Beta 4 Soft Proofing

I’m getting results from Soft Proofing I don’t understand and can’t find any reference to anywhere.
With different ink/paper/printer combinations and different Relative/Perceptual combinations, I get the following results when selecting “Destination Gamut Warning.”
Yellow border: Purple Out of Gamut
Yellow border: Red Out of Gamut
Yellow border: Yellow Out of Gamut
White border: Red Out of Gamut
Does anyone know what these differences mean?
Wil

During the beta period, please post LR4-specific questions in the LR4-specific forum:
http://forums.adobe.com/community/labs/lightroom4

Similar Messages

SRGB or Blurb icc profile better for soft proofing prior to Book module?

As I understand it images destined for Blurb are converted by the Lr engine into sRGB behind the scenes. To achieve best chance of colour accuracy in the finished Blurb book, is it better to softproof using a sRGB profile or the icc profile* offered on the Blurb Support website. On the surface this icc profile is recommended (by them) for their Booksmart process. Anyone know if that is similar to the Lr Book module process? There is no mention of Lr anywhere on the Blurb color management pages.
It would be great to pin down the answer to this. I cannot find any recommendation for best work practice aimed at getting good colour reproduction in these books; and trial and error, whilst acceptable in making inkjet prints, is a very expensive route when applied to printing a Blurb book.
* And even then, as far as I can see, there is no method for differentiating between the Blurb papers. It is just one profile to fit all.

I tried using 'Export Book to PDF' in the LR Book module with 'Book' set to 'Blurb' and the PDF images are all tagged as sRGB profile and 8-bit color.
SUGGESTION
If you set 'Book' to 'PDF' under 'Book Setting' you can use Adobe RGB profile, 300 ppi, and your own Sharpening selection, which as Andrew Rodney mentioned is a better choice. You can submit the LR Exported PDF at Blurb's 'PDF To Book' upload page and they will do the proper CMYK conversion on their end. The only issue is that the images are still exported in the LR Book module as 8-bit color JPEGs. This may cause banding with a wider gamut profile, but that should be apparent when reviewing the exported book PDF.
Here are some comments from Blurb concerning using Blurbs 'PDF to Book' workflow, which is similar to what I just described:
From Me:
My Workflow Details:
My objective is to process all images in LR4 and then export them as 300 dpi, ProPhoto RGB profile, 16 bit TIFF images for layout in InDesign using Blurb's InDesign plugin (Blurb Book Creator CS6 v2.0.2.34d8). I will soft proof the placed images inside InDesign using its 'Proof Colors' tool and the Blurb_ICC_Profile.icc profile. Once the InDesign layout is complete I will do the RGB to CMYK Blurb_ICC_Profile conversion during the export to PDF process using the Blurb PDF X-3 Export Preset v1-1.
Blurb's Resonse:
Response Via Email(David) - 07/18/2012
Using InDesign and our Blurb InDesign Plug-in does mean you're using the PDF to Book Workflow. This is because your InDesign files will ultimately be exported/uploaded as PDF files.
Regarding, "Once the InDesign layout is complete I would like to do the RGB to CMYK Blurb_ICC_Profile conversion during the export to PDF process":
Unfortunately, there is no option for this and it's actually unnecessary during the export process. Our printers convert and process all images as CMYK using the Blurb ICC Color Profile, so even if you upload/export them with an RGB color profile, they'll be converted to CMYK for the production process.
My Response:
Customer By Email - 07/19/2012 05:10 AM Thanks for the explanation David. It sounds like I can just upload the PDF file using my ProPhoto RGB profiled PDF, but I would prefer to do the conversion from ProPhoto RGB to Blurb ICC CMYK profile. This way I can see the results before uploading the file to Blurb. Can I use the Blurb PDF X-3 Export Preset v1-1 with Output > Color Conversion to Destination > Blurb CC profile, and then upload the PDF file myself? If so please advise where I should upload the file on the Blurb website.
Blurb's Response:
Response Via Email(David) - 07/20/2012 03:49 PM Hi Todd,
If you do end up exporting your PDFs with the workflow you're referring to, you can upload your files here:
http://www.blurb.com/make/pdf_to_book
IMHO there's no reason why Adobe and Blurb couldn't work together so ProPhoto RGB 16-bit images can be used in the book PDF that gets uploaded (or exported!) to Blurb's website. Blurb then handles the CMYK conversion using full-gamut 16-bit images and not clipped sRGB 8-bit images.

