sRGB Colour Space Issues

[Paul G]

In my most recent thread in 'Candids' called Henry and the ice-cream (http://www.ausphotography.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=40256) I've been discussing colour space issues with a few of you.

Well I'm still having trouble so I thought it best to move to the General Help forum for advice.

Despite changing every setting I can find in my software (CS4, Lightroom 2.0 and a trial version of Capture NX 2 that I downloaded last night) to sRGB I still don't get the same colour reproduction.

I edit the image to where I like it then as soon as I save it to My Pictures folder it appears very different.
But because the saved result is different to when I have finished processing, I don't know how much or little to do in my processing.

Below is a screen shot that will hopefully show what I have been rabbiting on about for the last few days.

As previously any help to try to rectify this is most appreciated!

http://i220.photobucket.com/albums/dd109/stampy4x4/ScreenShotColourComparison.jpg

[MarkChap]

G'day Paul,

I thought I had an idea, but was thinking as I type and bingo, my idea was soooooooooo wrong,
Which means I am sorry but I have no idea.

[ricktas]

Photoshop is colourspace aware. My guess is that windoze and the my pictures folder..isn't. So windoze just renders it how it feels like.

IE is also not colourspace aware but at least it assumes photos are are in sRGB.

Is your monitor calibrated?

[Paul G]

Photoshop is colourspace aware. My guess is that windoze and the my pictures folder..isn't. So windoze just renders it how it feels like.

This is the problem I can't seem to overcome because when I upload the pics from my folder to say Photobucket, they keep the same appearance when displayed on the web which means I can't get my vision for the pic to be accurately represented. How does everyone else get on - do your pics look different from your PP program to your saved copy in a folder?


Is your monitor calibrated?

Only by the online contrast/tone guides you can download and do by eye.

[Paul G]

I just found this bit of info...


To view or change the Windows default monitor profile, open the Display Properties screen by right-clicking on the Windows wallpaper (background) and clicking on Properties or by opening the Control Panel and clicking on Display. Then click on Settings, Advanced..., Color Management. The Default Monitor Profile and a set of profiles currently associated with the monitor are shown. You can add profiles to the list or set any of them as the Default.


...on this site...

Norman Koren - Monitor Calibration and Gamma (http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1A.html#Default_mon_profile)


...so I'm going to have a bit of a look at that now.



EDIT: Ok so my monitor is now set to sRGB Profile (which didn't show up previously) and I have done a screen calibration via the inbuilt NVidia GeForce product which checked brightness, temperature and the reds, greens, and blues.

[MarkW]

If all else fails, you could try installing Firefox which is colourspace aware and see what the results are. It is a free program so all you have to loose is a few megabytes of bandwidth and about an hour of your time.

[arthurking83]

I'm pretty sure the screen calibration isn;t the issue, as the evidence used with the screen capture cleary shows that in NX the image looks vastly different than it does in Windows Explorer.

Colour space is definitely in sRGB mode as shown in the lower left corner of the image in NX.

Some settings to check in NX Paul:

In the preferences settings (Edit->Preferences) check the settings enabled in the colour management tab.

In the 'Default RGB colour space' area makes use it's set to sRGB(which it most likely is anyhow), and check the tick to be 100% sure that the embedded profile isn't saved to the file.
it probably won't make any difference anyhow, as I think from memory you've set the camera to sRGB anyhow.
I think you'll probably see the option for Nikon sRGB 4.0.0.3001 or something like that.

I suppose you can only try different software to browse through your images too.
Try FSViewer (http://www.faststone.org/FSViewerDetail.htm) faststone's image viewer.
It's a great image viewer, and reproduces Nikons NEF files faithfully(even all the in camera enhancements are rendered pretty much spot on.
Much faster as a browser than either Capture or ViewNX, but never edit or save any NEF files with it, as the quality is best described as atrocious!
It's fine for editing and saving jpgs tho.

As for the issue of uploading the images and having them displayed as you describe!!?? :confused:

that is so totally weird.

just for testing puposes:

upload this particular image directly to AP as an attachment and let see how it compares to the screen grab you posted. At 450Kb you'll get a failed upload error, so resize it below 250Kb's. I find that at 900pix wide a quality setting of 60-70% should give you approx 100-200kb's for this particular image, so that should get your image onto AP as an attachment.

