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richt1

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Advanced apologies if asked and answered (I have searched) - sometimes, though, it helps to ask in one's own way. Colorspace managment & printing is new to me but I've been reading quite a bit since I purchased an R2400 a week ago.

I have so many questions, but for now, I'll limit it to this, although, I'm sort of expecting disparate answers:

I shoot raw + JPEG. If I'm going to print myself on the R2400, would one recommend to convert a RAW file (RAW ESSENTIALs) in sRGB or Adobe RBG, and then go from there through the printing process?

(Observations to date, although perhaps not relevant - but I certainly don't understand it):

Almost all the prints I've printed to date have started out as sRGB. If I stay with sRGB all through the printing process - no problem. If, though I convert to Adobe RGB (which, I quess, doesn't make much sense to do) or assign to AdobleRBG (similiarly, I guess it doesn't make much sense) - the print just won't print the image correctly. Put another way, it appears that if I start with either an Adobe RRB image or a sRGB image and stay there, the printer (also assigning the correct printer profile for the paper & color managment turned off to avoid double profiling) - will produce fine prints. If, though, I start with sRGB and convert or assign to Adoble RBG - forget it. The print comes out with what looks like roller lines or even scrapes on a certain portion of the print and even dried loose ink flakes on the top of the print as it ejects.

Again, though - I'm guessing this is loaded question, But IF PRINTING is the sole objective - does one recommend converting raw files to Adobe RGB, post-processing that file, and then printing that file? or......... just stay with rRBG?

(Another aside: the 20D allows selection of either Adobe RBG or sRBG when taking the picture, although Canon recommends for most purposes to shoot in sRBG. Am I correct that this setting only affects the JPEG image if one is shooting in JPEG? or, since i shoot JPEG & RAW, does this setting only affect the JPEG and is irrelvant in RAW?

Again, I'm sorry for the very basic questions here, which, themselves are hard for me to articulate since I understand so little of this. ... but I have to start somewhere, and this forum has often been of great help.

thanks.
 
Most of today's consumer inkjet printers including I believe the 1800 and 2400 Epson's use sRGB. This move was made a few years ago as it was supposed to help make it easier to get accurate color from the camera, scanner stage all the way through the print out stage. As far as I can tell it hasn't.

If your printer does use sRGB and you work in say Photoshop with Adobe 1998 RGB when you print the printer driver will convert to sRGB. I doubt you will notice any difference. I know the Adobe RGB has a wider gamut of colors than most.

Robert
 
As a general rule, if you are planning to print, shoot in Adobe RGB and carry Adobe RGB through to your printer profile--that is leave your Photoshop worksppace in Adobe RGB. If you want to output to the web, then convert your edited Adobe RGB master file (prior to doing a soft proof edit for printing to a specific paper). As a rule, you can convert from a larger colorspace (Adobe RGB) to a smaller colorspace (sRGB) but not the reverse. In any case do not assign colorspaces to make a conversion, just use convert.

Bob
richt1 said:
Advanced apologies if asked and answered (I have searched) -
sometimes, though, it helps to ask in one's own way. Colorspace
managment & printing is new to me but I've been reading quite a bit
since I purchased an R2400 a week ago.

I have so many questions, but for now, I'll limit it to this,
although, I'm sort of expecting disparate answers:

I shoot raw + JPEG. If I'm going to print myself on the R2400,
would one recommend to convert a RAW file (RAW ESSENTIALs) in sRGB
or Adobe RBG, and then go from there through the printing process?

(Observations to date, although perhaps not relevant - but I
certainly don't understand it):

Almost all the prints I've printed to date have started out as
sRGB. If I stay with sRGB all through the printing process - no
problem. If, though I convert to Adobe RGB (which, I quess,
doesn't make much sense to do) or assign to AdobleRBG (similiarly,
I guess it doesn't make much sense) - the print just won't print
the image correctly. Put another way, it appears that if I start
with either an Adobe RRB image or a sRGB image and stay there, the
printer (also assigning the correct printer profile for the paper &
color managment turned off to avoid double profiling) - will
produce fine prints. If, though, I start with sRGB and convert
or assign to Adoble RBG - forget it. The print comes out with what
looks like roller lines or even scrapes on a certain portion of the
print and even dried loose ink flakes on the top of the print as it
ejects.

Again, though - I'm guessing this is loaded question, But IF
PRINTING is the sole objective - does one recommend converting raw
files to Adobe RGB, post-processing that file, and then printing
that file? or......... just stay with rRBG?

(Another aside: the 20D allows selection of either Adobe RBG or
sRBG when taking the picture, although Canon recommends for most
purposes to shoot in sRBG. Am I correct that this setting only
affects the JPEG image if one is shooting in JPEG? or, since i
shoot JPEG & RAW, does this setting only affect the JPEG and is
irrelvant in RAW?