Soft-proof images

This question was posted in response to the following article: http://help.adobe.com/en_US/lightroom/using/WS2bacbdf8d487e582-5591e4a41341ae6cc6d-8000.ht ml

Thank you, THANK YOU for Julieanne's video as a part of your explanation here. If I were to try and understand better about 'soft proofing' images in advance of export to print by simply reading the text here I'd go cross-eyed trying to digest it precisely. This is a problem I have found with most of Adobe's (LR and PS) Product Support pages (as well as most of its 'Classroom in a Book' content, unfortunately the default "textbook" used by much of Academia). To be fair, Adobe seems to be focused on "explaining" pretty complex topics with the fewest possible words. (Who wants to read these days?! Such a chore, eh?) With Julieanne's video though she explains everything you might ever care to know about soft proofing – its utility, features in LR that will assist in bringing images back into gamut for WHATEVER specific surface one intends to work with for their final product printed – and WHY. She has always been, continues to be The Very Best in explaining the complexities of working with this great application. Thanks for including the screencast!

Can I soft proof in LR4 like I can in PS CS5?

I haven't used LR 4 yet, but did view the soft-proofing tutorial.
I applaud Adobe for adding this functionality in LR4. It was one of the most obvious lacking features in the previous version, and I've still been mostly doing all my printing through PS CS5.
While soft-proofing is not a perfect replacement for test printing, I've been mostly satisfied with proofing in CS5.
Proofing in LR4 seems a little different, but by using a virtual copy it looks like if I use my printer/paper profile I should theoretically be able to not only be able to deal with color gamut issues, but also adjust contrast & brightness to more closely match my original developed image, and could compare the original with virtual copy in compare mode. Is it that simple? And if so, why is there a contrast & brightness adjustment in the Print module? That latter adjustment would be similar to what one goes through in PS CS5 when soft-proofing prior to printing. However, why have it if it can be done in the Develop module......and regardless, from the video tutorial it looks like you can't preview the image after making those adjustments in the print module nor compare it with the original......thus forcing one to make multiple prints until the result is satisfactory.
Just seems to me there is a bit more tweaking to do in LR4 to make the soft-proofing more functional. Or, perhaps I'm too stuck with the paradigm set forth for soft-proofing in PS and need someone to clarify how I can achieve the same result in LR just as confidently.

Beaulin Liddell wrote:
BTW, I've benefited immensly from your and Martin's Evenings books.......you've never steered me wrong.
Thanks for the kind words...but LR4's soft proofing is worth the effort to use. It really is better than Photoshop's soft proofing. I'm still on the fence regarding VCs vs Snapshots for soft proofing It's a tossup but the VC part has been built in while making a snapshot wasn't.
The advantage of LR4's soft proofing is you get the ability to do a Before/After while still using the full range of LR4's controls to adjust the printed version. Makes it really easy to nail great print (assuming you have good print profiles).
As for the Print module Brightness and Contradt...that's really a special case that doesn't involved color managed output. It's a crutch for those who don't have a locked down system. It's east to tweak but you have to make example prints since the controls don't actually display but only impact the output. I tend to avoid that.

Soft proofing: how to A/B?

Hi all,
I'm kinda new to soft proofing, so maybe this is a silly question, but here goes:
My workflow for printing is that i first tweak my photos so they look like how i want them on my computer monitor, for uploading to Flickr.
After that i choose the one(s) i want to print (Epson 3880) and go into "soft proofing" mode.
After i've tweaked the photo to compensate for the print, i want to A/B with my original. What i've noticed is that i need to generally add a bit more brightness and vibrance to approach (on physical paper) what i see on my computer screen, so i want to be able to A/B between my original photo and the proof copy.
But the thing is, when i do this the "soft proofing" module remains engaged for both my proof copy (that's ok) and for my original photo (not ok!) which was tweaked to look good on the computer and never meant to be printed, and on which i never did any soft proofing!!!
This makes it really hard to A/B between the two copies.
So why doesn't the soft proofing module automatically turn off when you switch to another photo on which you haven't done any soft proofing?
Hmmm, clear as mud methinks!
But does anyone see what i mean and could offer any tips?
Thanks! ......... D

Daz V wrote:
So why doesn't the soft proofing module automatically turn off when you switch to another photo on which you haven't done any soft proofing?
Soft Proofing "simulates" on your computer display (transmissive) what the print copy (reflective) will look like in your hands. The two are radically different in contrast ratio, black level, and white level achievable, so it makes little sense to try and compare the two. They will always look quite different. The goal is to adjust web based images so they look good onscreen, and print based images with 'Soft Proof' so they look good in the actual reflective light viewed print copy. What are you trying to achieve?
You can view them side-by-side by windowing LR and your browser and viewing the image in both at the same time. In fact that would be much close to reality, since browsers aren't always properly color managed. Two separate displays would be even better for this purpose.

