color managment

[meghraj]

Well i have some problem with photo shop color setting. my working space in photo shop set to adobe rgb 1998. when i open my image in photoshop color looks very different from wat i rendered in 3ds max.its fine but when i save my jpg from my comp and upload that image in any site its look very differnt cos m working in adobe rgb and internet working in srgb, so i just want to know which colour space would be good. is it adobe rgb or srgb m confused?

[Brian Campbell]

I'm going to be corrected by Jeff, shortly after this post but here's the workflow here:

3ds Max is not color aware. So once you open you image in photoshop, you need to assign your monitors color profile, then convert to Adobe 1998 or sRGB profile. Depending on your clients, I would say the standard today of most people's monitors are non-wide gamut, so I would work in sRGB. If you know your image will be sent to someone with a wide gamut monitor, then go ahead and work in Adobe 1998. But for the general audience, I usually convert and work in sRGB, and save the image out with said profile.

[Jeff Mottle]

Hey Brian,

You're pretty much dead on with your advice. I'll throw in a few caveats though.

1) The monitor profile thing is a trick that is specifically for CG workflows that I have tested and came up with. It generally a very bad idea to do this. It's critical that if you do this your display profile is recent (within the last few weeks) and that you are actually using a display calibration device to profile and calibrate your display. Don't use a manufacturer's display profile that you can download off their website for example. It's not accurate enough.

2) The working space you use really depends on the gamut of your own display rather than that of your customer. If you have a wide gamut display I would recommend using AdobeRGB, otherwise I would use sRGB to simplify things, although you could use Adobe RGB as well if you understand the limitations. If you do use AdobeRGB as your working space and will be sending the files to a client who likely does not have a wide gamut display. Before saving the version for them, CONVERT your image to the sRGB colorspace then save and ensure the profile checkbox is enabled. You may notice some color shift (specially in the reds and blues) when you do this as sRGB is a smaller color space.

3) It is usually helpful before doing this conversion to softproof to sRGB before converting and saving so that you can make any neccesary color adjustments to accommodate the color space conversion.

4) If you are not using color management and are not calibrating and profiling your display AND you have a wide gamut display, the only thing you can do is open your image in Photoshop and convert to AdobeRGB. It won't be an exact match to what you saw in the framebuffer, but it will be as close as you can get. As Brian mentioned 3ds Max is not color managed so the colors you see in the frame buffer on a wide gamut display are going to be much more saturated than they should be. Working with Photoshop, 3ds Max and Wide Gamut display pretty much requires a color managed workflow if you want consistent colors.

If you have any questions, let me know.

Cheers,
Jeff

[Brian Campbell]

I was right, realiable Jeff coming with solid color managent advice.

And as I work with a wide gamut monitor, I still work in sRGB (although I do like working AdobeRGB), but I found that I've had to convert to sRGB in the end 90% of the time before sending out. So I geuss I gave up AdobeRGB (saving a short quick extra step), until hardware technology catches up and becomes more distributed across the typical workstation, then Ill switch to working in AdobeRGB.

[Jeff Mottle]

While there is nothing wrong with your workflow, you are unfortunately eliminating color data from your files by working in sRGB. When technology does catch up or if you ever wanted to get the extra color out in a print, all of that color data is gone. Not a big deal if you are not likely to go back into the archives in the future. It's more important with photos as you could in theory always re-render the image. You can't always go back and take the same photo.

[Mario De Achadinha]

Hi Jeff

I have a question for you? Currently I went from MR to VRAY and noticing a few things that confuse me. I see you mentioned that in max the colour will be more saturated in the frame buffer in max, but as soon as the image is saved out the colours seem to be washed out and we have lost that contrast and saturation in the output. Is this common with the vray frame buffer to do this? Cause In the mr frame buffer the render and saved out image were the same result? I am using the vray frame buffer with sRGB ticked and using gamma 2.2 under colour mapping. Currently I am fixing this by adjusting the levels in photoshop to get the colour and contrast back. Any advice where I could be going wrong?

[Jeff Mottle]

Hi Mario,

The problem I was describing with saturated colors occur due to 3ds Max not being color managed. Meaning it is not able to read the display profile for the system and correct the colors. As a result it defaults to the colorspace of the wide gamut display which is much larger than sRGB. So you end up making color corrections based on that color space. When you bring it into Photoshop, depending on your working space, the colors can shift a lot. The problem you are describing sounds more like an issue with gamma/linear workflow. While not really a color management issue per se, it can affect the image colors and tonal range. There are others who are better versed in LWF than me to explain that process.

[Mario De Achadinha]

Ok I see, thanks Jeff

[meghraj]

first thanks u very much jeff ,

well Jeff i have simple lcd monitor , and have very basic calibrations with lutcurve software and bcos i dnt have wide gamut monitor
i think i have to work on srgb rather than argb. well i have few questions.

1. which software should i use for calibrations? for my basic lcd monitor

2.few days ago i upload my work on Architectural Visualization Gallery forum link is here
http://forums.cgarchitect.com/68484-house.html
the image is looking very saturated and loses all my color data
bcos i think its automatically converted to srgb. is that true that its automatically converted to srgb and if it is so nxt time i have to upload with srgb corrections.

3.And the last one if i wana to sent my image thru mail so which color profile will be good and which color profile is good for printing with that cmyk conversion for printing.

[Jeff Mottle]

1. which software should i use for calibrations? for my basic lcd monitor

I would purchase a ColorMunki. This is the best most cost effective solution for calibrating and profiling a display.

2.few days ago i upload my work on Architectural Visualization Gallery forum link is here
http://forums.cgarchitect.com/68484-house.html
the image is looking very saturated and loses all my color data
bcos i think its automatically converted to srgb. is that true that its automatically converted to srgb and if it is so nxt time i have to upload with srgb corrections.

Can you tell me the model and make of your display. I want to be sure you really don't have a wide gamut display. If you really do not have one, then if you are seeing color shifts it could be how your color management settings are set up in Photoshop. Could you tell me those settings as well.

3.And the last one if i wana to sent my image thru mail so which color profile will be good and which color profile is good for printing with that cmyk conversion for printing.

Until you have a calibrated and profiled display and have Photoshop's color management set up properly, I would not assign any profile as it will be meaningless. If you were set up properly how you send a file to the printer really depends on the printer. Some ask that the images be sent in the AdobeRGB color space, others sRGB and some provide you the profile for the offset press and ask that you convert the images into that colorspace before sending them the images. If you don't send an image with a profile they will automatically assume sRGB anyway. When you are properly set up I would call and ask your printer how they prefer to receive images.