Again, I'm sorry for the very basic questions here, which,
themselves are hard for me to articulate since I understand so
little of this. ... but I have to start somewhere, and this forum
has often been of great help.

thanks.
Click to expand...
--
Bob
 
Thanks for the link. I certainly will read it. It's getting a little late now, but I wanted to thank you.

Rich
 
As a general rule, if you are planning to print, shoot in Adobe RGB and carry Adobe RGB through to your printer profile--that is leave your Photoshop worksppace in Adobe RGB. If you want to output to the web, then convert your edited Adobe RGB master file (prior to doing a soft proof edit for printing to a specific paper). As a rule, you can convert from a larger colorspace (Adobe RGB) to a smaller colorspace (sRGB) but not the reverse. In any case do not assign colorspaces to make a conversion, just use convert.
Bob

Bob,

Everything you say makes sense and thanks for the reply. And, it seems, as you say,you can't effectively convert from a smaller color space to a larger one. I didn't know I was trying to do that, but I later sorted through that that was what I was, in fact, doing, and it just wasn't happening. My kernel so far seems to be (although I understand only a fraction of it) is that if you start in Adobe RGB you can carry it through to either a print or a rRBG conversion for the web. you start in sRBG, you can't necessarily do the reverse.

I hear what you say, but I'm still trying to get a sense for whether shooting in Adobe RGB and following that path to print is appreciably better than just staying with sRBG. From a very limited sample of R2400 prints done both ways, I'm not sure I can tell the difference. Either way, unless corrected, since I record RAW files, I guess I can defer this question until I better understand it.

Thanks again.
 
digitaldog,

Thanks again for your response. I see that you have very useful info posted on your site. You can be sure I'll sort through it tomorrow. Thanks also for that link.

Rich
 
richt, there are arguments both ways, and I dont think you will every get a definitive answer. Generally, since most desktop inkjets will print larger than Adobe RGB for some colors, and substantially larger than sRGB, people will use Adobe all the way through for printing.

However, there are arguments against it. For instance, your monitor does not display larger than sRGB, so how do you edit a color you cannot see?. Additionally you may have a scene where there are no colors beyond the sRGB gamut, so why stretch your 8bit Look up Table for colors you are not going to use. There is also a group that claims it is better to use Pro Photo or one of the other super large spaces. Same issues apply. Additionally many Labs will notprint beyond sRGB, so if you are not printing in house it makes no sense to use the larger colorspace. I think it is really a matter of personal choice and mine is to use Adobe RGB.

Bob
richt1 said:
As a general rule, if you are planning to print, shoot in Adobe RGB
and carry Adobe RGB through to your printer profile--that is leave
your Photoshop worksppace in Adobe RGB. If you want to output to
the web, then convert your edited Adobe RGB master file (prior to
doing a soft proof edit for printing to a specific paper). As a
rule, you can convert from a larger colorspace (Adobe RGB) to a
smaller colorspace (sRGB) but not the reverse. In any case do not
assign colorspaces to make a conversion, just use convert.
Bob

Bob,

Everything you say makes sense and thanks for the reply. And, it
seems, as you say,you can't effectively convert from a smaller
color space to a larger one. I didn't know I was trying to do
that, but I later sorted through that that was what I was, in fact,
doing, and it just wasn't happening. My kernel so far seems to
be (although I understand only a fraction of it) is that if you
start in Adobe RGB you can carry it through to either a print or a
rRBG conversion for the web. you start in sRBG, you can't
necessarily do the reverse.

I hear what you say, but I'm still trying to get a sense for
whether shooting in Adobe RGB and following that path to print is
appreciably better than just staying with sRBG. From a very
limited sample of R2400 prints done both ways, I'm not sure I can
tell the difference. Either way, unless corrected, since I record
RAW files, I guess I can defer this question until I better
understand it.

Thanks again.
Click to expand...
--
Bob
 
Good, good, good. This is useful. Minimaly, it tells me that I'm not a total dolt and am grasping the basics of what I've been reading.

thanks.
 
On a typical consumer printer (I use an Canon ip5200) can you REALLY tell the difference between two prints, one using AdobeRGB the other sRGB?

I know I should answer my own question, and do the test myself, but just wondering if anyone else has done so, and can give me their opinion.
--
Mark

Check out my gallery:
http://www.pbase.com/mark_robinson
 
richt1 said:
I hear what you say, but I'm still trying to get a sense for
whether shooting in Adobe RGB and following that path to print is
appreciably better than just staying with sRBG.
Click to expand...
Only you can decide what's better.

When you shoot RAW, the file is essentially Grayscale data. You can encode that into any color space you wish.

When you ask the camera to provide a JPEG, you don't have that control. You get the color rendering (processing) the manufacturer thinks looks best and you have usually two color spaces to encode that data into; sRGB or Adobe RGB (1998).