Can you soft proof for Blurb in Lightroom? Can't get Blurb icc to show up in list.

I have added the Blurb_ICC_Profile.icc to Library/ColorSync/Profiles and Library/ColorSync/Profiles/Recommended, but when I turn on Soft Proof in Lightroom and try to select the Blurb_ICC_Profile.icc from the Profile dropdown in the Soft Proofing Workspace on the right, clicking on other to add it, it simply does not show up as an item in the list even though I have added it to the Profiles folder.
The Blurb profile does show up as an option for soft proofing if I try to do it in Photoshop, but I really want to do it in Lightroom to save time since I'm using the Book Module and I know Lightroom so much better than Photoshop.

Yes. I found another discussion on a blog that discussed the whole thing in detail. Has anyone found a profile that comes close that one could use in LR to soft proof for Blurb? Some said they used sRGB, but I compared and there is a huge disparity. Blurb color space is about 2/3 smaller than sRGB.

Changing color profile in Lightroom 5 Soft Proofing from ProPhotoRGB to sRGB is not showing any changes, changes in Photoshop CC are dramatic

I am working with the color profile ProPhoto RGB in both Lightroom 5 and Photoshop CC. In preparing for my first Blurb book I have tried to generate pictures in sRGB in Lightroom, using the Soft Proofing feature, but there are no changes at all. Then I transfer the same pictures into Photoshop, change the color profiles and the results are dramatically different.
What can I do to achieve the same results in Lightroom

With an average monitor what you see on-screen is already soft proofed to sRGB (or something very close to it), because that's all the monitor is capable of displaying anyway. So soft proofing to sRGB won't tell you anything. You won't see any difference.
In Photoshop it sounds as if you assign profiles. That's not the way to do it. If you convert correctly you won't see any difference. Same principle as above: there may be clipping in the process, but what you see on screen is already clipped, so no visual on-screen difference.
With a wide gamut monitor soft proofing becomes slightly more useful. But still you won't see any changes occurring outside Adobe RGB. You'll get a better idea by keeping an eye on the histogram. Ideally, all three channels should taper gently off towards the endpoints. If any one or two channels are backed solidly up against the endpoint, on either side, that's gamut clipping.
If Blurb gave you a real profile, one that reflected their actual printing process, you could soft proof to that. But apparently they don't.

Dueling Features: Soft Proofing vs Print Adjustment

I'm really trying to appreciate the value of the new soft proofing feature that's got many around here excited. While there are other uses I'll get to in a minute, is it fair to say this feature is designed to make printed output predictable and save paper? I watched Julieanne Kost's tutorial and saw how we can identify out-of-gamut colors on our display device and any number of output devices/processes/papers. Her mooring pole example only seemed to illustrate the inherent compromises we have to make. If we're lucky our monitor IS showing us a hi-fidelity rendering of the image gamut and we're making an informed creative decision about which way we accommodate outlier colors in the output space. If, as in her example, both ends of the line are out of gamut, I'm not sure we're doing much more than fiddling. Not that I have anything against the illusion of control... if I did I couldn't stay married.
So assuming we've got a good monitor and decent eyes, soft proofing gives us some predictive power over what we're going to get before we feed a 24 x 30 sheet of Exhibition Fiber into the 9890 and blow $6 plus ink.
More useful in my own case is the potential to tailor image adjustments to client's prepress requirements. If I can get a prepress profile from a magazine client I can try to give them images that print better on their presses while staying true to my vision. Am I on the right track here?
Getting back to the title of my post, the print adjustment sliders just leave me scratching my head. After working so hard for the calibrationists out there willing to spend an hour to save a sheet of paper, along comes the no-preview-try-it-you-might-like-it approach of the brightness and contrast sliders. Talk about appealing to two different mentalities. One saves paper, the other says "throw another sheet in the machine and let's see what comes out"
I'm purposely trying to be humorous. I picture two LR teams arguing across the meeting room table. The calibrationists vs the gunslingers. MadManChan tell me it ain't so.

