Question about color spaces..

bullshark

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Well I have been having a problem with colorspaces lately. I guess I never noticed it. I would edit something in Photoshop CS3 and look at it in Windows Picture Viewer and it would look totally washed out.. They use different color spaces, Photoshop was using Adobe RGB, and windows was using sRGB 2.1. So I changed my photoshop to sRGB2.1 and I got the things on MY computer to look right.. But what about OTHER peoples computers? I have two photographers that want me to send them pictures that I took, but I'm afraid they may look like sh*t.. What is the best way to get everyone seeing the same thing? What color space should I edit in? CMYK? sRGB 2.1? Adobe RGB 1998? I opened the same pictures that I edited on my home computer last night here on my work computer and they look overcooked.. On my computer they look perfect..
 
Well it depends what you are doing with your pictures, I am not going to get into technical details but here is an overview of what each colour space is good for.

1) Adobe RBG 1998 – This is a photo print standard colour space, this is best choice for printing your pictures at most high end photo labs. (Most Photographers I know work in this space)

2) sRBG 2.1 – This gamut was original designed for web developer to match the colour profile of most monitors on home computers. This is the best choice if you only plan to display your work on the web.

3) CMYK – This is designed for Large ink printers,(Magazines and Books are most common) Unless you are specifically asked for this I would avoid it. You can always convert at a later date if you need to.
 
ok, so if you were to present your work to someone over the computer, and you couldnt do it on the computer on which you edited the photos, what would you do to ensure they look as good as they do on your monitor? The person just wants a disc to see what you were made of. This is no little difference.. It's the diff btwn crap and good, the job or the unemployment line, the gourmet meal or starving to death..
 
If someone is looking at photography in that aspect they should have a calibrated monitor and they should also know to look at the colour space of the image.

If they don't there is not much you can do. Every monitor is different and will display different colour. If you want to be sure how someone will view your work, print a few samples as 8X10 and drop them off with them.
 
I have found that sRGB is ideal for about 90% of my clients/audience .. I do all my editing in a 16-bit ProPhoto RGB workspace .. then when I am finished with all the manipulation I convert to an 8-bit sRGB workspace before saving to JPG for the general public.
 
I don't understand the whole AdobeRGB thing. I do everything in sRGB. I view in a web browser, view in a thumbnail viewer, view in Windows application, work in an editor all in sRGB. I used AdobeRGB once and the colors were so drastically oversaturated, it looked horrible. I would have had to desaturate everything, but then if I uploaded to the web in sRGB, there would be no color in the photo.
 
I don't understand the whole AdobeRGB thing. I do everything in sRGB. I view in a web browser, view in a thumbnail viewer, view in Windows application, work in an editor all in sRGB. I used AdobeRGB once and the colors were so drastically oversaturated, it looked horrible. I would have had to desaturate everything, but then if I uploaded to the web in sRGB, there would be no color in the photo.

Right,sRBG is better for the web and monitors, but Adobe RBG is better for printing your pictures.
 
Right,sRBG is better for the web and monitors, but Adobe RBG is better for printing your pictures.
Still, my experience is, in sRGB, the picture is perfect, exactly what is wanted. Changing to AdobeRGB for printing and I have to do huge amounts of editing to get it back to looking good. Surely it is better to just leave it rather than use a ton of process work.

I have printed myself and the photos in AdobeRGB are terrible. Same photo printed in sRGB and they look great. I recently sent my first batch of photos to a printer (Adorama). I sent them in sRGB and when they came back, they look perfect, identical to my images on the screen.

So, I still fail to see the reasoning behind the AdobeRGB when I have to process the crap out of the color to make them look good again.
 
Still, my experience is, in sRGB, the picture is perfect, exactly what is wanted. Changing to AdobeRGB for printing and I have to do huge amounts of editing to get it back to looking good. Surely it is better to just leave it rather than use a ton of process work.

I have printed myself and the photos in AdobeRGB are terrible. Same photo printed in sRGB and they look great. I recently sent my first batch of photos to a printer (Adorama). I sent them in sRGB and when they came back, they look perfect, identical to my images on the screen.

So, I still fail to see the reasoning behind the AdobeRGB when I have to process the crap out of the color to make them look good again.

Something is wrong there. Exactly how are you changing from sRGB to Adobe RGB?

