Issue: Lightroom changes my PSD white points on my PSD's

[Ronald604]

Does your Lightroom do this to you?

I just found an issue with LR (my perceived issue anyways) and I wonder if any of you knew about this or noticed the same thing.

I've always noticed that sometimes when I export files from LR, that the color or luminosity changes if I open the same file in Photoshop...even if it was edited and finished in photoshop. Sometimes the white areas (255 per RGB channel) would be exported with decreased intentisity (droppig to 247 per channel).

My process is I shoot in Adobe1998 and then import into Lightroom. And if I export it from LR it goes out as sRGB.

If I edit in Photoshop, then it goes in there through LR as ProPhoto RGB and is saved in that color space in a PSD file, which then back to the LR catalogue. When I export the PSD from the LR catalogue it goes out as sRGB.

WELL.... through some experiments and trials this morning, I discovered that the reason why my images that are finished in PS are coming out at decreased luminosity is that it seems that LR only lives in the sRGB color space.

I assumed that it would convert the ProPhoto RGB in my PSD file *correctly* into the correct closest equivalents in sRGB. But the interpretation is not very good and I get a result that is somewhere in between viewing an sRGB and ProPhotoRGB image in the sRGB color space.

This was easily corrected by convered the image in PS to sRGB at the end of finishing, or just keeping the image in sRGB when editiing in PS from LR. Or bumping up the white slider in Lightroom to compensate (but now you're just guessing when trying to match what you did in PS).

But now the issue is, to convert PSD files to sRGB, PS wants to flatten my layers (I always try to keep my layers intact). And all my PS files in the LR catalogue since day one are in ProPhoto RGB.

Question: what should I do/what would you do? Does the very latest LR version exhibit this issue? Does this exist in CaptureOne?

It will be a pain to go and fix everything, probably save from PS, including images on my portfolio, etc...

Your feedback is appreciated.

 

[Johan Elzenga]

Lightroom does not 'live in the sRGB color space'. Everything in Lightroom is done in Melissa RGB, a special version of ProPhotoRGB. Maybe this helps: The Truth about Lightroom Colour Management

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

Is it possible that somewhere along the way you are letting photoshop not color manage? One thing you might try (from the beginning, with a new shot) is set the PS options to warn every time a mismatch occurs (Edit, Color Settings, Color Management Properties, check all the boxes).

I think I'm careful, and somehow last week I managed to lose my profiles; I had created a new image and pasted layers in. MUCH later I realized the colors were wrong, and tried fixing white balance, etc. until I realized what I had done. Now I have all the boxes checked again.

 

[LouieSherwin]

Lightroom does not 'live in the sRGB color space'. Everything in Lightroom is done in Melissa RGB, a special version of ProPhotoRGB. Maybe this helps: The Truth about Lightroom Colour Management

Nice article I learned some new things, thanks Johan.

My process is I shoot in Adobe1998 and then import into Lightroom. And if I export it from LR it goes out as sRGB.

Assuming you are shooting raw then the camera colorspace has no effect. It only effects the in camera JPEG creation. As Ferguson points out you have some control for how Lightroom makes the raw to RBG conversion by selecting one of the camera profiles. Adobe standard is what the Adobe engineers think is the most neutral conversion, the others are intended to mimic the in camera scene settings for the camera created JPEGs.

Sometimes the white areas (255 per RGB channel) would be exported with decreased intentisity (droppig to 247 per channel).

Do not me misslead by the RGB numbers. 255 red is the most saturated red for the color space. It is a different color in sRGB, Adobe RGB and ProPhoto RGB. When you convert an image from one color space to another the color management engine (CME) is designed to try and keep the red you see in the original to look the same as the red you see in the derivative (export) but the the RGB numbers especially for the saturated colors will probably never be the same.

This was easily corrected by convered the image in PS to sRGB at the end of finishing, or just keeping the image in sRGB when editiing in PS from LR.

You really do not want to do this. You are simply destroying all the saturated colors available in the original raw capture. Further more by using sRGB as the image color space you put sever limitations on any editing you can to in PS. It is simply best to keep the images in the largest colorspace available to you and then let the CME take care of the color conversions when you output the image.

-louie