VeloDramatic wrote:
Getting back to the title of my post, the print adjustment sliders just leave me scratching my head. After working so hard for the calibrationists out there willing to spend an hour to save a sheet of paper, along comes the no-preview-try-it-you-might-like-it approach of the brightness and contrast sliders. Talk about appealing to two different mentalities.
Yup, very confusing. Especially if the issue is, my prints are too dark compared to my display which this is presumably supposed to fix. If the prints really are too dark, the RGB values need to be fixed and we have to wonder why the user didn’t see on their calibrated display, the RGB values are too dark. If instead, the print is darker appearing than the display, the fix seems to be to properly calibrate the display or fix the print viewing conditions to produce a match. And if the print is only too dark appearing compared to the display, what do the sliders do once you have a lighter (matching) print next to your too bright display and move the print away? Seems it would appear too light, not a good solution.

Soft proofing problem with wide-gamut monitor

Hi,
I've just upgraded to a wide-gamut monitor (Dell U2713H).
I set the colour-space to adobe RGB when using Lightroom (I'm on LR5).
When I select soft proofing , my picture goes grey (that is, where I was displaying the photo in the border, then changes to a uniform grey within the proofing border). If I click on 'create proof copy' the picture then displays.
When the picture is grey and I move my mouse over the image, I can see the RGB% values change, as if there is an image there.
Previously, I had a (rather) low-end viewsonic and had no problems - Soft-Proofing worked fine. All I did was install the new monitor.
I'm running windows 7, nvidia 8800GT card, 8gb memory. No system changes prior/after changing the monitor.
Everything else on the monitor works fine (better than fine, actually, it is a great monitor)
Soft-proofing in photoshop (CS6) works fine, for what that is worth.
I'm a bit stumped. Can anyone help?
hans

1234ewqrd wrote:
I set the colour-space to adobe RGB when using Lightroom (I'm on LR5).
What do you mean by this? Are you selecting Adobe RGB as color profile for you rmonitor? Or are you talking about selecting Adobe RGB as softproofing color space in Lr?
The fact that your images are grey in Lr is a strong indication that your new monitor is not calibrated and is way off the chart. It might be brand new but that does not mean that its tonality and color display is correct for photo editing in Lr.
Calibration is done with a piece of hardware called a spectrometer and the accompanying software. Brand names are Spyder, ColorMunki, GretaghMacbeth. After calibration the software creates a profile that is used by the monitor.
You don't select any other profile than the profile created by calibration and profiling for photo editing - irrespective of which program you use for photo editing.
In the meantime - as a temporary remedy and until you get the calibration tools - you can set your monitor to sRGB. Be aware that sRGB is a much smaller color space than what you rmonitor is able to display; with sRGB you basically prevent the monitor from displaing wide gamut.
See here on how to set the monitor to sRGB:
http://members.lightroomqueen.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/1137/188/how-do-i- change-my-monitor-profile-to-check-whether-its-corrupted
http://forums.adobe.com/message/4977176#4977176
Everything else on the monitor works fine (better than fine, actually, it is a great monitor)
You have no way of telling if the monitor works fine, i.e. if the monitor has the correct intensity (brightness) and if it displays the colors correctly, i.e. as a true representation of the color numbers. Our brain automatically adjusts colors to what they ought to be. What we see is basically unreliable for photo editing. Only a calibrated monitor will display the colors correctly.
Also, when you calibrate select an intensity (brightness) of araound 110 cd/m2 - irrespective of what the software suggests. Often monitors are way to bright which results in prints that are too dark.

Soft proofing to sRGB not working as expected

I've gone through three customer reps via chat on this, and none of them had a clue.
I recently discovered the soft proofing capability in Lightroom 4, and watched an Adobe video about it. Looked pretty cool. I experimented with soft-proofing for printing to an Epson Artisan printer. I'd always struggled a little bit with prints being too dark, etc., but now I was able to produce the best prints I've ever had.
But then I started to experiment with soft proofing for sRGB. My photo club takes photo submissions as sRGB, and they then show them on a monitor during meetings. Sometimes they don't look so good. So, I figured soft-proofing them first would help correct that.
So, I've got a photo that has a lot of red in it (a flower). The soft proofing indicated pretty much all of the reds were out of gamut. I tried reducing the saturation, but they had to go pretty much completely desaturated (black and white) before Lightroom said they were in gamut. I also experimented with change the hue, but still no luck.
I then deleted the soft proof virtual copy, and just exported the original as sRGB. Looked fine.
This would seem to make the soft proofing to sRGB to be somewhat useless for me (at least for reds - seemed okay for the small number of other photos I experimented with that didn't have that much red).
Just wondering if anyone else has had issues with this, or if I'm doing anything incorrectly, etc.
Thanks!
P.S. Update... Last chat rep had me try something that seemed to work better. My photos are stored in Lightroom as JPGs with a color space of RGB and a color profile of ProPhoto RGB. If I export that photo to JPG / sRGB, then re-import it into Lightroom, and then do the soft proofing again, it works much better. The downside of this that the two-step process makes it a bit unusable for me.

