color management for the web

[garry_b]

I am definitely a novice when it comes to color management. I think I'm getting

the hang of using printer profiles with my small Epson printer (R300), but for

now I'm less concerned with printing. I have yet to purchase a monitor

calibration tool, which I will do as soon as I feel like I have a better grasp

of the theory and methodology of color management.

 

My confusion at this moment has to do with saving images for the web. Currently,

I have Photoshop CS3 set to the Adobe RGB color space. I open an image, which is

tagged with the Adobe RGB profile. I edit the image. Then, I convert (not

assign) the profile to sRGB. The colors do not seem to change within Photoshop.

When I open the saved image (sRGB) in Firefox it appears more vibrant and

saturated than it does in photoshop. In Safari it appears the same as it does in

Photoshop. When I open the same image tagged with Adobe RGB it appears the same

in Firefox and in Safari as it does in Photoshop.

 

In the past, when I opened uploaded Adobe RGB files to the web they would lose

saturation. Now, all of a sudden there is no change. But the sRGB tagged files

seem to gain saturation inside the web browser.

 

Sorry for the long winded explanation. What am I missing? Can anyone offer a

color management workflow solution to ensure maximum color accuracy when viewing

images inside a web browser? If you know of any good, easy to follow texts on

this subject please let me know. Thanks.

[digitaldog]

All but one or two web browsers are color managed. So, you're basically hosed.

 

Save the documents in sRGB but realize, that absolutely doesn't guarantee anyone else will

see the same color appearance as you do.

 

Check out Safari, its color managed. Flash isn't so if you upload images in Flash, even

Safrai will not match say Photoshop (which is of course color managed).

 

The gory details are being discussed here:

 

http://dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=82126

[jautey]

Don't waste your time on trying to color manage for the web.

 

Outside the photo/graphic artist population no one has a properly calibrated monitor or the right profiles loaded up (some do, but they're a rare bird). Trying to educate them isn't going to help. So even if the viewer is using a color managed browser, chances are the user's monitor is not set up for optimal viewing anyways.

 

Make the image look good for you and leave it at that. Do save it as a sRGB jpeg.

[garry_b]

Thank you Andrew and Eric for your input. Andrew, I am really enjoying your website (digital dog) and I am learning a lot from your articles. Thank you. Please let me clarify my question. I realize that the web color is unpredictable and I'm not trying to ensure that an image looks good on EVERYONE's monitor, just my own. If I'm doing things correctly then I should be able to view the same image on my monitor inside a web browser and photoshop side by side and see identical color.

 

Right now, when I convert the image to sRGB and then go to save for web, even inside of the save for web dialog box the image colors change dramatically. However, when I do the same thing with and Adobe RGB image the colors don't seem to change until I check the convert to sRGB option inside the save for web dialog. Then the image colors change.

 

Am I just crazy? I know that there is some little thing that I must have overlooked.

[digitaldog]

What version of Photoshop? CS3 allows you to save and embed sRGB but CS2 was a bit

different. Make sure you are converting to sRGB in SFW and its embedding the profile,

otherwise Safari will see its untagged and use your monitor profile instead of sRGB.

[garry_b]

I am using CS3. I AM embedding sRGB profile into the files both via the save for web dialog and manually using convert to profile in the edit menu. Neither method works. The image appears more saturated and the blacks get clipped. I can see this happening inside the save for web dialog as well as inside Firefox and Safari. ???