# Color space



## GarfieldKlon (May 22, 2015)

Hi 

I'm using RAW as format. I now have a monitor that is able to cover 99% of AdobeRGB and 100% of sRGB.
If I'm editing a RAW photo in LR Develop module, LR uses ProPhotoRGB, right?

But if I'm editing it for publishing it on the web, this is useless or even worse. Wouldn't it be better to first export is as a JPG and use sRGB and then editing it?
Same question for AdobeRGB.

Or do I have to use 'Softproof'?


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## LouieSherwin (May 22, 2015)

Hi Garfield,

It is in fact a good idea that Lightroom uses a large color gamut such as ProPhoto RGB as it's working space. If you were to switch to a smaller gamut then the very first thing Lightroom would do is to limit the gamut of the raw conversion to the smaller space effectively loosing valuable information contained in your raw file. Additionally it allows the software to apply a wider range of adjustments to the image data with out the risk of clipping colors. For images that have a lot of color at the fringes of the gamut this would cause problems such as posterization that would be virtually impossible to rectify later. 

Just the fact of having a wide gamut monitor is a big help. So long as you maintain your monitor profile the color management system (CMS) is going to do an excellent job of handling most if not all out of gamut colors. Also the CMS is going to do the best job of handling the out of gamut colors while converting the image color space  to sRGB when you are done editing and export the image for publishing on the web. 

Soft-proofing is a valuable tool to preview your images in the target output color space and to see how much if any of the colors are out of range of the target gamut. However, it is not necessary or even advisable to try and edit the image in LR to remove the gamut warning. As I stated above you will almost always get better results if you let the CMS handle the out of gamut colors. It has a much more sophisticated approach to dealing with this than any tool available in Lightroom. 

Because of the large color space provided by ProPhoto RGB and because of the power of the Lightroom editing controls is quit possible that you can make adjustments in Lightroom that will push large areas of some images past the limits of the much smaller sRGB output color space. In these cases if can make sense to back off on some of these adjustments to reduce out of gamut colors. Just remember that any adjustments made in Lightroom affect all the image pixels whereas the CMS is only working on those that are out of gamut. You will need to look carefully at the final image in a color managed application to see what looks best.

There is some more information about this in the following topic including some links to a couple of tutorials about using soft-proofing in Lightroom.

print colours matt paper

-louie


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## GarfieldKlon (May 22, 2015)

Thanks for this hint 

An other question. Is it true, that LR uses different color spaces to present you a photo? For example it uses sRGB in the grid view and only in the Develop module you see the ProPhotoRGB? I've recently read something about that (unfortunately can't find it anymore).

edit:
Found it, it's on the offical Adobe site:
https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/help/color-management.html


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## LouieSherwin (May 22, 2015)

That's quit a nice summary. Thanks for finding  and posting it. I didn't know for example that Lightroom uses Adobe RGB for the previews. Good to know as it makes an even better case for using a wide gamut (Adobe RGB) monitor.

Keep in mind that the CMS is always working in the background so that even though Lightroom is using ProPhoto RGB when in the Develop module you will still only see that image as processed by the CMS using your monitor profile. This underlines the importance of having a quality, up to date monitor profile and the best quality monitor you can afford. 

For many years I used one of Apple's LCD monitors with good success. I was blown away, however, by with the dramatically improvement of my prints after upgrading to an Eizo ColorEdge monitor several years ago. It wasn't just the expanded color gamut but also the increased dynamic range that allowed me to to get substantially more shadow detail into my images and subsequently into my prints. Incidentally soft-proofing really helps for this because you can quickly switch and look to see how your adjustments are affecting the image for the target output. 

FYI, I am a bit of a color nut as I have an i1Pro measurement device and make all my own custom printer profiles as well. Although the differences between the standard canned profiles provided by the paper manufactures and my custom profiles are small they can be a big help when trying to tease out subtle detail at the fringes. I have found that a strong color management practice is critical in making the difference between pretty good prints and ones that pop off of the page. 

-louie


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## GarfieldKlon (May 23, 2015)

I bought my first really good monitor, a EIZO CS240, a few days ago 

Do you use the mode 'AdobeRGB' for your monitor? I'm using the calibrated slot.

What I don't understand is, that one of my photos looks pretty much better in the develop module than in the library view. But if I enable this two options in the histogram that show me which color my monitor can't display and which can't be shown for the target profile, then I can't see any difference and so I'm really confused why there is a difference in the both views.


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## LouieSherwin (May 23, 2015)

Hi,

I am not familiar with the CS240 model so I cannot give specific answers for the monitor you have. But as a general answer you should enable it to display Adobe RGB and always keep your monitor profile up to date by doing a new profile every 400-600 hour or so. You will need to follow the specific instructions for your display and calibration system to accomplish these.

Regarding the difference between Loupe and Develop how are the two views different? Perhaps a screen shot of each would help.

-louie


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## GarfieldKlon (May 24, 2015)

LouieSherwin said:


> Hi,
> I am not familiar with the CS240 model so I cannot give specific answers for the monitor you have. But as a general answer you should enable it to display Adobe RGB and always keep your monitor profile up to date by doing a new profile every 400-600 hour or so. You will need to follow the specific instructions for your display and calibration system to accomplish these.



I just calibrated it and using that as profile, in the OSD menu that's the mode 'CAL 1'. I think that includes the AdobeRGB.


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## Adrian Malloch (Jun 1, 2015)

In general, you should be using Native Monitor Gamut when creating a profile in Eizo Color Navigator. Choosing Adobe RGB or other options will unnecessarily limit the total gamut that the profile uses. The Adobe RGB option is there for workplaces with multiple monitors where consistency from monitor to monitor is more important than the best output from any one monitor.


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