> if I'm doing anything incorrectly,
You should not really try to do the bringing of the colors into gamut too much. I know the videos you see online show this but it is really counterproductive in many cases. You'll often completely desaturate or get really disagreeable hue shifts if you trust the out of gamut warnings as you have noticed. What you should do is turn on the softproof and check whether your image looks good and the colors don't shift too much. If they do or you lose essential detail, try to correct it using the HSL tools or local desaturation. The out of gamut warning is more useful when you are proofing to a printer profile and you might have colors that your display cannot show but your printer can print. For sRGB, not so much in my experience.
> Last chat rep had me try something that seemed to work better. My photos are stored in Lightroom as JPGs with a color space of RGB and a color profile of ProPhoto RGB. If I export that photo to JPG / sRGB, then re-import it into Lightroom, and then do the soft proofing again, it works much better
That's a silly answer that rep gave you. What happens when you export to sRGB is that all your colors will get truncated hard(it uses a relative coloremtric conversion) to the sRGB profile, so if there was detail there that you wish to preserve you just lost it and you won't be able to get it back. Of course if you then soft proof the sRGB jpeg to sRGB, you will have an easy time conforming it to sRGB, since it already is! The out of gamut warning it might show you on sRGB jpegs without any correction is not correct - a known bug or strangeness with how Lightroom handles these and just tiny touches on the sliders will make them disappear. It is fooling you and in fact you were better off not even trying to soft proof and simply exporting to sRGB and ignoring soft proofing.
P.S. the monitor problems you have noticed in your photo club are probably more an issue of the monitor not being calibrated and probably not using a color managed application to show the images. If your monitor is calibrated and that one is too and using a color managed app to show the images should give you very good correspondance in color between your monitor and that one regardless of what color space you choose for the images. That might perhaps be a good thing for the club. You really need to be calibrating monitors and use only color managed apps for display.

Soft proofing - implementation suggestions

Reading this thread it seems the Lightroom team is seriously considering or actually implementing soft proofing for LR3.0. Since it's not in the current beta, the users cannot give feedback on the implementation. Instead, let's use this thread to give suggestions on how soft proofing should work.
Here are my suggestions:
availability: soft proofing should be available in all modules: you need it for print and web output, but the necessary corrections are made in the develop and library modules.
UI placement: the film strip seems to be a logical place for a tool that can be used from within all modules.
features: soft proofing would need an on/off toggle, a clipping indicator toggle and a list menu to select/create soft proofing profiles (with a choice of relative/perceptual; black point would be nice but doesn't fit the 'lightroom way').
monitor proofing: make it easy for users to select the profile corresponding to their monitor. That way they get a warning that their monitor may be 'cheating' them (especially on laptops).
further: the tool could show a warning if it is switched on with the 'wrong' profile for the active module. For example, for web you should only use sRGB, for print the same as selected for the printer and for the slideshow perhaps only the monitor profile.
Anyone else?
Simon

