sRGB as your working space if you own a modern inkjet printer. when you paid for the printer, you paid to have a large color gamut, so don’t kill that by using a too small space to start with.

Just one little thing I want to be sure of, when I set the working space in Photoshop I should set the same working space in my camera, is that correct? Ok that is my questions and I want to thank you guys for being so helpful it is really appreciated.

No, you don’t have to do that. Photoshop will keep the color space of the image the way it is, if you set this in the color preferences. If you shoot in RAW, the color space setting of your camera is irrelevant because the choice is made in CameraRAW.

—
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

On Dec 24, 4:59 pm, (Johan W. Elzenga) wrote:

RDOC wrote:

I know this is a subject that is very argumentative but let me get your opinion that I value very highly. I keep changing back and forth between a working space of Adobe RGB (1998) and sRGB IEC6 1996 and would like to know in your opinion which one should I really be using. Last nigh I attended a lecture and the lecturer said unless you are a real way out photographer blending colors than stick with sRGB and I have heard that many times before.

Even if you heard it a thousand times, it’s still wrong. If you use an online print service, sRGB is often what you need to send them. But even then you could always use AdobeRGB as the color space of your master images, and convert only the JPEG’s you send to the printer to sRGB. If you print at home, AdobeRGB is the better choice, but you do need to read a little bit about printing with color management. Epson printer drivers have a special AdobeRGB color space setting, though, so for Epson printers AdobeRGB is defenitly recommended.

I am just a regular person that does photography for the fun of it, shoot jpegs and yes take my work into ACR and than CS4 and do the necessary adjustments. The lecturer stated that the home printers convert your photos to sRGB before printing them so why not just use that as your working space.

This guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Home printers do *not* convert your photos to sRGB before printing! They convert the photos to the printer color space (or you let Photoshop do that if you use color management from Photoshop). Because that printer color space is much lager than sRGB, it’s not a good idea to use sRGB as your working space if you own a modern inkjet printer. when you paid for the printer, you paid to have a large color gamut, so don’t kill that by using a too small space to start with.

Just one little thing I want to be sure of, when I set the working space in Photoshop I should set the same working space in my camera, is that correct? Ok that is my questions and I want to thank you guys for being so helpful it is really appreciated.

No, you don’t have to do that. Photoshop will keep the color space of the image the way it is, if you set this in the color preferences. If you shoot in RAW, the color space setting of your camera is irrelevant because the choice is made in CameraRAW.

—
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

Johan ok I am following your advice and I presently have the Color Settings, Work Spaces, RGB: Adobe RGB (1998) set in Photoshop CS4 and I am using an Epson Stylus Photo R1900 and a Canon Pixma 4500 printers which both are inkjets. My camera is a Nikon D80. I shoot a variety of landscapes and pictures of people as a hobby. So my question is what Color Mode should I use?

Ia sRGB for Portrait Shots
II AdobeRGB for photos that will be extensively processed or retouched IIIa sRGB for nature or landscape shots
Default setting is Ia sRGB

On Thu, 24 Dec 2009 09:15:01 -0800 (PST), RDOC wrote:

I know this is a subject that is very argumentative but let me get your opinion that I value very highly. I keep changing back and forth between a working space of Adobe RGB (1998) and sRGB IEC6 1996 and would like to know in your opinion which one should I really be using. Last nigh I attended a lecture and the lecturer said unless you are a real way out photographer blending colors than stick with sRGB and I have heard that many times before.

More important than which one you use is to pick one, and stick with it. There is very little, if any discernible difference between sRGB and Adobe RGB. I recommend using sRGB simply because it is less confusing, and you run the risk of eventually having one of your Adobe RGB images interpreted as sRGB, resulting in someone else experiencing dimmed colors in your images.

I am just a regular person that does photography for the fun of it, shoot jpegs and yes take my work into ACR and than CS4 and do the necessary adjustments. The lecturer stated that the home printers convert your photos to sRGB before printing them so why not just use that as your working space.

I agree with the lecturer absolutely. Printers do generally have an sRGB setting, or revert to sRGB when the color settings are reset. Ditto for monitors.

Just one little thing I want to be sure of, when I set the working space in Photoshop I should set the same working space in my camera, is that correct? Ok that is my questions and I want to thank you guys for being so helpful it is really appreciated.

Hope this helps – as is often the case, opinions differ, and there will probably never be a real consensus. You will not go wrong, however, sticking with sRGB.

Just to add to the confusion, there are other color spaces that people swear by, notably ProPhoto RGB, which began life at Kodak as a very wide gamut color space capable of representing any color that film was capable of. And, yes, there are people who swear by this color space as the only one worth using.

Until you run into a specific problem with a color situation that you cannot reproduce, my advice is to stick with sRGB. As Baretta used to say, in his better days, you can take that to the bank.

Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all of you.
—
Mike Russell – http://www.curvemeister.com

My workign method is to set my camera to the largest colour space possible, edit it with the largest colour space, and as long as my monitor is calibrated as best as possible, I will let my printer handle the colour at its best setting, just the same as the fact that I work at a higher resolution than the final output size.

RDOC wrote:

Johan ok I am following your advice and I presently have the Color Settings, Work Spaces, RGB: Adobe RGB (1998) set in Photoshop CS4 and I am using an Epson Stylus Photo R1900 and a Canon Pixma 4500 printers which both are inkjets. My camera is a Nikon D80. I shoot a variety of landscapes and pictures of people as a hobby. So my question is what Color Mode should I use?

