Adobe Bridge - please help

Images are displayed differently in Bridge than in Photoshop. They are generally lighter and weaker, as can be seen in the following screen shot. This is the same image, top image is Bridge, while the one at the bottom is Photoshop. What is going on here? If it matters, I'm using CS5 on MacOS X 10.6.6.



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Olaf

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Olaf

I see the same thing on a PC with Windows 7. I always just chalked it up to Bridge using some sort of quick way to generate the preview. I don't like it, but I've never investigated it either. The thing that bothers me is that the Bridge images always look too soft.

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Thanks,
Magic Captain Mario

I've seen this to some degree as well ... mainly between PSD's in aRGB (as well as NEF's) when displayed in Bridge (vs CS4) ... I've always assumed Bridge isn't colour managed ... anybody know?

... Duncan

Ralph

Olaf.dk said:

Images are displayed differently in Bridge than in Photoshop. They are generally lighter and weaker, as can be seen in the following screen shot. This is the same image, top image is Bridge, while the one at the bottom is Photoshop. What is going on here? If it matters, I'm using CS5 on MacOS X 10.6.6.



--
Olaf

Click to expand...

...should display the same way in both applications if Bridge is color profile aware. I just cannot believe that Bridge would not be reading the embedded profiles of the files it is displaying, but it sure seems so...

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Olaf

I'm surprised you haven't gotten an answer from one of the experts. It sure seems like Bridge isn't paying attention to PS color profiles however; I couldn't find where Bridge had any setting for color management. Strange, hope you get your answer.............Ralph

Olaf.dk said:

...should display the same way in both applications if Bridge is color profile aware. I just cannot believe that Bridge would not be reading the embedded profiles of the files it is displaying, but it sure seems so...

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Olaf

Click to expand...

Edit-> Creative Suite Color Settings.

And yes this is in the Help files.

If you don't have a hardware color calibrated monitor, you should.

Lightroom 3 uses ProPhoto color space, and there is no other choice. I keep Bridge CS5 and Photoshop CS5 set to ProPhoto color space, but set so that images will open in their embedded color space or ask me what color space to use if there isn't one embedded in the file.

Images look identical in all three programs this way.

lumigraphics said:

Edit-> Creative Suite Color Settings.

And yes this is in the Help files.

Click to expand...

Ah but this is setting is only available if you have the full creative suite. If you're "just" using PhotoShop CS5, this option is greyed out in Bridge. So I don't believe there is anywhere to specifically set Bridge colour settings, which I think would be a rather useful feature to have.

I had a similar issue just recently: had an image in ProPhoto (default PS working space) and so of course the profile was embedded in the file. When I displayed it in Bridge having saved and shut down the file in PS I noticed that the image was far less vibrant. I double-checked and Bridge was indicating that the colour profile was ProPhoto (I began to wonder if I'd inadvertently switched to a different profile somehow!). I did some experimenting in PS and I noticed that the if I converted the image to sRGB, the colours matched the thumbnail and full-size preview in Bridge.

My conclusion: Bridge doesn't seem to be fully colour managed (as I'd believed it was) and it defaults to sRGB. However, that said, I've not really noticed this with any other images... Perhaps I've just been lucky and this one stuck out because it was using particuarly saturated colours.

So does anyone know the score with Bridge colour management?

M

Mr Mario,

You can get Bridge to generate full size previews and also monitor screen-size previews. Have a look in Bridge Edit/preferences dialogue for the "Cache" page, where you can tick a box "Keep 100% previews in cache". This is also the page where you can set the cache max-size as well as its location; and where you can can compact the cache (delete preview files of images you have deleted) or purge it (empty the cache entirely) if and when it gets a bit full.

And it can get full, quite quickly, as the full-size previews gobble up megabytes. Ideally, set the cache to live on a different physical disk from that where you keep programs and the operating system. If you do purge the cache, Bridge will still regenerate a full-size preview whenever you open any particular image file. It just takes a little longer to display it than it would if it already had a full size preview waiting in the cache.

On the "Advanced" page of the Bridge Preferences dialogue box, you can also tick a box "Generate monitor sized previews". The preview cache will then hold both 100% and monitor-size previews at their native resolution (image pixels & monitor screen-size pixels respectively).

If you do this, the previews shown by Bridge will look exactly as the images will look in Photoshop. There should then be no fuzziness, which can be caused by Bridge having only small-sized cached thumbnails in the preview cache to interpolate and show at full-screen size.

Just keep an eye an the blossoming cache file size, as it can soon add up to gigabytes and gigabytes.

SirLataxe

lumigraphics said:

Edit-> Creative Suite Color Settings.

And yes this is in the Help files.

Click to expand...

The screenshot I provided is after that has been done. I've chosen "Europe General Purpose 3" and checked that it is the same in Photoshop. The image shown is a web-sized jpg in the sRGB color space. And no, the color profile has not been stripped from the file...

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Olaf

Olaf.dk said:

The image shown is a web-sized jpg in the sRGB color space. And no, the color profile has not been stripped from the file...

Click to expand...

Interestingly, the preview is consistent with Photoshop when I am looking at a RAW-file (Canon CR2-file).

I am running just CS5 and Bridge does allow me to click on Creative Suite Color Settings but gives the following error message:

"Suite Color Management is not enabled.

Suite Color Management requires that a qualifying product has been launched at least once to enable this feature."

Go figure.............Ralph

mollysnoot said:

lumigraphics said:

Edit-> Creative Suite Color Settings.