Jeff Schewe wrote:
I disagree for several reason: 1) the Develop module is the ONLY color accurate viewing environment, 2) Develop already has a before/after built in that can be adapted to the task of showing a before and an after with the after representing the output space. 3) the Develop module allows the creation and or selection of Develop templates as well as snapshots. Snapshots might make an excellent vehicle for carrying image adjustments.
I am not sure what you mean by the develop module being the only color accurate viewing environment. I just checked it by setting my monitor gamma to 1.0, and all modules applied the necessary adjustments to the images. The only difference I could find is that the other modules use heavily compressed JPGs, leading to the occasional artifact when viewing at 1:1.
I really believe that soft proofing itself is fundamentally an analysis tool that should be accessible from all modules, and not necessarily be linked to image adjustment tools. If someone wants to work on a set of images for a particular output process, he/she should be able to make all necessary changes with soft proofing turned on, and have the effects visible in all modules. Of course, in practice many users will want to target different output media for the same image, and such tools are important, but need not be a show-stopper for soft-proofing to appear.
On your number (2), I personally don't find before/after view essential, or even that useful, when making adjustments for printing. When you want to compress an image into the gamut of a printer, I tend to make small adjustments in the context of that particular image, not with a reference to some master image. The exception to this case would be if you really have something which you would call the 'master' (say, some really famous image), and you want the output to be as close as possible on more restricted printing process. In any case, I wouldn't consider a before/after view as essential. And when it's needed, it could be implemented by an on/off toggle as well, IMO.
I find snapshots quite cumbersome, and especially for the purpose of keeping track of such 'output versions'. The problem is that they exist inside the develop module, they are 'all or nothing', and there is no easy way to transfer partial settings between snapshots. For example, suppose I have three 'output versions' of an image, and I decide to change some of the underlying settings (say, the white balance). Then I don't have an easy way to synchronize these changes between the output versions. Another issue is that there is no easy way to recall snapshots from outside the develop module. If I want to print a couple of images for which I have the necessary adjustments at some other time, I have to go in and select the appropriate snapshot for each of them. In the context of these 'output versions', this is something that should be possible from the library module, where you select the versions you have worked on before.
Also note that while Develop might be the place for adjusting the image for the output, the creation of an output adjustment might be best called up in Print (or Export). So you might create a saved preset that contains the output device, the specific profile, the rendering intent and whatever output based adjustments the image (or images) may need. That could be done directly in the Print module...
The three main factors that soft proofed adjustments require is a change in the tone curve required by differences in dynamic range or outputs, hue and saturation adjustments to counter or alter the way a profile may render a certain (or several) colors and a local area contrast adjustment in the form of Clarity. Ideally, the soft proofing tools should contain a soft proofed histogram, color samples in the output space and tone/color adjustments suited for correcting for the output condition.
Ok, I can see a benefit to a separate output adjustment tool that is specifically aimed for the type of adjustments you'd make when soft-proofing. The settings for this tool could be linked to the output device and profile, so that they would switch automatically according to the profile that is selected. When soft-proofing is turned on in the library module, there could be an icon in the images for which a particular output transformation is defined. And because soft-proofing would be fully functional in the develop module, you could inspect which other images need further adjustments.
I don't think it's very useful to have a 'preset' for this tool for a particular output profile and rendering intent, independent of the image. That's the job of the profile itself. However, it should be possible to easily copy-paste such settings between images. For example, if I have shots a number of images in bright green grass, I will probably need similar adjustments for all of them. Also, settings should be copyable to serve as a starting point for use with a different profile.
The 'output adjustment tool' itself should IMO contain two things:
1) Photoshop-like hue/sat control (with selectable color ranges) [most important]
2) Manual tone curve adjustments.
I wouldn't mind if the tool is only accessible from within the develop module, as long as you can see the soft-proof from all modules. The soft-proofing functionality (separate from this tool) should also take care of adjusting the histogram in the library and develop modules.
Summarinzing, I see room for two separate tool sets that do not necessarily need to be implemented at the same time. The first is an overarching soft-proofing solution that makes the effects of the output transformation visible throughout the workflow. The second is a separate output adjustment tool in the develop module, that is able to link it's settings to the currently selected output device/profile.
Simon

Soft Proofing: may not work on my screen

First of all: Thanks so much for implementing soft proofing! Especially in such an easy way! I was really hoping you'd do it exactly like that.
Anyway, I've got a wide gamut monitor (Thinkpad W520 laptop screen). And I've got an image with a lot of strongly saturated reds (PowerShot S95, RAW).
Now, if I switch between Loup View and Develop View, I can see a huge difference in the reds because the Loup preview is sRGB (medium quality). I can also see the same difference when exporting to sRGB vs. exporting to AdobeRGB.
However, if I engage soft proofing and select sRGB, the image still looks the same. Only the little preview in the upper left changes to what I would expect.
That's not exactly what I would expect ^^
On the other hand, if I select a custom profile (AdoramaPix, lustre paper), the whole rig seems to work.
More information:
- Windows 7, 64 bit with 64 LR4 beta
- Whether relative or perceptual doesn't matter
- Only seems to affect sRGB
- The image shows very, very clear differences between sRGB and AdobeRGB on my monitor, so it's definitely not a visual problem on my end
- The histogram changes when switching between sRGB and AdobeRGB in soft proofing mode
- I really cannot see the slightest change in the image when switching
I hope you can find a fix or point out what I'm doing wrong because I would really like to use soft proofing for images published on the web, which is of course in sRGB.

I went on about this a little more scientific by creating an image with three rectangles: red, blue and green.
All of them are 100%, e.g. (255, 0, 0). Colorspace: ProPhoto RGB.
Results when exporting the images to AdobeRGB and sRGB, concentrating on the reds:
- sRGB looks very washed out
- AdobeRGB looks a bit washed out
- Original ProPhoto has so much red that it almost drives me nuts
Now, I would really expect similar results when activiating soft proofing.
But when selecting either AdobeRGB or sRGB, the reds always drive me nuts.
There is just no difference at all to the original ProPhoto image!
Conclusion 1: Dorin, you were right, previews are in AdobeRGB. What I saw in the reds was the difference between ProPhoto and AdobeRGB. Somehow my screen seems to have extreme reds (calibrated recently with an X-Rite ColorMunki Display).
Conclusion 2: Soft proofing with AdobeRGB and sRGB really DOES NOT WORK!

