Often when you are designing, colors can appear one way on your monitor but appear drastically different when printed. Thankfully, Photoshop contains enhanced color management features that can make screen colors come as close as possible to what you’ll see in the final printed piece. These color settings can also be synchronized with the other applications in the Creative Suite (such as InDesign and Illustrator) through the Adobe Bridge application. Color management is intended to ensure that the colors you are viewing onscreen are displaying—as accurately as possible—a true representation of what your photos will look like upon final output. The idea here is to maintain color consistency on every device (print and display) through the use of embedded color profiles.
What’s an ICC Color Profile?
As a print designer, I’m sure you’ve heard the term ICC color profile. But what is it? What does it do? Well, different devices, such as scanners, monitors, and digital cameras all display RGB and CMY colors in different shades. An ICC profile is a small file that describes how a device reproduces color. ICC stands for International Color Consortium, which is the organization that created this file format. Photoshop uses these profiles as a set of instructions in order to display color accurately. ICC profiles are device profiles and are not to be confused with color space profiles, which are applied to images. The range of color each device can reproduce is referred to as its gamut. If a color appears muted, or out of gamut on a certain device (such as a printer), this means that the color requires a wider range of RGB or CMY colors than the device can reproduce.
Monitor Calibration
Agood way to start out with color management is to first calibrate your monitor. Calibration adjusts the output of your monitor to ensure accurate display. This is achieved by fine-tuning the brightness, contrast, and color balance settings. On the Windows platform, you should take advantage of the visual calibrator that comes with Vista. Mac OS X users can calibrate by using the Display Calibrator Assistant that comes with OS X. In System Preferences, choose Displays; click Color; then click the Calibrate button. The Assistant will walk you through the process from here. If you’re serious about color, you should consider investing in a colorimeter, which is a hardware calibration device. These hardware devices tend to be much more accurate than software calibration, because they do not rely on your eye as the already-mentioned software utilities do. They usually start around $100 and can be purchased from various computer catalogs and websites. After you’ve calibrated your monitor, your operating system generates an ICC profile that your operating system can recognize. You can then decide how you’d like to use color space profiles with your images in Photoshop—or if you’d even like to use color management at all (and I recommend that you do!). For a more in-depth look at calibration and color management, you might want to check out Tim Grey’s book Color Confidence (Sybex, second edition 2006).
Color Settings
Because there are so many different monitors and printers available, there is no one specific way to manage color. It’s up to you to run some tests on your images and choose the color settings that produce the most accurate and consistent results. This section offers you some guidelines for applying color management in a typical print design/production workflow. You can choose color management settings from the Color Settings dialog box. To display the dialog, choose Edit --> Color Settings, or press Shift+F+K / Shift+Ctrl+K.
Working Spaces: RGB Most image editing is done in the RGB color workspace. Ideally this workspace includes a balanced amount of RGB, which results in gray. The working space refers to the type of RGB used with every new document created in Photoshop. The Working Spaces RGB drop-down list contains several options to choose from—all of them balanced, with each one containing a different range of color (or gamut). The best working space choice for editing images intended for output on a commercial printing press is Adobe RGB. Agood second choice is ColorMatch RGB, only because it contains a smaller color gamut than Adobe RGB.
Working Spaces: CMYK From this list, select the profile that most accurately describes the printing conditions used to reproduce your image. Choose from one of the following:
- U.S. Sheetfed Coated for glossy brochures
- U.S. Sheetfed Uncoated for dull-finish brochures
- U.S. Web Coated (SWOP) v2 for magazines
- U.S. Web Uncoated for dull-finish publications
Ultimately, you must convert all of your RGB images by using one of these four CMYK profiles before outputting to a commercial printing press. Always keep safe copies of your original working RGB images and apply the final CMYK conversion to a duplicate of the image. The final CMYK image is what you should place in your layout document. Choosing the conversion option as your CMYK workspace allows you to convert to Working CMYK in the Convert To Profile dialog box.
Color Management Policies You have three options for handling RGB, CMYK, and Grayscale images that are newly opened in Photoshop:
Convert To Working RGB converts the newly opened image to the current working space profile if it does not match.
Preserve Embedded Profiles leaves the image alone and does not convert it to the currently assigned working space profile.
Off disables color management for newly opened and newly created documents that do not match the current working space profile. If a newly opened document contains an embedded profile that matches the working space, that profile is preserved.