Could it be an issue with PB?

and to be sure!!
the image currently displayed in the CaptureNX window looks the same in both LR and PS?? :confused013
.... so Windows Explorer is displaying the image 'wrong'?

and I highly recommend that FSViewer program too... I'm sure you'll like it.

[bigdazzler]

ill add a little to this re: Photobucket. I host all my images with PB and they reproduce deadly accurate both in my browser (Safari) and on AP, so dont think its PB mate.

this is easy fixed .. buy a mac and use iPhoto for your jpgs ;) Youll wonder why you waited so long :D

[Paul G]

Thanks for the replies again guys following on from my other thread.

Just quickly on PhotoBucket to Daz - I've used it for years too but a friend recently made me aware of the difference in appearance of his PhotoBucket hosted images compared to his now, SmugMug hosted images. The difference is noticeable so I'm wondering myself about investigating SmugMug a bit more. I just finished their free trial but because of these colour issues I only uploaded one pic in that time :rolleyes:

As for my sRGB dilemma, this afternoon I had a look at my monitor profile (I use a slightly older Samsung SyncMaster 710v) and it only showed the model of the monitor under the profile. I don't know what I did next, whether it was a screen refresh or something else, but next thing I know the sRGB profile was visible and able to be selected..:confused013
Anyhow, since then my pics having been showing the same result from PP to saving into a folder.

The only odd little thing I'm seeing now is when I open a RAW file a dialogue box opens telling me of an embedded profile mismatch (so I'm converting to the working colour space sRGB) and the only thing I think this can mean is the profile that's set in my D200. Would that be right? It is however set to sRGB...I've double checked!

http://i220.photobucket.com/albums/dd109/stampy4x4/Colourmismatchdialogue.jpg

[bigdazzler]

that to me mate seems that the camera colorspace is set to Adobe RGB ... thats what my cameras are set to as well. I work in Adobe RGB in Aperture and then when exported as TIFFs to GIMP for further editing/resizing GIMP converts the file to sRGB ... colour is pretty well identical though. I dont see any discernable difference.

[I @ M]

the only thing I think this can mean is the profile that's set in my D200. Would that be right? It is however set to sRGB...I've double checked!


The only options you have for setting the colour in camera are Adobe RGB and sRGB but that setting must be the same in all 4 memory banks for all shots to be captured in the same colour space.
Maybe recheck that all 4 banks are set the same?

[ricktas]

Also, how are you importing the files from the camera/memory card onto the hard-drive. Depending on how you do it, you could have a setting there that is converting them to AdobeRGB.

[jev]

Do you shoot in JPEG or RAW? When in RAW, the color space you set in the camera doesn't matter - it's what the converter is set to that determines the color space in JPEG/TIFF/PSD, ....

[Paul G]

To answer the above;

Darren I've checked and my camera is definitely set to sRGB.

I@M your question sort of follows on fron Darren's. Do you mean the four 'Shooting Menu Banks' A,B,C,&D? I've checked these and they are all on sRGB.

Rick I've used a few different ways of importing files. I used to just import to a folder then open a file using whichever program I wanted to process with. More recently I've been using Bridge to import with. And just the other night I had a go with Capture NX 2 after I downloaded the trial version as a lot of Nikon users have told me this is the best program to handle Nikon's NEF files. I'm a little confused as to the best approach to be honest.

And Jev I'm shooting RAW for the time being and I have heard a lot of people say that most of the camera setting are ignored/not used when you shoot RAW.

[BLWNHR]

Paul, I experience a similar problem when using the 'Save for Web & Devices' function in Photoshop CS3.

If I have an image open and go File -> Save for Web & Devices and click [Save] teh image saves exactly as I see it in Photoshop.

However I made an action for batch saving photos for web use. When I used it I noticed the colours looked washed out and slightly wrong. I re-made the action and got the same result. I spent ages mucking about with it and discovered the problem.

This is the part that may pertain to you; I noticed in the action it was not saving in sRGB colour! (You can check this by clicking the arrow beside "Preset: [JPEG High]" under the Save Cancel and Done buttons). Try as I might, but I cannot get Photoshop to remember to convert the shot to sRGB when batch saving for web.