When you select Adobe RGB you have more saturated colors to work with. Does the scene you shot have those colors is the first question? Shoot a gray card in either sRGB or Adobe RGB and you'll see the scene is very desaturated and either will do. Shoot a scene with very colorful imagery and there will very likely be colors that fall outside both! Are those colors important to you?

Now you have the gamut of the output device. You may have decided to shoot into Adobe RGB (1998) and it's quite likely you clipped (lost) saturated colors in a scene that may or may not be printable on your printer. So you have at least three gamut's to look for; the scene, the gamut you encode that scene into and the gamut of the output device. Then there's the gamut of the display (which 99% of users are working with something very close to sRGB). A saturated image in Adboe RGB will likely have colors you can't even see on the display. But you very well might be able to see them when ink hit paper.

--
Andrew Rodney
Author of Color Management for Photographers
The Digital Dog
http://www.digitaldog.net
 
Mark - I've just carried out my own very subjective test on two of my RAW images as I was rather intrigued to see if there was any difference. I adjusted the images to my satisfaction in RSE and then saved once with AdobeRGB and once with sRGB. I then printed the pairs on the same sheet of paper, using Qimage. Now I suppose you want to know what I found? Yes, there is a difference, it's very subtle, but it IS there, with the AdobeRGB print having just that little bit more colour depth and punch. The average man in the street may not notice much difference at all, but it would matter if you were selling prints or even files of your pictures for publication. I'll now wait to be shot down in flames!
--
Gordon Tarling
 
Very, very intersting, Gordon. You've done exactly what I did with a couple of files. My two samples, though, just weren't the right one's to select - there wasn't , I suspect, enough of a range of color in them to begin with - so I couldn't really tell - so I wasn't really surprised with the result. At that juncture, I was just trying to get the printer not to screw up which it was doing when, apparently it was doing when I started with a rRBG file and either assigned or convered to Adoble RGB before printing. BUT, your results, as subjective or limited as they may be, intrigue me enough to continue to dabble with this topic as I print at home. Thanks for giving it a go.

Rich
 
Scott Kelby in his book "The Photoshop CS2 Book for Digital Photographers" goes through a very simplified explanation of how to set up your camera and photoshop. He recommends that you stay in the Adobe rgb color space if you are going to do your own inkjet printing. You might want to check your camera settings and make sure you are shooting in Adobe rgb (the default is srgb). That will affect your jpegs. As for your raw files if you are using Adobe camera raw, at the bottom left hand corner of the page, make sure the box that says "Show Workflow options" has a checkmark in it. Then select adobe rgb as your color space. Now your raw files will come into Photshop in that colorspace. In photoshop, go to Edit, Color settings and choose North american Prepress 2. There are some other goodies that yu can do to fine tune this (get Kelby's book) but that should be enough to get you going.

If you ever send your photos out to a lab, they need to be converted back to the sRGB colorspace; same if you want to put them on the web.
--
Cynthia in South Florida
http://cynthiam.smugmug.com/
 
Cynthia,

Another thank you. This has been a very useful thread for me. ..... and the book recommendation is one I will pursue. It sounds like a good resource. I just haven't had much luck with some of the books I've purchased. Some are layed out more efficiently and are easier to follow but it' often hit or miss for me. This sounds like a good one.
 
It is simple and straight forward. He does a very simple chapter on color managment (which is where all of this fits in) and on color correction. If you get the book, don't overlook the introduction. Soemwhere in there he refers you to a website where you can download the images used in the book so you can follow along with what he does.

Good luck. With the r2400 you should get some stunning results. I have the r1800, quite nice, too, but weak on the B+W. Someone in my photography class uses the r2400 and her color prints (on matte paper, she doesn't use gloss) are always stunning.
--
Cynthia in South Florida
http://cynthiam.smugmug.com/
 
i am using sRGB for now but here is some more food for thought from the smugmug 'help' section... maybe if i go out and buy a $5000 monitor to show the aRGB gamut i will change my mind (or i will have lost my mind if i go spend that on a monitor :-)

as you probably already know, the smugmug help section has lots of interesting articles.

http://www.smugmug.com/help/srgb-versus-adobe-rgb-1998

--
Lee
 
lee_b said:
i am using sRGB for now but here is some more food for thought from
the smugmug 'help' section... maybe if i go out and buy a $5000
monitor to show the aRGB gamut i will change my mind (or i will
have lost my mind if i go spend that on a monitor :-)

as you probably already know, the smugmug help section has lots of
interesting articles.

http://www.smugmug.com/help/srgb-versus-adobe-rgb-1998

--
Lee
Click to expand...
The smugmug article is seriously flawed. From comparing aRGB and sRGB photos(impossible with a presumed sRGB viewing monitor) to stating prophoto RGB is 16 bit but Adobe RGB is only 8 bit.

Looks oriented toward rationalizing why photo printers normally use sRGB. Gee, kinda hard to explain why CostCo's printers have a larger than sRGB gamut and can have the sRGB bypassed to accomplish this.
 
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