Gamut question for slide scanning

Hello all,

 

So I finally pulled the trigger on a Nikon Seuper CoolScan 9000 ED. It's about

twice as big as it looks in pictures! But it's built like a tank and does

wonders with old Kodachrome slides.

 

My question is: if I am scanning in a wide gamut, how do I convert this to a

narrower one (like sRGB)? I have Photoshop CS2 but I'm a bit confused. When I

scan in sRGB I get a much more vibrant image than Adobe Wide. But when I import

the Adobe Wide into PS, shouldn't I be able to perform some kind of gamut

narrowing that would produce the more vibrant image (albeit with less overall

tonal information)?

 

I'm scanning for archiving purposes, but I'm also making a set of images that

will be viewed only on computer screens. So I'd like to scan in Adobe Wide, but

convert to sRGB for viewing.

 

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

 

-ch

Hi Christofer: You need to study the issue of color gammuts, color spaces, etc., and there is no better place to do it than in the Bruce Lindbloom web site, to my mind one of the world's true experts in the field. Another excellent source is Bruce Fraser's Real World Photoshop, he has other books specifically on the subject.

 

http://www.brucelindbloom.com/index.html?LabGamutDisplayHelp.html#IntegerLab

 

In short sRGB is a narrow and quite limited color space which fits the limited gammut of ink jets but for archival purposes hardly worth bothering with. I leave to your research to investigate the rest.

BTW, the Nikon is a great machine. Enjoy.

You guys are wearing me out with all the new technical information residing within your substantial knowledge base. Thanks. It is a great link that will require further study. Makes me yearn for a less complicated 3F era.

Scan in a wide space like AdobeRGB, EktaSpace, etc. Work on your files in that space. For printing convert the profile to a custom printer profile, or SRGB if it's not available and you're sending out jpegs. Inkjet gamuts are generally wider than SRGB as far as I understand.

 

For the web convert the profile to SRGB.

 

You can see the change, what colors are clipped, etc with the proof colors mode.

 

Try a basic photoshop book like Real World Photoshop or Real World Color Management to better understand these issues.

It sounds like you have color management turned off in PS. Find the 'Color Settings' dialog (It's under Edit in PS6) and select the color

workspace you prefer. Then when you load an image made with the scanner PS will ask you to Keep,Convert to WS, or Discard it's embedded profile (color workspace).

 

I agree that Bruce Fraser, et al "Real World Color Management" is a

great source for demystifying Color Management. Rodney Andrew's "Color

Management for Photographers" is also highly recommended.

Thanks for all the responses--very helpful. I guess I was surprised because I thought that these two processes would deliver the same result:

 

1) Scan slide in Nikon Scan using sRGB

2) Scan slide in Nikon Scan using Adobe Wide and then convert to sRGB in Photoshop

 

However, option 1) produces a far more vivid image on my screen. So I'm still a bit confused.

 

-ch