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Essay: Understanding Color Science and Color Management in Adobe Photoshop

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Paste yAdobe Photoshop and Color

There exists a field of study called Color Science that is dedicated to the understanding of the creation of color, its sources, and the human perception of color. Did you know you can attend a university and acquire a degree to become a Color Scientist? Thank goodness they exist so that we can create better designs using our contemporary digital tools. The goal here will be to explain the necessary basics of Color Management in Photoshop in terms we can all understand to ensure true color reproduction.

Color Space

In the digital world, each color is described using numbers. The numbers represent the amount of color mixed to create particular colors in a color space. RGB is a color space where all colors in an image are comprised of certain amounts of Red, Green, and Blue. CMYK is another color space where all the colors in an image are comprised of certain amounts of Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black. So in the RGB color space, an RGB color of R=167, G=32, and B=109 produces the Fuchsia color you see below. To produce that same color in CMYK, look to the right of the yellow outlined box and we see that we would use 35% Cyan, 100% Magenta, 29% Yellow and 4% black.

Color Gamut

Color Gamut on the other hand, is the range of colors that can be created in a particular color space such as the RGB or CMYK color space. Each color space, and there are many, has its own color gamut, represented by a shaped diagram as seen here. The gamut of colors are the colors that a particular color space can depict. RGB has colors it can depict digitally that CMYK cannot and vice versa.  Notice that there is no digital color space that can completely accommodate what the human eye sees.

Devices and Their Color Spaces

The devices we typically use to get images in and out of Photoshop often use a unique color space or way of characterizing color. The two types of devices are:

o Input Devices – cameras and scanners

o Output Devices – monitors, printers, and film recorders

It is very common for these devices to operate in a different color space. So the scanner may change the colors of the original image, the monitor may change the colors of the original scan, and the printer may change the colors of what you were seeing as you were editing in Photoshop. This is where Color Management Systems (CMS) come into play. A CMS will make adjustments to colors in order to make them consistent between one device and the next. This avoids making edits to an image in Photoshop only to have it print in different colors from what was intended, for example.

Why do different devices have different color spaces? Because of light. More colors are created with light than with ink. Light also affects color (the light on the monitor) differently than it affects ink on paper as light bounces off of it.

NOTE: With today’s technological advances, we need to make a distinction about output printing devices. You can print using a local printer or you can print using an offset printer. Offset printers are commercial printers using large printing presses. Today’s local printers, your inkjets and desktop laser printers, print using RGB just fine and there is no need to convert from RGB to CMYK. When you are targeting a commercial, offset printer, converting to CMYK will be necessary.

Color Management System

A basic CMS consists of a couple of common techniques and practices:

1. Calibrating your monitor.

2. Establishing and working with ICC profiles for the following:

a. Your input device

b. Your monitor

c. Your document in Photoshop

d. Your output device

Image Courtesy of Adobe Systems

A. Profiles describe the color spaces of the input device and the document. The manufacturer of a device will often provide users with the profiles for download at their website. It is also very likely that the profile will automatically install when you install the device software, the drivers, into the computer.

B. Using the profiles’ descriptions, the color management system identifies the document’s actual colors.

C. The monitor’s profile tells the color management system how to translate the document’s numeric values to the monitor’s color space

D. Using the output device’s profile, the color management system translates the document’s numeric values to the color values of the output device so the correct appearance of colors is printed.

Photoshop, as a vital part of the production process, works with these profiles in the CMS flow.

To establish a proper CMS, we must have profiles for the three areas:

1. Input and output devices

2. The monitor

3. The document.

#1 – Calibrating and Profiling Your Monitor – Calibrating and profiling your monitor is important and should be done first. It is likely you will be able to download a profile from the manufacturer if using an LCD laptop. A professional will often purchase special hardware and software kits for calibrating and profiling a desktop monitor. There are also built-in capabilities that come with a monitor. The following document is available on Adobe’s website with instructions as to how to calibrate you monitor. Contact the manufacturer of your specific monitor for any additional information such as an .icc profile also. For this lesson, we will assume you are working on a calibrated monitor and that you have a profile that is stored on your computer. With that, Photoshop will automatically start working with your monitor profile making color considerations.

#2 – ICC Profiles

Color profiles are data files that describe what color space the device is using therefore telling what colors it can scan, display or print. A scanner will have its profile; a printer will have its profile. This is an .icc file.

Usually you can get these files from the manufacturer of the device if it’s not automatically installed when you add the device to your computer configuration. You can also obtain device profiles from your service provider, download profiles from the web, or create custom profiles using professional profiling equipment.

How to Install a Profile

• In Windows, right-click a profile and select Install Profile. Alternatively, copy the profiles into the WINDOWS\system32\spool\drivers\color folder.

• In Mac OS, copy profiles into the /Library/ColorSync/Profiles folder or the /Users/[username]/Library/ColorSync/Profiles folder.

After installing color profiles, be sure to restart Adobe applications.

In this example, a profile is being installed that was downloaded off the self-publishing book website Blurb.com.

 Just right clicking on the profile and select install. Restart Photoshop.

#3 – Color Settings in Photoshop

The Workspace – Document Profiles

When you are creating new documents in Photoshop, you can establish the workspace color for that document in the menu: Edit>Color Settings dialog box.

When we bring an image from a scanner or a camera, the document appears with a working space assigned. Notice there are many versions of the RGB workspace. The same is true for CMYK. This is why we desire profiles for our devices.