Soft proofing and Out of Gamut warning

I like to use Blurb for a perfect photo book. I am an amateur photographer but like the most of my pictures on paper.
What's the perfect workflow for soft proofing ?
A friend of me has calibrated my screen (Thunderbolt Apple screen).
My current methode :
I take a picture in RAW with AdobeRGB profile setting, i adjust a few parameters in Lightroom and then go to Photoshop and start de soft proofing with the Blurb-ICC profile.
The result with soft proofing is like there's a white mist over the picture. Then i try to optimize this with various parameters.
When i try the soft proofing with the Blurb ICC profile + out of Gamut warning option .... there are many colors out of gamut .
My second methode :
When i import the raw picture in photoshop cc and i convert the picture to the Blurb profile, then there are no out of gamut colors but everything is in CMYK.
Is this a good way for perfect photo books in Blurb ?
Or must i ignore the out of gamut colors ?
Is it better to make my pictures in sRGB ?
When i want to save the end result in Photoshop cc ( jpeg for Blurb ) must i enclose the Blurb ICC (when in CMYK) , Adobe RGB or sRGB profile (when in RGB) ?
Please help me make a perfect photobook
Mario

Since I don't know what "Blurb" is, I'm going to assume that's your printing service somewhere, and that they have provided you with their target printer profile.
What you describe under current method is absolutely normal, expected behavior. Adobe RGB simply is a much larger color space than whatever this Blurb profile is.
If you care to let me know how or where I can get a hold of this Blurb profile, I can in a matter of seconds prepare an illustration of how the two profiles compare to each other. From where I sit, it would appear you're throwing away a lot of image quality by using Blurb.
There are two wacky ways of getting around your seeing the out of gamut warnings. The first is not to soft-proof at all. (Duh! ) The other one is an unorthodox workflow which works just fine PROVIDED you are aware that the image files as an end product are only good for Blurb and for no other purpose, and that is to set your WORKING COLOR SPACE from the get go to the Blurb profile. Of course that is not the recommended or even kosher workflow. It is only a workaround to the deficiencies of this Blurb profile.
I cannot comment on your "second method" until I know more about this Blurb phenomenon. If they print on a CMYK press, then they are throwing away a lot of colors, even if you send them images in sRGB. Nothing you can do about that.
The one thing I can say is that if the outfit doing the printing is the one that sent you the profile, then they will know how to deal with an sRGB file. The profile they sent you is just what their printing process uses. No need to attach a copy of their own profile.

Costco and soft proofing show dull washed out image

OK, so I am trying to utilize my nearest costco to print some images from lightroom 5. I am getting back dull washed out prints.
Facts:
I shoot in RAW in manual mode
I am using sRGB when I do my post processing
I export to jpg for printing
I used the costco LR5 plugin from Alloyphoto to upload to Costco
I have installed the printer profiles from drycreek for the specific location/printer and have chosen the correct profile as I export
I made sure that I chose to have Costco NOT autocorrect the color
Even when I use LR5's soft proofing, I get the same result on my monitor
I checked the print I got back and it says that they did NOT autocorrect (taken with a grain of salt)
The machine they are using is a Noritsu QSS-A, so I know my profile is correct
I have attached a screen shot of what I am seeing.
Why am I seeing this on my soft proofing as well as my prints?
How can I solve this and get vibrant prints?
Any advice would be helpful.
Message was edited by: moviebuffking

