Lightroom and Photoshop colours
Roy Mathers
Registered Users Posts: 73 Big grins
I have a slight problem that I'm sure some of you gurus can help me with. It seems that if I open the same picture in both Lightroom and CS2, the one in CS2 appears darker. Is there any reason for this that you know of?
I notice it when I have finished with a photo in Lightroom and I have got the colours, tone balance, cropping etc just as I want them and then open the file in CS2 for some extra work like cloning and sharpening for example (I still prefer PS's cloning and sharpening). Lo and behold, when it opens in Photoshop, the colours look ever so slightly different and, as said before, the picture looks darker.
Can anyone explain, and help please? Obviously, I would like them to look identical in both programs and see no reason why they shouldn't. I'd be grateful for any pointers.
I notice it when I have finished with a photo in Lightroom and I have got the colours, tone balance, cropping etc just as I want them and then open the file in CS2 for some extra work like cloning and sharpening for example (I still prefer PS's cloning and sharpening). Lo and behold, when it opens in Photoshop, the colours look ever so slightly different and, as said before, the picture looks darker.
Can anyone explain, and help please? Obviously, I would like them to look identical in both programs and see no reason why they shouldn't. I'd be grateful for any pointers.
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They appear the same to me and that's how the two should behave.
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
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Dave, are you exporting the file from Lightroom to Photoshop, or reopening the image directly into Photoshop?
What is the working color space in each application? sRGB, aRGB, ProPhoto etc?
Seems like they should look the same to me - I have not noticed any differences - I can see them both simultaneously on my Cinema Display.
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sRGB
I'll dig deeper when I can get to my other computer.
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To explain a bit more - after I have exported, say, a tiff from LR to its own folder, I can open that tiff in PS and, if I compare it with the version of it in the Library module in LR, it looks darker. I will try what you suggest (screenshots) but what concerns me is that although the pics might be the same, they appear different on the screen. Before I got LR, I knew that what looked right in PS would print the way I wanted it. Now, if I do the adjustments in LR, I'm not sure - if you follow that reasoning.
IIRC, the beta version of Lightroom could not view .psd files, but the release version can, at least if they are saved in the ProPhoto RGB color space (I know for sure Lightroom can't view Photoshop LAB files; I am not sure about other color spaces). Since Lightroom went live, I have been doing all my exports to Photoshop as .psd files and it works great. I can treat a Photoshop file (even one with layers) just like it was a raw file.
But the question is, how are your color settings in Photoshop? Is it preserving the embedded profile? What color space are you using for export?
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
IF you have LR set to export to ProPhoto RGB, do you have the color space being preserved upon opening from LR into Photoshop?
When you go into your color settings, click on the RGB working space popup and towards the top you'll see "Monitor:XXX" where XXX is the name of the display profile that Photoshop is using. DO NOT SELECT IT. Is this however the display profile you've built for use with Photoshop (and other ICC aware applications)?
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
Andrew -
Historically I have used Adobe RGB as my working color space in PS and as the space I use in ACR (pre-CS3/ACR4). When I create jpegs for the web, I go to 8 bit and change to sRGB.
But when I was setting up and reading about LR, I saw that ProPhoto was the default colorspace, which gave me pause. Which begs the question: Should I now change to ProPhoto as my PS CS3 working colorspace? Or change LR to AdobeRGB, if I can?
My images are on the web (smugmug), printed on my Canon printers or sent out to a service for large prints. NO prepress at all. While I don't mind going to sRGB from Adobe, to use 3 spaces seems silly. Or is it?
(anyone else with an opinion, please chime in. I'm sure there are at least one or two of you out there
-Fleetwood Mac
For export out of LR, I'd use ProPhoto RGB because many images and some printers exceed Adobe RGB gamut. This is explained in more detail here:
http://www.adobe.com/digitalimag/pdfs/phscs2ip_colspace.pdf
You can go from ProPhoto to sRGB for the web, no problem, you can't go the opposite direction!
Again, ProPhoto RGB isn't necessarily the default color space in LR for export. A cousin of ProPhoto RGB is used for all processing under the hood. All rendered images imported into LR will get converted to this space for editing. Raw files have no color space so its moot.
There's also this about LR color management specifically:
http://www.ppmag.com/reviews/200701_rodneycm.pdf
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
When I started using Lightroom, I switched my entire workflow to 16 bit ProPhoto RGB. Adobe RGB is a smaller color space which is an advantage if you are working in 8 bits, but once you give up on 8 bits, I don't see any reason not to standardize on ProPhotoRGB. My master files are now kept in one of two forms: CR2 (Canon RAW) if all my processing is in Lightroom or a 16 bit ProPhotoRGB if I need to do some work in Photoshop. I do all further conversions on demand. For instance, when I upload to smugmug, I generate the JPEGs directly from Lightroom letting it do all the conversion from the source. Once the JPEGs are uploaded, I delete them from my hard drive; they are easy enough to regenerate if I need them again.
Thanks for the reading material. I had seen the first one before. According to that one, set and forget isn't the answer. We need to choose the space each time in ACR.
You and I seem to work the same. I was in Bridge/ACR3 with 16 bit Adobe, but I am just starting with LR, so that is why I was thinking about changing.