Typically, scanners and cameras come in with the RGB subset of sRGB profile. A professionally shot camera image could come in with the ProRGB Photo, a larger gamut RGB color space, profile. Adobe RGB is popular for images that will be printed and sRGB is popular for images targeted for the web. So if an image comes in from a scanner in the sRGB workspace and we are going to load this image to the web, we would not need to do any conversion. But, if the image is targeted to be printed, we would load and select the proper CMYK profile under the CMYK dropdown under Working Spaces. Photoshop will then color manage the image for us.

If we bring in an image from a camera using the sRGB workspace and we will be including this image in a printed book that will be printed using the self-publishing website, Blurb.com, we can download the printer profile from the Blurb.com website, load it into our Color Settings in Photoshop and select it as our target output. This will ensure that the colors we see and edit in Photoshop will be what prints.

The preset settings are North America General Purpose 2. If we were in another country, we might make a different selection. When we upload a profile to use, this changes to Custom.

Under Working Spaces, Adobe RGB is preferred for documents that will be printed because it contains more colors, some that are included in CMYK. sRGB is preferred for documents that are targeting the Internet therefore the screen. Photographers like to use ProPhoto RGB because it has the largest gamut of colors.

When you see colors change because you have the preview checked, you are converting to colors that are no longer in the gamut of the target profile. You get to choose what happens to those colors that are out of gamut by your choice dropdown called Intent (Rendering Intent).

Rendering Intent

When you are converting from RGB to CMYK, there are conversion options. In the same Color Settings dialog box, we also have the ability to take some control of these conversion options called Rendering Intent. Rendering Intent has been described as translating from one language to another. Most Pros agree that the best “language dictionary” to choose under Rendering Intent is Relative Colorimetric. This means that Photoshop takes any color out of the new gamut and changes it to the next closest color in gamut. Perceptual is a good choice for images with really rich colors that are likely out of gamut that have details that are important to keep in the image.

Also under the menu Edit>Convert to Profile, you can apply color space and conversion option settings on a case-by-case basis to make decisions about the best settings, one image at a time.

Soft Proof

Before you send your final Photoshop document to off to be commercially printed, we can create what is called a soft proof. A soft proof is a preview within Photoshop of what your image will look like printed as compared to a hard proof where you actually print a copy on paper. The reliability of a soft proof will depend on how well Photoshop’s workspace converts to the printer device’s color space and then how well the monitor interprets the color spaces color space.

To create a soft proof, choose View>Proof Setup. Then select:

– Either a preset listed that corresponds to your output color space (CMYK for example)

– Or choose Custom where you can load a specific output profile. This will be a more accurate approach.

– You can also choose View>Proof Colors.  There will now be check mark next to the item in the View menu list and you will see the name of the proof preset next to the image name.

– You can compare colors in the original image if you create a duplicate of the image in a new window before converting the file to a soft proof.

Activity 1: Create a Soft Proof

1. In Photoshop, create a new document, File>New. Set the parameters to a 5” x 5” document, 300 pixels/inch, in the RGB color mode. Accept the rest of the defaults and click OK.

2. Create a large box filling the document leaving a ½ inch white border. Fill this box with the Blue, Red and Yellow gradient fill.  

3. Make a copy of this file by selecting from the menu Image>Duplicate.

4. Arrange your two images Two up, vertically from the Window>arrange command.

5. Choose one of the images and from the view menu, select Working CMYK and note the changes and color shifts.

6. Unselect Proof from the view menu (this unchecks it) to undo.

7. Again, from the view menu, select other work spaces and notice the color shifts.

8. Continue to Undo by going back to the View menu and unchecking Proof Colors (Ctrl + Y)

9. Now under View>Proof Setup, select Custom.

10. Explore the options and their results by including the Rendering Intent options as well as any installed profiles.

Activity 2, Part 1:

Real World Scenario: Set up Photoshop to edit and print a jewelry catalogue.

Scenario: You have used a digital camera to shoot a series of hand-made jewelry pieces for a client who wants you to then create a photobook to showcase the jewelry makers work.

Considerations: You will be using the online book making service provider, www.blurb.com. Below is the web address to download any needed printer profiles.  After you have set up Photoshop, import two photographs, make size adjustments, and create a Soft Proof to ensure the photos are ready for printing.

Steps: Import the images into your computer. Remember to save copies of the originals for Part 2 of this Activity. What color space are they using? What setting adjustments should you make in the Color Profiles dialog box to begin editing the photos and getting them ready to print? Resize the two provided images down to a size where both will fit onto an 8” x 10” landscaped page. Review your lesson notes to ensure success!

Blurb.com – http://www.blurb.com/color-management

Images – 2 included. These are the images that you should find as digital files that accompany this lesson.

Activity 2, Part 2:

Real World Scenario: Set up Photoshop to edit and create a webpage for a jewelry website.

Scenario: You have used a digital camera to shoot a series of hand-made jewelry pieces for a client who wants to pass on the photos you have prepared to a web developer who will be building an online store where customers can purchase the jewelry.

Ask Yourself: What is the target output device? What color space does it use?

Steps: Import the images into your computer. What color space are they using? What setting adjustments should you make in the Color Profiles dialog box to begin editing the photos and getting them ready the web? Resize the two provided images down to the size 300 x 300 pixels. Review your lesson notes to ensure success!

Images – 2 included. You are using the same images as in Part 1 that you should find as digital files that accompany this lesson. Good Luck and practice and enjoy your new knowledge!

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