For print/production artists, it’s best to set all three menus to Preserve Embedded Profiles, especially when working with images provided from outside sources. It’s rare, but sometimes photographers will provide images with custom RGB profiles assigned, and when they do, you may not want to convert them to your current workspace. More often than not, photographers will turn in photos with the sRGB profile embedded. sRGB is best suited for web graphics, and should always be converted to the Adobe RGB working space.
Profile Mismatches and Missing Profiles If you’re first starting out with color management, you may want to enable all of the Profile Mismatches and Missing Profiles options: Ask When Opening, and Ask When Pasting. Doing so tells Photoshop to display a warning dialog box every time you open or paste a document containing a profile that does not match the current working space profile or an untagged image that contains no profile at all. This way you can make your color management decisions each time you open an image rather than letting Photoshop automatically apply the Color Management Policies chosen in the Color Settings dialog box.
The Embedded Profile Mismatch dialog gives you the same options that are available in the Color Settings dialog: preserve, convert, or discard the embedded profile. The Missing Profile dialog lets you assign the working space profile, assign any other profile available, or leave the image untagged. Once again, for print design and production, sRGB profiles should always be converted to the Adobe RGB working space, and custom profiles should be preserved. Unless you’re not planning to use color management at all, never discard an embedded profile or leave an image untagged.
If after a while you find that the color management warning dialogs are slowing you down, and you are almost always converting to the Adobe RGB working space, you can turn off the Ask When Opening and Ask When Pasting options. From that point forward, Photoshop automatically applies the Color Management Policies chosen in the Color Settings dialog, without stopping to ask you each time you open a document.
Synchronized Color Settings
The Photoshop and CS3 color settings are enabled by default when you first launch the application. At the top of the Color Settings dialog box, Photoshop displays whether the current settings are synchronized with the other applications in the suite. To unsynchronize, choose a different setting from the Settings list. For more information on a chosen color setting, hover the cursor over the Settings list and refer to the bottom of the dialog for a brief description.
To resynchronize, choose the same setting applied in the Adobe Bridge application’s Suite Color Settings dialog box. You can access this dialog in Bridge by choosing Edit --> Creative Suite Color Settings or by pressing Shift+F+K / Shift+Ctrl+K. Abrief description is listed under each setting name in the dialog. The best choice for print designers and production artists is North America Prepress 2, which uses the Adobe RGB and U.S. Web Coated (SWOP) v2 working spaces.
What’s an ICC Color Profile?
As a print designer, I’m sure you’ve heard the term ICC color profile. But what is it? What does it do? Well, different devices, such as scanners, monitors, and digital cameras all display RGB and CMY colors in different shades. An ICC profile is a small file that describes how a device reproduces color. ICC stands for International Color Consortium, which is the organization that created this file format. Photoshop uses these profiles as a set of instructions in order to display color accurately. ICC profiles are device profiles and are not to be confused with color space profiles, which are applied to images. The range of color each device can reproduce is referred to as its gamut. If a color appears muted, or out of gamut on a certain device (such as a printer), this means that the color requires a wider range of RGB or CMY colors than the device can reproduce.
Monitor Calibration
Agood way to start out with color management is to first calibrate your monitor. Calibration adjusts the output of your monitor to ensure accurate display. This is achieved by fine-tuning the brightness, contrast, and color balance settings. On the Windows platform, you should take advantage of the visual calibrator that comes with Vista. Mac OS X users can calibrate by using the Display Calibrator Assistant that comes with OS X. In System Preferences, choose Displays; click Color; then click the Calibrate button. The Assistant will walk you through the process from here. If you’re serious about color, you should consider investing in a colorimeter, which is a hardware calibration device. These hardware devices tend to be much more accurate than software calibration, because they do not rely on your eye as the already-mentioned software utilities do. They usually start around $100 and can be purchased from various computer catalogs and websites. After you’ve calibrated your monitor, your operating system generates an ICC profile that your operating system can recognize. You can then decide how you’d like to use color space profiles with your images in Photoshop—or if you’d even like to use color management at all (and I recommend that you do!). For a more in-depth look at calibration and color management, you might want to check out Tim Grey’s book Color Confidence (Sybex, second edition 2006).
