ProPhoto or Srgb?

Hi all you Lightroom experts,

I'm confused.......In Lightroom they recommend using the 'ProPhoto' colour space when exporting into Photoshop etc. but everywhere else I see people saying to use 'Srgb' profile.
There's a huge difference when changing from one to the other so which should I use and when???? .....and what about when I want to have my photos printed and the printer requires another profile? if I change the profile the image changes completely! HELP!

I'll leave someone who actually uses LR to give specifics but in general:

If you aren't sure what you are doing stay in sRGB all the way through from camera through processing to print. This should always work and any printer is going to accept sRGB.

You can probably optimise processing by firstly taking original camera images in the slightly wider AdobeRGB colourspace. I assume LR works internally in LAB or something rather than in one of the RBB colourspaces but I might be wrong - if I am a LR user will have to advise. When/if you export to photoshop you may want to use a colour space wide enough to fit all your LR colours inside, exporting in AdobeRGB may be enough but you may need ProPhoto if you have really extreme colours in your image. In general it is best not to use a colour space that is massively wider than you need so I do question using ProPhoto as a general policy.

So my advice is keep it simply and use sRGB all the time. Or use AdobeRGB all the time and accept possible complications when printing or exprting to the web. Messing about further I don't advise unless you want to go bald prematurely

Michael, Like most things in photography it depends on your needs and experience.

This link can explain things far better than i would be able to. Once you have read it, I think you will be more informed as to which colour space is for you.

http://fstoppers.com/adobergb-vs-srgb

I accidentally processed some images in the profoto colour space. When uploaded to the web and viewed on an ipad they looke like they hasd been sepia toned

Generally (especially if unsure), sRGB

ProPhoto gives an absolutely massive colour gamut. When using it you MUST use 16-bit, and it gives a huge degree of latitude for editing and colour matching. You only ever edit in ProPhoto. You always have to convert (not assign!) the profile to the destination colour space - which may well be sRGB.

I have some stickies on colour management. Have a read
If they don't make sense to you then always use sRGB.

99% of the time you won't be missing anything

Matt

Many thanks all!
That link Fletcher is very useful! thanks for that.

Matt, how do I access your 'stickies'?

Michael,
They are sticky topics under the General Digital forum section.
Here is a link - https://www.pentaxuser.com/forum/topic/basic-colour-management--c1--amp--ps-2384

Hope that helps!
Matt

Just for interest, here are two examples:
ProPhoto



srgb



Both were edited in Lightroom, one as proPhoto and the other as srgb

They should look the same, even with different colour spaces (especially on the Mac)

You must be doing something wrong...
Matt

Matt, thanks for the link, very informative, just what I need. I just have to decide now, which one to use

Matt on my Mac which was calibrated 5 days ago using a Colormunki their is a difference between the two plant images Michael posted, the Prophoto greens look a lot better and the image has more pop to my eyes.

Michael, i would personally go either for RGB or Prophoto if you are intending to print your own work. However, you will need to ensure your workflow is right from a calibrated monitor and printer together with using the correct paper profiles, but the end results will be in a class of their own if you get everything right.

What I meant was that it will not matter which colour space they are edited in.
The ProPhoto MUST be converted to sRGB before saving for web.
And therefore if they look different here your process is wrong.

Actually in LR you should use 16-bit ProPhoto ONLY if you are editing in PS. When done convert to sRGB for web and output.

So, answering your question - use sRGB

Matt

Matt in relation to the web you are right, but in relation to editing for printing the colour space becomes very important. RGB is a lot easier to get to grips with than Prophoto.

However, If people never intend to print their own images then sRGB makes life simple. I guess at the end of the day a lot of people will just want an auto mode for everything, but with a little trial and error in relation to learning, one develops a better understanding of why things work or don't work.

I know, hence my comment about ONLY using ProPhoto if you edit in PS

But the OP isn't about editing.



I downloaded both the "example" images. Neither have the profile info embedded so the browsers are viewing as if they are sRGB (because that's assumed).

Actually, I can see that they've been wrongly labelled
The one marked as "sRGB" (the bottom of the two) was ProPhoto. It looks dull because the colour space is wrong.

To prove this I pasted each image into Photoshop as an sRGB image.
Then, the bottom image I used "Edit" / "Assign Profile" and picked ProPhoto. Bingo - now both images look the same.


That's too simple a statement. You can print perfectly well in sRGB colour space. Other colour spaces may have benefits - but even with printing you need to go through a colour management check to ensure that it's all necessary.

The professional printer service I use (ProAM) use their own profile which is extremely close to sRGB. Yes, you should use their profile, but sRGB will do nicely, and AdobeRGB is wider than their colour gamut (and ProPhoto definitely is).
Pretty much all online printing services expect sRGB.

Sure, using a wider colour space - and AdobeRGB is perfectly fine for printing in 8-bit colour - gives more colour range. ProPhoto is perfect for editing where there's a great deal of PP required (and especially if colour matching is needed for products etc).

Colour management need not be difficult, but a user needs to understand the difference between "Convert" and "Assign" when it comes to profiles, and what they're trying to achieve

There's more to be gained from sRGB and a decently calibrated monitor


Converting to the appropriate colour space for output is crucial if using anything other than sRGB. Even if you use AdobeRGB for home-printing then you still need to understand the nuances of where the colour management is applied, and how (including the 'intent'). Certainly if you use ProPhoto you must understand all of this, and also the implications of editing in a gamut that is certainly wider than the gamut of your output device (which is where soft-proofing and gamut clipping comes in).

Sorry about the ramble

Matt

[quote:3496ace15f="MattMatic"]I thought that; whenever I have forgotten to convert from ProPhoto to sRGB for posting, the photo looks dull