Quote:
Originally Posted by Phil
Thank you for that.
I've had a look online and it seems I've been doing it all wrong since I started!
Apparently I should always convert to SRGB after editing... I never knew how to convert, but now I do.. Thank you so much!
Hopefully that should solve this problem! I actually had it printed as a test today, to see how it came out on the shop printer. (not acrylic) and I was quite disappointed. It was dark and quite blue. The shop assistant couldn't explain it either...
|
I would always recommend that you keep your workflow the same all the way through.Shoot sRGB -> process sRGB -> print sRGB or shoot AdobeRGB -> process -> AdobeRGB -> print AdobeRGB.
The problem with
editing in AdobeRGB, will be the display. To maintain the workflow, even to convert after, you will need to have a monitor capable of displaying AdobeRGB. Add to that, for online display, most website (if not all - I am not sure how it works) will not display AdobeRGB, and force drop various colour tones. You have seen what can happen with the prints. The same happens with an online display. It will be less noticeable on a monitor because of the optical difference of emission (monitor) and absorption/reflection of light (print). Even by converting after you have edited, even with an AdobeRGB monitor, to sRGB, you could be throwing away some of your efforts.
So think of your workflow, even if you shoot in AdobeRGB, edit in a photo editor capable of utilising an AdobeRGB palette, but your monitor is not capable of displaying in AdobeRGB, you could be editing colour shifts into a shot that may shift further again when it comes to printing (dont worry about online display etc, as most instances it will be very subtle and not normally visible).
The sRGB version and original version of the shot, when viewed in my windows picture viewer look so very similar, however when I open in PS(which is capable of displaying AdobeRGB, as is my currently uncalibrated monitor), the whites of the lighthouse are a little brighter in the sRGB version, however, in the Adobe version, there is more subtlety to the shadows in it, but it is slightly duller for it. (I dont know how much this variance is down to your conversion, or if there was any bastardisation of the colours via the web host - the metadata was intact, hence the warning).
Like most things digital, there is a similar process in film, if you shoot colour neg film, you develop in a c41 process. Shoot slide you process in e6. (commonly). It is still quite common to cross process these two c41 film in e6 or e6 in c41. (it is different with black and white/colour etc)
I am not a fan.
There are further considerations, many of which I never tried to understand, or look to far into. One that sticks in my mind that was an issue for me at the time, was gamma (2.2 and 1.8). I cannot recall any of it, but seem to rem something about 2.2 was the Windows preferred gamma figure, whereas Macs used 1.8, and this would be an issue when using a monitor from a pc onto a mac, and the gamma wasnt corrected.
After a long time experimenting and reading up, I used to enjoy the technical side of it, but started to become obsessed with it, I started to lose interest in taking photographs so I gave up, and settled onto sRGB. It was more than capable of satisfying my images, and when I did get AdobeRGB prints done professionally (and I even bought an A3 printer capable of it), there was a little difference to me, and no difference when shown to others. Shoot in sRGB, get it right in camera, and maybe make it sparkle in the edit. this will mean that you can spend more time enjoying photography, whilst sharing it with others, either by print or online.
when I mentioned in an earlier post about being able to calibrate an external monitor, I should clarify, that you should be able to calibrate a laptop screen, however as you know as it moves, this calibration would change, whereas an separate monitor will be easier to maintain a constant state of calibration. (most stand alone monitors will have a wider dynamic range too, this is particularly important for wedding gowns - think of looking at a wedding dress on one device, but seeing so much more detail when viewed on another)