Color Settings
Because there are so many different monitors and printers available, there is no one specific way to manage color. It’s up to you to run some tests on your images and choose the color settings that produce the most accurate and consistent results. This section offers you some guidelines for applying color management in a typical print design/production workflow. You can choose color management settings from the Color Settings dialog box. To display the dialog, choose Edit --> Color Settings, or press Shift+F+K / Shift+Ctrl+K.
Working Spaces: RGB Most image editing is done in the RGB color workspace. Ideally this workspace includes a balanced amount of RGB, which results in gray. The working space refers to the type of RGB used with every new document created in Photoshop. The Working Spaces RGB drop-down list contains several options to choose from—all of them balanced, with each one containing a different range of color (or gamut). The best working space choice for editing images intended for output on a commercial printing press is Adobe RGB. Agood second choice is ColorMatch RGB, only because it contains a smaller color gamut than Adobe RGB.
Working Spaces: CMYK From this list, select the profile that most accurately describes the printing conditions used to reproduce your image. Choose from one of the following:
- U.S. Sheetfed Coated for glossy brochures
- U.S. Sheetfed Uncoated for dull-finish brochures
- U.S. Web Coated (SWOP) v2 for magazines
- U.S. Web Uncoated for dull-finish publications
Ultimately, you must convert all of your RGB images by using one of these four CMYK profiles before outputting to a commercial printing press. Always keep safe copies of your original working RGB images and apply the final CMYK conversion to a duplicate of the image. The final CMYK image is what you should place in your layout document. Choosing the conversion option as your CMYK workspace allows you to convert to Working CMYK in the Convert To Profile dialog box.
Color Management Policies You have three options for handling RGB, CMYK, and Grayscale images that are newly opened in Photoshop:
Convert To Working RGB converts the newly opened image to the current working space profile if it does not match.
Preserve Embedded Profiles leaves the image alone and does not convert it to the currently assigned working space profile.
Off disables color management for newly opened and newly created documents that do not match the current working space profile. If a newly opened document contains an embedded profile that matches the working space, that profile is preserved.
For print/production artists, it’s best to set all three menus to Preserve Embedded Profiles, especially when working with images provided from outside sources. It’s rare, but sometimes photographers will provide images with custom RGB profiles assigned, and when they do, you may not want to convert them to your current workspace. More often than not, photographers will turn in photos with the sRGB profile embedded. sRGB is best suited for web graphics, and should always be converted to the Adobe RGB working space.
Profile Mismatches and Missing Profiles If you’re first starting out with color management, you may want to enable all of the Profile Mismatches and Missing Profiles options: Ask When Opening, and Ask When Pasting. Doing so tells Photoshop to display a warning dialog box every time you open or paste a document containing a profile that does not match the current working space profile or an untagged image that contains no profile at all. This way you can make your color management decisions each time you open an image rather than letting Photoshop automatically apply the Color Management Policies chosen in the Color Settings dialog box.
The Embedded Profile Mismatch dialog gives you the same options that are available in the Color Settings dialog: preserve, convert, or discard the embedded profile. The Missing Profile dialog lets you assign the working space profile, assign any other profile available, or leave the image untagged. Once again, for print design and production, sRGB profiles should always be converted to the Adobe RGB working space, and custom profiles should be preserved. Unless you’re not planning to use color management at all, never discard an embedded profile or leave an image untagged.
If after a while you find that the color management warning dialogs are slowing you down, and you are almost always converting to the Adobe RGB working space, you can turn off the Ask When Opening and Ask When Pasting options. From that point forward, Photoshop automatically applies the Color Management Policies chosen in the Color Settings dialog, without stopping to ask you each time you open a document.
Synchronized Color Settings
The Photoshop and CS3 color settings are enabled by default when you first launch the application. At the top of the Color Settings dialog box, Photoshop displays whether the current settings are synchronized with the other applications in the suite. To unsynchronize, choose a different setting from the Settings list. For more information on a chosen color setting, hover the cursor over the Settings list and refer to the bottom of the dialog for a brief description.
To resynchronize, choose the same setting applied in the Adobe Bridge application’s Suite Color Settings dialog box. You can access this dialog in Bridge by choosing Edit --> Creative Suite Color Settings or by pressing Shift+F+K / Shift+Ctrl+K. Abrief description is listed under each setting name in the dialog. The best choice for print designers and production artists is North America Prepress 2, which uses the Adobe RGB and U.S. Web Coated (SWOP) v2 working spaces.
Color Management: What Color Settings Should I Use?
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