Ia sRGB for Portrait Shots
II AdobeRGB for photos that will be extensively processed or retouched IIIa sRGB for nature or landscape shots
Default setting is Ia sRGB

I would use AdobeRGB for all photos. Only if you want to place a photo on the web or have it printed on line, you need to convert a copy to sRGB (In Photoshop, choose ‘Edit – Convert to profile’). As I said, the Epson printer driver has a special setting for AdobeRGB. I’m not sure about the Canon driver. The (better) alternative is to let Photoshop do the color management anyway. Both printers support that out of the box as long as you use manufacturers own papers. You do need to read a little on color management, but it’s not so complicated as you may think. Just follow the ‘Print Workflow 2’ instructions on this site: http://www.computer-darkroom.com/ps10_print/ps10_print_1.htm It’s a little dated (Photoshop CS3) but nothing really changed.

—
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

On Dec 25, 6:14 pm, (Johan W. Elzenga) wrote:

RDOC wrote:

Johan ok I am following your advice and I presently have the Color Settings, Work Spaces, RGB: Adobe RGB (1998) set in Photoshop CS4 and I am using an Epson Stylus Photo R1900 and a Canon Pixma 4500 printers which both are inkjets. My camera is a Nikon D80. I shoot a variety of landscapes and pictures of people as a hobby. So my question is what Color Mode should I use?

Ia sRGB for Portrait Shots
II AdobeRGB for photos that will be extensively processed or retouched IIIa sRGB for nature or landscape shots
Default setting is Ia sRGB

I would use AdobeRGB for all photos. Only if you want to place a photo on the web or have it printed on line, you need to convert a copy to sRGB (In Photoshop, choose ‘Edit – Convert to profile’). As I said, the Epson printer driver has a special setting for AdobeRGB. I’m not sure about the Canon driver. The (better) alternative is to let Photoshop do the color management anyway. Both printers support that out of the box as long as you use manufacturers own papers. You do need to read a little on color management, but it’s not so complicated as you may think. Just follow the ‘Print Workflow 2’ instructions on this site:http://www.computer-darkroom.com/ps10_print/ps10_print_ 1.htm
It’s a little dated (Photoshop CS3) but nothing really changed.
—
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

Well as usual the answer are all great and I will put them to immediate use so thanks to all for the help, it is really appreciated.

Hi All,

I"ve been lurking here for a while, getting to know the company. I’m a long time photographer, film and digital and found myself dissatisfied with the color prints I was getting. This all leads into color management, which is not simple. There is one book that one should at least attempt to read and that is "Real World Color Management" by Bruce Fraser et all. If this book doesn’t confuse you, you are already an expert.

I read above various comments about color space and color profiles that appear confused, if not confusing. Briefly, a color space defines the limited colors that can be seen or reproduced by a particular system, i.e., camera, monitor, printer, scanner compared to the human eye. If the color you want to see is not in the defined color space, then there is <no> possibility of ever seeing it on a monitor or reproducing it on paper.

The <accuracy> of the color that is generated by a monitor, for example, is determined by the (icc) color profile of the monitor. If you cannot calibrate your monitor, at least try to use the icc profile supplied by the monitor manufacturer unless there is a glaring issue ( have had this problem.) sRGB is poor compromise developed years ago in the time of poor quality; it is a least common denominator for displays and excludes many colors. Compare it to the even more limited "color space" of safe HTML colors. Using even an inexpensive monitor calibrator like the Huey will bring you miles ahead.

How do you share these pictures? If you use the web, change the profile to sRGB, the least common denominator. Use perceptual rendering or relative colorimetric representation. This way you will not display a color to someone else’s monitor that they will see inappropriately. You have shrunk the color space and have fewer colors than originally. Hope they also have a calibrated monitor, using a correct icc profile.

Printing? A whole new can of worms. What color on the print corresponds to what color on the monitor? First, printers and their papers/inks have their own color space, that is, the range of colors that they can reproduce. But first you have to generate a color profile, an icc profile, that attempts in the best possible way to have colors on the monitor correspond to the best representation on the print.

To go from the general to the specific, if one is using camera raw data, there is no color space for the camera. One can be generated for a camera but it is not for the faint of heart.

Now, one picks a color space to work in. Use the widest you can, like ProPhoto. Your raw data is now presented on the monitor using the ProPhoto color space with the monitor profile you have chosen, hopefully one you have generated yourself. If you use sRGB, you will have thrown away all colors outside of the sRGB color space but are in the standard IEC color space representation.

Now save the image from camera raw to PSD, jpeg, tiff or whatever. What color space will you use? sRGB for monitors, the least common denominator. For printing, the widest gamut possible, ProPhoto.

To make a print, it’s color space is determined by the printer, it’s inks, and the paper. Now you need a color profile <in that color space.>.If you can calibrate the printer to match the colors printed with IEC color using for example, a ColorMunki, all better. If not, use the printer manufacturer’s recommendations and the associated icc profile. If you use a different manufacturer’s inks or others’ paper, you are on your own unless they supply you with icc profiles for your printer, their ink and that specific paper.

My hope here is not to generate heat but light. No flames. I have never done this before but the itch got to me. I’m open to correction, criticism, etc, but please no name calling.

Paul Simon

"Evan" wrote in message

My workign method is to set my camera to the largest colour space possible, edit it with the largest colour space, and as long as my monitor is calibrated as best as possible, I will let my printer handle the colour at its best setting, just the same as the fact that I work at a higher resolution than the final output size.