Don't even want to call this one "colour management"

[briarrose]

Oh, that's great news! Glad to hear it all worked out for you!

[byRo]

This seems like a good place to remind folks that the prize for this month's contest is "Color Management for Photographers" donated by Focal Press.

Rô

[smiley guy]

The response to this one has been great and very helpful to me. A confusing issue it seems, not only for me but for many other people.

So this evening I went to another photo lab where I may get some stuff printed when I need things of (supposed) better quality or sizes outside of 4x6, 5x7 and 8x10. I asked about their colour profile they use in their machines and they are also using sRGB. This is Henry's in Canada by the way. The gentleman's response was that most labs/machines will use sRGB because nobody really wants to pay royalties for using Adobe RGB. Is this an ignorant reponse? Is it standard in the industry to be using sRGB in the printing of digital photos or scans of slide/film photos? If that is the case and all my output is through external labs then what is the point of me working in ARGB? It seems to me that ALL my work to be output should be in sRGB and that should basically be my default in PSCS2. Could somebody correct me if I'm wrong?

[john_opitz]

<<Is this an ignorant response?>>

Yes, it is. If the machine is capable of printing a wider gamut color profile…. it can. Its not going to cost the lab any more to use an adobe_rgb profile. Some labs, as well as the print industry (cmyk) don’t know about or what’s it about (color gamut) the adobe_rgb color profile and/or other wide gamut profiles.

<<Is it standard in the industry to be using sRGB in the printing of digital photos or scans of slide/film photos?>>

Yes, and there are some that do wide gamut printing as well. Not only for Adobe_rgb.
Also for ProPhoto_rgb, Wide_GamutRGB. It’s a good idea to find out about this from the printer, if
Possible. Which brings us to the reason why the sRGB is the standard. The sRGB is the lowest common denominator to ruin a file. If you CONVERT an sRGB profile to Adobe_rgb. It will not be hosed (as they call it). If the file is in Adobe_rgb and it gets converted to sRGB, it will be hosed…looks pretty ugly. But it’s really more about education and knowledge for the whole color management thing, though. It was suppose to be easy for everyone, when it was presented. But it did not work out that way. Putting it to a down to earth way…some just don’t know or care about how color management works. Converting and assigning especially. Speaking for myself…I know about and how to use color management, even using it for color correction. So, I use it that best suits me… So even if you don’t know or care about it, your file well still be printed as what you see on the monitor (more or less). That’s if you use the defaults of P.S, and you don’t change it to a custom setting or Adobe_rgb color space, and not covert to the printers’ output. So the safest thing to do is just set your workspace to sRGB. Most other image-editing programs (think Microsoft) use the sRGB as a standard. That’s why if the image is not tagged with a profile. It is assumed as sRGB. So even if your lab is using a printer that is Adobe_rgb profiled and your file is in sRGB, your file will not be too far off, of what’s on screen. Which one would say! Why don’t they just use Adobe_rgb? Well see first paragraph of my response.
Also, one other thing. When your using Adobe_rgb. You are not seeing the entire color gamut on your monitor, because…the monitor is not capable of producing all those colors (on screen). Something to think about when using a wide gamut color space…unless it’s a Wide Gamut Monitor of course. Which those things run about 6 grand, ($6,000.00_U.S.Dollars) give or take a few dollars and pennies. You can spend about 3 grand for a wide gamut that only produces…I think its 58 % of the Adobe_rgb gamut. The one for 6 grand encompasses 100% of the Adobe_rgb gamut. NEC is one company that produces them. Makes one, want to learn to work by the numbers.

<< If that is the case and all my output is through external labs then what is the point of me working in ARGB?>>

See above…. For wide gamut printing. In your case, just use sRGB. The Adobe_rgb is more colorful than sRGB, but less detailed than sRGB. Both have 2.2 gamma.

[tetsuo]

I know is is going to complicate things.. but here is a idea. an idea that i put to use..
all my 16bit tiff are in ProPhoto profile.. the file is always saved in that profile as a master file and a archival file. archival file cuz you will just want to archive this file.

you need to convert the color profile. note it's CONVERT not ASSIGN

if you need to output to kodak/fuji.
prophoto -> Frontier sRGB (prophoto IS larger than any sRGB)

if you need to output to CMYK
prophoto -> SWOP (prophoto is larger than almost any CMYK profile)

if you need to output to epson 2100/R4200
prophoto -> *paper's icc profile* (the only sRGB larger than epson gamut range) (Epson 2100/R2400 is larger than adobeRGB by almost 10-15%)

if you want to output to web,
prophoto -> srgb 1996 2.1 (almost any profile is larger than this color space)



you might want to turn on CTRL-Y for color proofing.

the whole idea of working with prophoto rather than adobe is cuz epson printers already exceed adobe color range. and some color seperation printers maybe CMYKOG (Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Orange Green) you will/might need the extra color range.


just my 2 cents.