Color Managing Question

[zoran]

In Photoshop what exactly is colour managing for? Does it effect the colours when an image is printed or is it only for viewing on screen purposes?

 

[chrfr]

In Photoshop what exactly is colour managing for? Does it effect the colours when an image is printed or is it only for viewing on screen purposes?

It's both.

 

[zoran]

Ηοw can i associate a picture with a color management profile permanently? I don't want it to keep asking me everytime i open it! Is is possible?

 

[superscape]

Ηοw can i associate a picture with a color management profile permanently? I don't want it to keep asking me everytime i open it! Is is possible?

I think what you're asking about is assigning a profile to an image. You can do that from Edit>Assign Profile then select whatever options makes sense to you.

Be aware that colour management is a fairly hefty science in itself. Be sure you know what you're doing before you start messing about with it. I know enough about it to know that I don't know enough..!

 

[zoran]

Thanx superscape. In what way can i get in trouble though when using a color profile?

 

[Dana Beck]

Thanx superscape. In what way can i get in trouble though when using a color profile?

Just to mention: you want to use "convert to profile" under the edit menu rather than "assign to profile," thus letting PS actually convert the image's colors rather than your assigning them as is.

Also, color profiles are good; you _want_ to use them, as they define your preferred color space. For example, you want to edit in the biggest color space: Adobe RGB, Pro Photo, or even sometimes sRGB. When finished editing, you want to output your file in a color space specified by either your hardware device or intent (printer, for example, can use either Adobe RGB or sRGB; online/screen needs sRGB) or the preferred color space of a commercial print service as specified (look on their website). Lots of gotchas in _wrong_ color profiles: brown prints (double profiling by both PS as well as local printer), mismatched prints (wrong colors), etc. You can "soft proof" your print before output pretty accurately if you have a calibrated monitor...to see onscreen how it will look printed (you have to turn on "Proof Colors" in PS first to see how it will look printed). As the earlier poster said, a big topic. Best advice is to start by calibrating your monitor with a hardware calibrator.

 

[superscape]

Thanx superscape. In what way can i get in trouble though when using a color profile?

There's a whole science dedicated to color management that involves calibrating monitors, managing profiles, output devices etc. I'm afraid it's beyond me. I'm lucky enough to have color management specialists to delegate that sort of stuff to!

 

[zoran]

I would be very obligated if you could help me with this thread of mine. I need to go back to my original colour settings, can you help me? When i say original colour settings i mean the ones that were there intact after the installation of cs6!

 

[Dana Beck]

I would be very obligated if you could help me with this thread of mine. I need to go back to my original colour settings, can you help me? When i say original colour settings i mean the ones that were there intact after the installation of cs6!

Here are the default settings that Photoshop installs with--not the best for editing--but they are the original color settings (from EDIT-COLOR SETTINGS):

This is also, as you can see, where you can turn off the "Ask When opening" pesky questions that are annoying you.

Hope that helps.

 

[zoran]

Many many thanx!!!