ICC embedding problem

[Wino]

Equipment: Fuji Finepix S8000fd, Windows 7 Ultimate, Paintshop Pro X3.

After editing an image I click on "Save as" and then the "Options" button. In the resulting window I get the option to check the "Embed ICC" box, which I always do. Then I click "Ok" and finally the "Save" button. However, when I next click on the image it's profile says:

RGB - 8 bits/channel.
ICC Profile: None.

Does that information only apply to the preview thumbnail, and if it does, can I safely assume the ICC profile has in fact been embedded in the image itself?

Hopefully a kind person will help me out here.

 

[Edsport]

Go to "Edit", then convert to profile and in the destination space choose sRGB IEC61966-2.1 and hit ok...

 

[Wino]

Thanks Edsport for your kind reply.

Actually I'm still at a loss. Go to "edit" - where please? Hopefully with your patience and help and I'll resolve this ICC problem.

 

[Edsport]

Ahh sorry. I now see photoshop wasn't in your list of software. Didn't pay much attention to it when i posted...

 

[Garbz]

Ok just some quick questions. Do you actually use a non-standard colour space? It makes little sense to tag the sRGB ICC profile in an image since software that doesn't understand profiles will assume it's sRGB anyway.
Also WHERE are you checking the profile? In your software? In windows? Did you close and open the image again before you checked?

More importantly if you close and open the image again does it look horrendously different?

 

[Wino]

Ok just some quick questions. Do you actually use a non-standard colour space? It makes little sense to tag the sRGB ICC profile in an image since software that doesn't understand profiles will assume it's sRGB anyway.
Also WHERE are you checking the profile? In your software? In windows? Did you close and open the image again before you checked?

More importantly if you close and open the image again does it look horrendously different?

Hi Garbz,
Thanks for responding.
As far as I'm aware I don't use a non-standard colour space. To be honest I don't know what colour space is, so it will still be in default setting.

I'm checking via PSPX3. I click "File" then "Open" to get a window listing my images. I then click an image and on that same window it then says:

"Image information/preview"
"RGB - 8 bits/channel"
"ICC profile None"
The height and width measurements it quotes are the same as the original image.

There is also a smaller thumbnail of the image.

Did I close and open the image again before I checked? After I save (save as) I close the image and then check via PSP as shown above.

When I close and open the image there is no difference.

I have just taken 2 identical pics. In one I checked the 'Embed ICC Profile" box. In the other, I did not. There is no difference between the two whatsoever (not that these old eyes can see that is.

Perhaps as I'm not a commercial photographer/printer, and just want to be satisfied with prints (I do them myself), I should not concern myself about ICC profiles but continue as I have done for some good time.

Thanks again for responding.

 

[Wino]

Ahh sorry. I now see photoshop wasn't in your list of software. Didn't pay much attention to it when i posted...

No problem Edsport. Thanks anyway.

 

[Garbz]

I have just taken 2 identical pics. In one I checked the 'Embed ICC Profile" box. In the other, I did not. There is no difference between the two whatsoever (not that these old eyes can see that is.

This basically means that the image you are saving follows the sRGB ICC profile. This is the standard profile that is rendered when no profile is found or if the program editing images is not aware of how profiles work (which happens depressingly often).

Congratulations, you're not doing colour management. Keep it that way, it's a whole world of pain for a very very small gain in saturation of your images.

To give you the background, the sRGB profile defines a standard set of colour points which is followed by 99.9% of products out there such as monitors and photo editing software. However it doesn't cover all the colours our eyes can conceivably see. There are monitors out there which can produce richer reds, greens, and blues, and there's printers out there which can print slightly richer colours as well. But since there's a hard limit in a colour i.e. sRGB(255,0,0) represents a certain red colour which may not be quite as rich as your print can display, it's possible to record these richer colours by using a different profile. i.e. sRGB(255,0,0) = AdobeRGB(219,0,0) allowing you to display a more richer red if you use AdobeRGB. The caveat is that every program that attempts to open the image that is saved in AdobeRGB needs to know that the colour values are non standard, and thus enters the "Embed ICC Profile" option.

As mentioned it's a world of hurt for very little gain. I suggest you get a degree in astrophysics before starting down the colour management route.

 

[Wino]

I have just taken 2 identical pics. In one I checked the 'Embed ICC Profile" box. In the other, I did not. There is no difference between the two whatsoever (not that these old eyes can see that is.

This basically means that the image you are saving follows the sRGB ICC profile. This is the standard profile that is rendered when no profile is found or if the program editing images is not aware of how profiles work (which happens depressingly often).

Congratulations, you're not doing colour management. Keep it that way, it's a whole world of pain for a very very small gain in saturation of your images.

To give you the background, the sRGB profile defines a standard set of colour points which is followed by 99.9% of products out there such as monitors and photo editing software. However it doesn't cover all the colours our eyes can conceivably see. There are monitors out there which can produce richer reds, greens, and blues, and there's printers out there which can print slightly richer colours as well. But since there's a hard limit in a colour i.e. sRGB(255,0,0) represents a certain red colour which may not be quite as rich as your print can display, it's possible to record these richer colours by using a different profile. i.e. sRGB(255,0,0) = AdobeRGB(219,0,0) allowing you to display a more richer red if you use AdobeRGB. The caveat is that every program that attempts to open the image that is saved in AdobeRGB needs to know that the colour values are non standard, and thus enters the "Embed ICC Profile" option.

As mentioned it's a world of hurt for very little gain. I suggest you get a degree in astrophysics before starting down the colour management route.

Thanks for the follow-up Garbz. With your help I have now put the ICC question to bed. My brain is now taking a deserved rest.