Setting Color Management Policies in Photoshop Part 3

The options are similar to the default policies of the Color Settings dialog box:

-->Use the Embedded Profile (Instead of the Working Space): Photoshop displays the file in its original embedded color space and does not perform any color conversions.

-->Convert Document’s Colors to the Working Space: Photoshop converts the file from its embedded color space to your working color space.

-->Discard the Embedded Profile (Don’t Color Manage): Photoshop doesn’t utilize any color management when opening files but displays the file in your working space.

Be cautious about making any CMYK conversions. If you encounter a Profile Mismatch with a CMYK image, you will probably want to preserve the image’s embedded profile unless you’re absolutely sure it should be converted to another CMYK working space. But, if the image doesn’t have a profile, then by all means convert it to your CMYK working space.

If you select the Ask When Pasting option for Profile Mismatches, Photoshop prompts you when you drag and drop layers or selections that have the same color mode but different color profiles. In the Paste Profile Mismatch alert dialog box, you have two options:

-->Convert (Preserve Color Appearance): Photoshop converts and matches the appearance of the color rather than the RGB numerical values. For example, the RGB color of R 152, G 122, B 250 may be a different shade of purple in one RGB working space versus another. If you preserve the numerical values, the shades won’t match. If you preserve the appearance, Photoshop attempts to maintain the two shades.

-->Don’t Convert (Preserve Color Number): Photoshop does not convert the appearance of the color but instead matches the RGB numerical values. If you don’t select the Ask When Pasting check box, Photoshop pastes the color appearance between RGB images and pastes the numerical values between CMYK images. If you select the Ask When Opening option for Missing Profiles, Photoshop displays a Missing Profile alert and also provides you with the following options.

-->Leave As Is (Don’t Color Manage): This leaves the image untagged and without a color profile, but displays the image in your working space.

-->Assign Working RGB (or CMYK or Grayscale, depending on your image mode): your working space: Photoshop tags the image with your working space and displays it in that working space. If you change your working space, the image retains the old working space.

-->Assign Profile: This option allows you to assign any color profile contained within the pop-up menu. You can use this option if you know where the untagged image originated. For example, if you scanned your image and your scanner doesn’t embed profiles, you can assign the scanner profile.

Unless you have a specific reason not to, I recommend that you assign your working RGB space to those orphan files. I recommend selecting the Ask When Opening and Ask When Pasting check boxes. That way you know when a profile mismatch occurs and you have the choice of picking your course of action, which includes overriding the defaults you set in the policy settings. This allows you to evaluate whether you want to preserve or convert on a file-by-file basis.

For example, if you’re a print designer, and a Web designer gives you a file, you get a profile mismatch alerting you that the file has the sRGB color space and that it doesn’t match your working space of Adobe RGB (1998). If you’re going to use the image as-is for Web content, you tell Photoshop to preserve the embedded profile and not to make any conversion. But if you want to repurpose the image (for, say, a logo), you have to instruct Photoshop to convert the file to your working RGB space. (Of course, ultimately, you have to also convert the image mode to CMYK for printing purposes.)

To find out the color profile of an image, choose Document Profile from the pop-up menu at the bottom of the image window. Also if an image has a color profile that differs from your working space, an asterisk appears in the title bar. An untagged image displays a pound sign.

By the way, when you select the Advanced Mode option, you have a few additional options regarding color conversion engines and rendering intents, which are methods of color translation. I recommend putting your trust in Photoshop and leaving these options at their defaults, unless you’re a bona fide color expert.