And yes this is in the Help files.

Click to expand...

Ah but this is setting is only available if you have the full creative suite. If you're "just" using PhotoShop CS5, this option is greyed out in Bridge. So I don't believe there is anywhere to specifically set Bridge colour settings, which I think would be a rather useful feature to have.

I had a similar issue just recently: had an image in ProPhoto (default PS working space) and so of course the profile was embedded in the file. When I displayed it in Bridge having saved and shut down the file in PS I noticed that the image was far less vibrant. I double-checked and Bridge was indicating that the colour profile was ProPhoto (I began to wonder if I'd inadvertently switched to a different profile somehow!). I did some experimenting in PS and I noticed that the if I converted the image to sRGB, the colours matched the thumbnail and full-size preview in Bridge.

My conclusion: Bridge doesn't seem to be fully colour managed (as I'd believed it was) and it defaults to sRGB. However, that said, I've not really noticed this with any other images... Perhaps I've just been lucky and this one stuck out because it was using particuarly saturated colours.

So does anyone know the score with Bridge colour management?

M

Click to expand...

AFAIK that option is only relevant if you need to make other Creative suite programmes aware of the color management settings you are using in Photoshop

Bit of quirky programming by Adobe, normally they wouldn't show or at least grey out such an option.

Ralph Ramirez said:

I am running just CS5 and Bridge does allow me to click on Creative Suite Color Settings but gives the following error message:

"Suite Color Management is not enabled.

Suite Color Management requires that a qualifying product has been launched at least once to enable this feature."

Go figure.............Ralph

Click to expand...

You're absolutely right Ralph - it isn't greyed out as I stated, you just get the error message and are unable to use this feature unless you have the full CS (as far as I can determine). I guess it was just greyed out in my mind as I knew it didn't work!

M

Ralph Ramirez said:

I am running just CS5 and Bridge does allow me to click on Creative Suite Color Settings but gives the following error message:

"Suite Color Management is not enabled.

Suite Color Management requires that a qualifying product has been launched at least once to enable this feature."

Go figure.............Ralph

mollysnoot said:

lumigraphics said:

Edit-> Creative Suite Color Settings.

And yes this is in the Help files.

Click to expand...

Ah but this is setting is only available if you have the full creative suite. If you're "just" using PhotoShop CS5, this option is greyed out in Bridge. So I don't believe there is anywhere to specifically set Bridge colour settings, which I think would be a rather useful feature to have.

I had a similar issue just recently: had an image in ProPhoto (default PS working space) and so of course the profile was embedded in the file. When I displayed it in Bridge having saved and shut down the file in PS I noticed that the image was far less vibrant. I double-checked and Bridge was indicating that the colour profile was ProPhoto (I began to wonder if I'd inadvertently switched to a different profile somehow!). I did some experimenting in PS and I noticed that the if I converted the image to sRGB, the colours matched the thumbnail and full-size preview in Bridge.

My conclusion: Bridge doesn't seem to be fully colour managed (as I'd believed it was) and it defaults to sRGB. However, that said, I've not really noticed this with any other images... Perhaps I've just been lucky and this one stuck out because it was using particuarly saturated colours.

So does anyone know the score with Bridge colour management?

M

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

--
Thanks,
Magic Captain Mario

Seems strange that Adobe would do that, but it is one complicated bit of software.............Ralph

mollysnoot said:

You're absolutely right Ralph - it isn't greyed out as I stated, you just get the error message and are unable to use this feature unless you have the full CS (as far as I can determine). I guess it was just greyed out in my mind as I knew it didn't work!

M

Ralph Ramirez said:

I am running just CS5 and Bridge does allow me to click on Creative Suite Color Settings but gives the following error message:

"Suite Color Management is not enabled.

Suite Color Management requires that a qualifying product has been launched at least once to enable this feature."

Go figure.............Ralph

mollysnoot said:

lumigraphics said:

Edit-> Creative Suite Color Settings.

And yes this is in the Help files.

Click to expand...

Ah but this is setting is only available if you have the full creative suite. If you're "just" using PhotoShop CS5, this option is greyed out in Bridge. So I don't believe there is anywhere to specifically set Bridge colour settings, which I think would be a rather useful feature to have.

I had a similar issue just recently: had an image in ProPhoto (default PS working space) and so of course the profile was embedded in the file. When I displayed it in Bridge having saved and shut down the file in PS I noticed that the image was far less vibrant. I double-checked and Bridge was indicating that the colour profile was ProPhoto (I began to wonder if I'd inadvertently switched to a different profile somehow!). I did some experimenting in PS and I noticed that the if I converted the image to sRGB, the colours matched the thumbnail and full-size preview in Bridge.

My conclusion: Bridge doesn't seem to be fully colour managed (as I'd believed it was) and it defaults to sRGB. However, that said, I've not really noticed this with any other images... Perhaps I've just been lucky and this one stuck out because it was using particuarly saturated colours.

So does anyone know the score with Bridge colour management?

M

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

...let's see if anyone over there knows what is going on... I used a rearranged crop from the above screen shot, with the images side by side. That makes the difference real obvious; left is Bridge, right is Photoshop:



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Olaf

Do you use an external monitor? I have had this problem before. Bridge is definitely color managed, but does get confused when you have two monitors. If you have an external monitor which you use to view the Bridge window, try this, change the profile on your internal monitor to the profile of your external monitor. Obviously, your internal monitor will look off. Let me know if this works.