moviebuffking wrote:
I have calibrated my monitor as good as I can get without specific hardware. I have 18 years experience calibrating monitors (via optical media and my eyes), so I know that mine is very close.
It is virtually impossible to "accurately" set the Luminance, Gamma, and Color temperature "by eye." This is most likely the cause of your prints not matching the screen image you see in LR. That being the monitor's Luminance (i.e. Brightness) level is too set to high.
http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/colour_management/prints_too_dark.html
To see if this could be your problem I downloaded the posted screen shot and cropped out the 'Copy' image, which has your adjustments applied to it. Here are my results:
Click on image to see full-size
I needed to apply a full F stop (+1.0 EV) of Exposure correction to achieve a good midtone brightness level for the print image. You'll notice I also added -50 Highlights and +50 Shadows along with +25 Vibrance. I bet the image with my adjustments added looks way too bright on your uncalibrated monitor.
You have two (2) issues–Monitor Calibration and LR Basic Panel Control Adjustments
Monitior Calibration
I would highly recommend investing in a hardware monitor calibrator such as the X-Rite i1 Display and ColorMunki, or Datacolor Spyder models. If you tell me what make and model monitor you are using I can recommend specific calibrators.
Temporarily you can try adjusting the monitor "by eye" to get it closer to the desired 120cd/m2 Luminance, 2.2 Gamma, and 6500K Color Temperature using the test patterns at this site:
http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/
When the monitors Brightness and Contrast controls have been correctly set the screen image should look much closer to the prints you have recently made with the LR Soft Proof adjustments. So in fact you will be adjusting the monitor to make it look bad with the LR adjustments you applied. The proper monitor settings will make the Lagom test patterns look correct AND should make your bad Costco prints now match the screen image using you original LR settings.
After changing the monitor's Brightness and Contrast settings try readjusting a few of the image files you had printed and send them to Costco as check prints. Compare them again to your monitor's screen image. They should be much better!
LR Basic Panel Tone Control Adjustment
LR's PV2012 Tone controls can provide much improvement to your raw image Highlight and Shadow detail. Start with all of the Tone controls at their '0' default settings and adjust them from the top-down in the order shown below.
1. Set Exposure for the midtone brightness ignoring the highlight and shadow areas for now. Setting Exposure about +.5 EV higher than what looks correct for the midtones seems to work best with most images.
2. Leave Contrast at 0 for now. You’ll adjust this after the first pass.
3. Adjust Highlights so that blown out areas are recovered and “fine tonal detail” is revealed.
4. Adjust Shadows to reveal fine detail in dark areas. For most normal images simply setting -Shadows = +Highlights (Example -50 and +50) works very well.
5. The Whites control sets the white clipping point, which you can see by holding down the ALT key as you move the slider. Adjust it to the point where you see clipping just appear with the ALT key.
6. The Blacks control sets the black clipping point, which you can see by holding down the ALT key as you move the slider. Adjust it to the point where you see clipping just appear with the ALT key.
7. Now go back and adjust the Contrast control to establish the best midtone contrast.
8. Lastly touchup the Exposure control for the best midtone brightness.
9. If necessary “touch-up” the controls using the same top-down workflow.
moviebuffking wrote:
Am I correct in assuming that the soft proof (with a certain profile) is a "preview" of what that print will look like?
Soft Proof does two things. It shows you what the image's colors will look like in the target color space (i.e. printer profile). You can see what (if any) colors are "out of gamut" by clicking on the small icon in the upper-righthand corner of the Histogram. You can also see if any of the colors fall out of your monitor's gamut by clicking on the small icon in the upper-lefthand corner of the Histogram.
When you check 'Simulate Paper & Ink' the Soft Proof image's contrast and color saturation are changed to make it look closer to what the "reflective" print image will look like when held next to the monitor for comparison. Many people have difficulty using 'Simulate Paper & Ink' since it requires using precise light levels for viewing the print and a well calibrated monitor.
In summary my best suggestion is to purchase and use a good hardware monitor calibrator on a scheduled basis to insure you have an "accurate" screen image inside LR and other color managed applications like PS.

Soft Proof for Third Party Printing?

Julieanne's great training video covers Soft Proofing for monitors and local printers. How about using it for exports to third party Printers? All my work is exported to my Zenfolio sponsored website. From there is purchased for print by further exporting it to MPIX who in turn ship it directly to the buyer. How can I use Soft Proofing to optimize those photos. With LR3 my highly random and guesstimate solution was to add +5 with the brightness slider. I don't know why but its seemed to work even though the images were overly bright on my iMac monitor.

In terms of Blurb, unless you know for a fact that they use only one profile, then the soft proof debate is moot. And I seriously doubt they have one profile for all their papers (that is basically impossible).
This is correct. Blurb uses different printers/presses for different run sizes. You really cannot predict which one they will use and soft proofing to their one profile is really not useful. In fact I have tested this before and had two identical books printed with them, one using their (indeed cmyk) profile and one leaving all the images in sRGB. The sRGB one came out much closer to the original and the cmyk one came out too dark. In fact the cmyk one looked like what happens when I apply generic US web coated to images in their profile, so if you want to print with blurb, you're better off completely ignoring their profile and sending everything in sRGB as Lightroom appears to do. Of course you could have guessed this as they only offer a single profile, while they offer quite a few different papers as well as use multiple printers/presses.

Beta 4 Soft Proofing

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