When I change my PS CS3 workspace to ProPhoto, should my older PSD files based upon AdobeRGB, be converted to Prophoto? I realize, short of going back to the original RAW file, I can't 'get back' that lost data if I convert to ProPhoto form Adobe RGB, but is it actually harmful to the image in a PSD file? Or is it simply my preference to keep/convert the colorspace of old files?
-Fleetwood Mac
I've checked these again and I have verified that Photoshop is preserving the embedded profile. I also confirmed that I am exporting in sRGB (which is the space I use in Photoshop). However, I noticed that in Lightroom preferences (External Editing), the 'Edit in Photoshop CS2' bpx was showing ProPhoto RGB in 16 bits. Would this make a difference?
The color appearance should pretty much match. Ideally you'd test the same color space but in ICC aware applications, you'd see very small differences, mostly in very saturated colors that fit onto your display between the two.
So these documents are Raw's, not pre-existing rendered files like JPEGs or Tiffs right?
As for ProPhoto RGB (yes, use 16-bit) there are two disadvantages, neither earth shattering (and one we also share with Adobe RGB (1998))
1. The gamut of these color spaces exceed nearly all displays which are in the sRGB gamut area more or less. So you may have colors you captured you can't see on an sRGB display (they are out of gamut).
2. ProPhoto RGB defines possible colors that fall outside human gamut (due to the size of the space). Its possible to specify colors you can't see (and which don't exist as far as we are concerned).
Wider gamut displays, while having their own issues take care of #1 (well better with respect to colors in Adobe RGB (1998)).
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
You could yes. That's basically what I do. Its all 16-bit ProPhoto RGB out. I do have an email preset for Lightroom that's a small, 8-bit, sRGB image for obvious reasons. But if I'm going to edit the image or use full rez data, its ProPhoto RGB. I can always convert from this much larger gamut color space and bit depth to a smaller gamut, lower bit depth, lower resolution file for specific needs. I can't go the other direction.
Its still odd you don't see the same previews. Now the two applications do NOT operate identically in previewing! I know this for a fact (the two teams need to fight out who's 'right' although I'd put money on the newer technology, LR). Even though the two app's are using different math and code, they should be very close when viewing at 100% zoom or higher. And the two must match zoom ratio.
Oh, it just occurred to me. How are you building your display profiles? Some products allow you to build them as LUT or Matrix (in the software preferences). Check to see and set them to LUT if possible.
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
I'm sorry if I appear to be a dummy but this is beyond my understanding!
Are you using an instrument (colorimeter) and software to calibrate and profile your display?
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
No.
Well then its hard to discuss what, where or how the profile currently being used might affect all this. Some users who have built their own profiles have reported better matching when they use the option to build a more complex, LUT (look up table) based profile for use by Lightroom than the standard profile (Matrix).
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
My inclination is to leave all masters in what ever color space I created them in as long as all I am doing is printing or creating JPEGs. If I decide I want to create a new master, I go back to the original RAW and reprocess it in ProPhoto RGB. My workflow is so much better today than it was even a year ago that I have been pretty regularly replacing my masters with new ones in ProPhoto RGB because I know I can get a much better result with my improved skills. However when I do have good older masters, I leave them as is.
Absolutely! If these are rendered images, leave them as is. If Raw, doesn't matter. But you would have to re-render them. Now, depending on the product, say Lightroom, all the edits are intact (metadata edit instructions). All you'd have to do is re-render into the new color space. Doesn't take long.
Keep in mind that image (scene) gamut plays a role too. Shoot a bride in a white wedding dress, a gray card, a very pastel scene, it might all fit within sRGB. What's really nice about Camera Raw (and needs to be updated in Lightroom) is the histogram shows saturation clipping based on the current color space encoding option you have. If you see a red, green, blue, cyan, magenta or yellow spike on either end of the CR histogram, that indicates saturation clipping. You're not in a wide enough gamut space, these colors are going to clip. A black or white spike is all three, that's tone clipping.
I've yet to see any image that shows color clips in ProPhoto RGB, tons in sRGB and many,many in Adobe RGB (1998). But the point is, in CR, you can see this before you even render the image. So if you go back and say the image is currently configured for sRGB and you see no colored spike, no big deal.
Back to LR. You could just keep the encoding color space set to ProPhoto RGB and not ever worry about saturation clipping. The same is true for CR.
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
Are you saying then that it would not be possible to get LR and PS to match without calibrating my monitor? Couldn't I just make sure that the colour space (in my case sRGB) is the same throughout the process?
Incidentally, I thought it might be useful to show you this picture. It is a couple of screen shots of the same picture viewed in Lightroom (on the left) and Photoshop and illustrates, I think, the difference I was complaining about.
No, both would equally produce incorrect previews.
Photoshop, Lightroom, Camera Raw, C1 etc all use the display profile to produce a preview of the numbers. That preview is as accurate as the profile that describes your display conditions.
The differences above are pretty profound and not what you should be seeing.
Are you working on a Mac or Windows machine?
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/
I am using Windows. Although my monitor isn't calibrated, I know that what I see on the screen in Photoshop prints the way I want it on my printer. It may be that I shall have to go back to the beginning and import the same pictures again, making sure that the colour space is the same all the way along the process. Does this seem the best idea to you?
No, something else is going on. If your display isn't calibrated, its equally not calibrated for both applications.
Author "Color Management for Photographers"
http://www.digitaldog.net/