I know you are not using Photoshop, but the problem sounds very similar to mine. My guess is that your software is NOT saving to sRGB, despite what it is telling you.

How you fix this I don't know as I have never used CaptureNX (only use Photoshop). Hopefully this information may help someone work out your problem.

[I @ M]

Yep Paul, A,B,C and D in the shooting menu banks. As far as I know, if they are all set to sRGB in there they can't come out of the camera as anything else.

If you can stand the learning curve and the odd vague sort of style to Capture NX I would stick with it, NEF conversion and colour accuracy are pretty good with that program.

[arthurking83]

.....

Rick I've used a few different ways of importing files. I used to just import to a folder then open a file using whichever program I wanted to process with. More recently I've been using Bridge to import with. And just the other night I had a go with Capture NX 2 after I downloaded the trial version as a lot of Nikon users have told me this is the best program to handle Nikon's NEF files. I'm a little confused as to the best approach to be honest.

And Jev I'm shooting RAW for the time being and I have heard a lot of people say that most of the camera setting are ignored/not used when you shoot RAW.

You can still edit with PS/LR/PSP/Google/Pewkasa/whatever tickles your fancy after viewing with either Capture or ViewNX.
What happens is that you don't ever work on the NEF raw data directly, even with Capture or View NX's, but you actually work on a TIFF file, if you use use either of the Nikon programs.
(Not enough experience to understand what other programs do??)
What happens with the NX suite is that as you edit an image, the edits are written to a side file, that is part of the raw data, and that only describes how the raw image is to be displayed.
Once you understand that concept, it's easy to understand why the NX programs display a better rendition of the image. ;) (only Nikon fully understands the nuances of it's proprietary files, everyone else guesses at it with different results).
So, make a few basic adjustments(even in ViewNX) such as brightness, contrast, highlights/shadows recovery or whatever, and then save that NEF as is(with the new edits) You can always undo those edits at any time, and then apply different or more edits at a future date. That could be important in the future for when software get better at doing particular forms of editing :th3:) Saves space in not having to have multiple copies of images if you archive. You only have one high quality file, and that's the NEF.
If you think the image needs more intricate/detailed editing, like cloning or whatever programs like PS are good for, then simply press the open with option in either Capture or View, and the file is opened as a TIFF file in your editor of choice.
You can set up multiple programs in View NX to open with, but only 1 application is available in Capture's options preferences(I've now set that to Neat Image :th3:).

I never keep any TIFF files as they are way too big to do on a regular basis, only keep the final jpg after any external editing, and the NEF fiile.

As for the colour space mismatch!... :confused: is that in Capture or PS(that error message).
In three years of using both Nikon Capture and Capture NX, I've never seen it, even though I have switched from adobeRGB to sRGB and back and forth in camera.

That is very weird to see, especially if you're 100% sure that the cam is set to sRGB.

AND!! (I'm assuming here that the D300 and D200 work the same way)
I used to (but not any more, due to naming issues) set my landscape shots to adobeRGB in one memory bank specifically set up for landscape shots. All other are shot in sRGB mode.
By default, if the camera is set to adobeRGB, the file name is set with an underscore before the DSC prefix(eg. _DSCxxxx) where the sRGB version is set normally with the underscore after the DSC prefix(DSC_xxxx).
Bloody annoying if you shoot landscapes and other stuff on the same card, as the all files with the underscore display with priority on the PC, but I like to view my files chronologically(numerically).

So the moral of the story is that I used to use adobeRGB for the vast majority of my images, but CaptureNX would always work in the sRGB profile. I've never had that warning message.

Now that I'm more aware of colour spaces, I don't need to set the images differently(for printing)

The cause of the warning and colour mismatch and how to fix it is beyond me ATM.

The only thing I can think of(as a random, out there, and just to be sure thought process)
I'd expect that message to appear if you were saving the images on the camera as jpgs!
That's where you may see issues with converting from adobeRGB to sRGB, or whatever.
The NEF simply doesn't understand colour profiles as a raster image does, as it's not defined in the same way.