Best,
Helen
 
Still, my experience is, in sRGB, the picture is perfect, exactly what is wanted. Changing to AdobeRGB for printing and I have to do huge amounts of editing to get it back to looking good. Surely it is better to just leave it rather than use a ton of process work.

I have printed myself and the photos in AdobeRGB are terrible. Same photo printed in sRGB and they look great. I recently sent my first batch of photos to a printer (Adorama). I sent them in sRGB and when they came back, they look perfect, identical to my images on the screen.

So, I still fail to see the reasoning behind the AdobeRGB when I have to process the crap out of the color to make them look good again.
There is a difference between converting from one color space to another and mistakenly viewing an image in the wrong space.

If you have an image that is in Adobe RGB, and you try to view it with a program/system that is meant for sRGB, you will likely get weird results...because the image isn't converted. However, if you use Photoshop (or whatever) to convert from Adobe RGB to sRGB, then you shouldn't have any problems.

So you shouldn't have to rework your images when switching color spaces, just be sure to convert from one to the other.
 
There is a difference between converting from one color space to another and mistakenly viewing an image in the wrong space.

Mistakenly or purposefully. Photoshop will allow both conversion and switching without remapping. It sounds like he's doing the later and then needing to reedit.
 
I will check it out tonight. I could swear I was converting. I was printing on a little 4x6 printer of which I have used up all the supplies for, so I won't be using it again since it is far cheaper to send them out. But, I think I converted to AdobeRGB, then printed (printer setup for AdobeRGB) and the photos were vastly oversaturated in color. My daughter's skin was quite pink and she has birthmarks on her arm which the print made stand out in almost a flourescent look.

I have since left colorspace stuff alone and ignored it. That was back when I first got my camera and joined this forum that I was messing around with it all.
 
If you start out with an sRGB image and want it in Adobe RGB you would need to convert to Adobe RGB in Photoshop. If you convert, you should see no change - if you see a change then it is an indication that you didn't convert. It is also possible, as Bifurcator says, to simply assign Adobe RGB. If you just assign Adobe RGB to an sRGB image it will look oversaturated.

When printing from Photoshop, you should not generally set the printer profile as Adobe RGB - that will lead to very wrong colours. In a nutshell, you should use the profile that is appropriate for the printer and paper in use.

Best,
Helen
 
I noticed a big difference when printing. I shoot in AdobeRGB. When converting raw to jpg, I convert into sRGB because most of my work is used on the internet. I forgot to convert back to AdobeRGB before taking my photo to Cosco for printing. When I got print it came back a little over saturated; enough to make a very noticeable difference. I won't make this mistake again. Good thing I only wasted $1.49 on an 8x12 print. Costco has some pretty good prices for printing.

Does it make a difference which gamut setting I'm shooting my RAWs in? My camera option is set to AdobeRGB.
 
I noticed a big difference when printing. I shoot in AdobeRGB. When converting raw to jpg, I convert into sRGB because most of my work is used on the internet. I forgot to convert back to AdobeRGB before taking my photo to Cosco for printing. When I got print it came back a little over saturated; enough to make a very noticeable difference. I won't make this mistake again. Good thing I only wasted $1.49 on an 8x12 print. Costco has some pretty good prices for printing.

Does it make a difference which gamut setting I'm shooting my RAWs in? My camera option is set to AdobeRGB.

This is not a colour space issue. This is an incompitent person printing issue. If you convert from sRGB TO AdobeRGB you will so no, nadda, nil, zip difference at all unless either you stuff up the conversion to AdobeRGB or the other person is stuffing up the conversion from whatever you give them to their printer.

Also no, Raw is raw, the Camera profile determines how the colours are mapped to a standard space and then software decides if you end up in AdobeRGB or any of the other spaces.

There seems to be some confusion in this thread so let me say this. If you have a standard monitor (i.e. not one that cost you $1000 plus and has a wide gamut coverage) then you will not see any difference between sRGB, AdobeRGB, or any of the other largers spaces unless you stuff up the conversion.

The only time you should see a visible difference is when viewing on something with a large gamut (nice screen, professional printer), and even then only from the large gamut to the small one, and even then the difference if done properly is so slight and minute for any reasonable photo (yes even with a polariser if you can refrain from artificially boosting the saturation) that you have a hard time telling the difference even when the images are side by side. Anything else is most of the time just a problem with how you convert colour spaces.
 

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