Image colour change when going from ACR to PS

[Manfred M]

I checked my Win 11 updated PS & Camera Raw again for the issue and did not notice anything (Standard sRGB NEC monitor). I did update my Nvidia 1060 series video card to a Win 11 driver and that solved a significant performance issue. Perhaps if you downloaded DXO PhotoLab 5 as a trial version, you could have a different color management system to compare color management & Raw demosaicing. I really like DXO and have NIK and a number of other DXO addons as well...not too expensive.

I have used the DxO product for about the past 20 years and I did not buy PhotoLab 5. The DxO product had two great features, so far as I was concerned. It was catalogue free and it had an outstanding lens profile correction, chromatic aberation correction and fantastic noise reduction algorithms. The downside was a rather awkward user interface and a somewhat slow response rate when loading up images. My second raw processor is Capture One and while I am no expert in using it, the camera tethering capabilities are something I use in the studio all the time.

To me PS Edit > Color Settings can be confusing as I have to remember to actually save a change for it to take effect.

I have used Photoshop for over 18 years and I have had to use that functionality twice in that period because I had to prepare some CMYK images for offset press printing. I'm not sure why you need to get into that functionality at all.

One thing that opened my small brain quite a lot was the realization that many RGB Mode color spaces (sRGB, Adobe RGB) are centered at the D65 illuminant (6500K I think) which is white for all practical purposes. The colors get increasingly saturated as they are distant from the D65 point. So much, if not almost all, photos look reasonably great in sRGB. Certainty, I would imagine, for skin tones it is hard to visualize a tone beyond the sRGB color space.

sRGB, Adobe RGB and DCI-P3 all use the D65 illuminant. THe very popular ProPhoto RGB used D50. Digital photography has traditionally used D65 but the offset printing industry has traditional used D50. Daylight colour films tended to be set for 5000K white balance and the daylight and electronic flash tend to be in the 5500K - 5600K range, so there is no magic about D65.

There is more to photography than skin tones; saturated reds, greens and blues (think flowers, fireworks and coloured lights). The sRGB colour space has problems with those hues. If you are posting your images on websites and use a low end,non-colour managed displays, sRGB can be as good as it gets. Do any high quality inkjet printing of saturated colours and you will want and need a wider colour space, I virtually never work in sRGB and I default to either Adobe RGB or ProPhoto RGB, depending on the image characteristics. I have a number of images that look terrible in sRGB, especially when using the Relative Colorimetric rendering intent.

So, software wise, setting everything to sRGB should minimize any color shifts if Windows properly reads the color information (.icm) during boot-up... in Windows 10 & 11: Windows/System32/spool/drivers/color). I certainty hope the next Win 11 update addresses all color issues. Oddly enough, it takes about the same amount of time to load PS now as it did back in 1994 and I still have many of the same printing vexations as back then as well. So, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Grahame's issue has nothing to do with the colour space he uses. There seems to be a problem with his computer as my Windows 11 computer does not display any of the issues that he has reported.

[Stagecoach]

Update ...................................

With some time to spare over the holiday I decided to wipe the drive and do a full clean install of Windows 11 after backing up everything.

With PS, ACR, LR and ViewNxi now all operational colours are consistent throughout and visually accurate. E.g. grey is grey and white is white.

I have tested using both the Win system automatically loaded generic PNP monitor driver that shows the GPU model and also the generic sRGB icm profile, results are the same. I'll run a calibration with the Spyder later.

So what the problem was I still have no idea, there was a conflict somewhere.

[pschlute]

So pleased you have fixed the issue. I guess the problem related to the installation of Win11 via the upgrade route from 10, versus a clean Win11 install. It would indicate the former method broke the colour management in some way, perhaps only affecting certain types of GPU or software being used.

I bet you feel relieved.

[Cantab]

Update ...................................

With some time to spare over the holiday I decided to wipe the drive and do a full clean install of Windows 11 after backing up everything.

With PS, ACR, LR and ViewNxi now all operational colours are consistent throughout and visually accurate. E.g. grey is grey and white is white.

I have tested using both the Win system automatically loaded generic PNP monitor driver that shows the GPU model and also the generic sRGB icm profile, results are the same. I'll run a calibration with the Spyder later.

So what the problem was I still have no idea, there was a conflict somewhere.

I'm glad you've got the problem fixed. But I wonder how many hours it took to wipe the drive, do a clean install of Windows 11, do the Windows updates, reinstall your software etc. etc. I remember doing something like this many years ago with a computer that was running Windows 98 or possibly XP; it took a lot of time!

When it comes the time that I have to have Windows 11, I'll need to decide whether to go the upgrade route or install an additional drive and do a dual-boot (as I did many years ago when I had to switch from XP to Windows 7). The difficulty is that I currently have Windows 10 installed on an M.2 solid drive. Oh well, it's not a question I'll need to decide for some time.

[Stagecoach]

So pleased you have fixed the issue. I guess the problem related to the installation of Win11 via the upgrade route from 10, versus a clean Win11 install. It would indicate the former method broke the colour management in some way, perhaps only affecting certain types of GPU or software being used.

I bet you feel relieved.

Thanks Peter, I'm certainly relieved now.

[Stagecoach]

I'm glad you've got the problem fixed. But I wonder how many hours it took to wipe the drive, do a clean install of Windows 11, do the Windows updates, reinstall your software etc. etc. I remember doing something like this many years ago with a computer that was running Windows 98 or possibly XP; it took a lot of time!

When it comes the time that I have to have Windows 11, I'll need to decide whether to go the upgrade route or install an additional drive and do a dual-boot (as I did many years ago when I had to switch from XP to Windows 7). The difficulty is that I currently have Windows 10 installed on an M.2 solid drive. Oh well, it's not a question I'll need to decide for some time.

Thank you Bruce.

Quite a few hours went into the investigation and nearly two days to complete the rebuild as I want it.

My Windows was also on an M.2 solid drive and fortunately I have a number of other drives where I could backup everything. Luckily I found a great article on Windows Central that walked you through absolutely every step and with that on a Laptop it was easy to follow. The Windows 11 load also had clear precise instructions for cleaning the M.2 drive of its partition structure.

Things have certainly advanced these days, no drawers and boxes full of CDs to find and phone cameras to take snaps of any settings you think you may want to recall.

[Cantab]

...
My Windows was also on an M.2 solid drive and fortunately I have a number of other drives where I could backup everything. Luckily I found a great article on Windows Central that walked you through absolutely every step and with that on a Laptop it was easy to follow. The Windows 11 load also had clear precise instructions for cleaning the M.2 drive of its partition structure.

Graham, is this the Windows Central article that you refer to? https://www.windowscentral.com/how-u...-11-windows-10

[Stagecoach]

Graham, is this the Windows Central article that you refer to? https://www.windowscentral.com/how-u...-11-windows-10

No Bruce.

This is the far more comprehensive one that I followed for a 'Clean Installation'

https://www.windowscentral.com/how-d...all-windows-11