LIghtRoom color problem vs PhotoShop CS2 on Nikon RAW

Question

I recently bought Adobe Lightroom and I was surprised to notice some huge color differences compared to PhotoShop CS2.
Im using Nikon D80 and shooting RAW. I have calibrated semi-pro monitor.
The same RAW file opens in LightRoom pretty well until you get the rendering preview. Once the preview is done, the picture becomes desaturated in red and blue and has a green cast especially in the shadows with much lower contrast. If I use Edit in PhotoShop option, the picture becomes even worse (even more desaturated and greenish) when opens in PhotoShop. If I open the same RAW in PhotoShop directly (using the NEF plug-in, not CameraRaw!) everything is just fine. The picture looks as opened in Nikon Picture Project or as I saw it when I took the picture.
After doing some research, I think that my problem relates to the way that Adobe Camera RAW, Bridge and LightRoom open a Nikon sRGB 4.0.0.3001 (D80) raw file. However, all the things being equal, PhotoShop CS2 (using the NEF plug-in) renders the same colors as Picture Project does (and what I saw on my camera and in reality). I also noticed that choosing sRGB in Camera Raw bring the things closer to the Picture Project colors but far from identical. Anyways, there is no way to change anything in LightRoom, outer than manually twicking all colors until I think it looks good. Which, I think Is very subjective and is different for every picture.
Right now, my Creative Suite Color Settings is North America General Purpose 2 (synchronized for all CS applications) and no application asks me anything about changing the color profile when opening the file. I shoot (with D80) in raw, Normal camera mode (no saturation / contrast, color profile change). I opened the same file in all mentionned applications (LightRoom, CameraRaw from Bridge, PhotoShop and Picture Project) and save them as .jpeg (same size, dpi, etc.) without changing anything (no camera calibration in ACR or LR; no printer profile in PhotoShop). I sent the .jpegs to my local Costco and printed them on glossy paper. All of them printed the same way that they look on the screen. LR, ACR - desaturated on red&blue, color cast on green and low contrast, while great vivid colors and contrast from PhotoShop and Picture Project. For me it looks pretty much as Adobe applications convert Nikon sRGB into a very unappealing Adobe sRGB (and way different from what I saw in reality). I know this is very subjective; some people may argue that Nikon profile is too reddish and oversaturated. But I find the whole story rather unusual. They all work in the sRGB space and there shouldn't be any differences. I've done lot of testing with color profiles and replacing the Camera Raw plugin file format (common files) with Nicon plugins and vice-versa. But still the same result.
I create a User Profile in LightRoom and I get pretty decent colors now, but when I want to edit the file in PhotoShop (from LightRoom) I get the same green and desaturated version.
What do you think?

Answer 1

>Regarding LR, what I'm looking here is a "factory made" solution; something that can give consistent results in the initial conversion (like Nikon plugin for PhotoShop, for e.g.)
The problem with that conversion is that you cannot change it. In lightroom you change the actual conversion parameters, which gives you far more leeway and allows for far better conversions in the end. Currently (this will change with Lightroom 2.0 apparently) the only recourse you have if you prefer Nikon's colors is to shoot jpeg, or run your NEFs through capture and create 16-bit tiffs. This is just the way it is. A hammer gives a different result than a screwdriver.
>It's hard for me to believe that Adobe has invested so much energy and resources in color profiling but it's unable to get nearly close to the Nikon raw colors.
Nikon's colors are far from colorimetrically correct which you can see in many tests. Here is an example for the D300: http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/D300/D300IMATEST.HTM It is off in the deep reds, the saturated blues, and the Olive-like colors. Profiling the camera does not help you get close to Nikon's colors, but it will get you closer to the ideal colors. I doubt it has been Adobe's goal to get close to the in-camera rendering with Lightroom upto 1.4. They profile all the cameras and make some value judgments on what is more important. Skin tones vs saturated colors etc just like Nikon does.
Regarding getting close to camera colors, there is a trick that you can do to get close to the camera jpeg that involves the ACR calibration scripts. You do need PS CS3 though.
>I find rather strange that apparently there is no way to get professional conversion. This is defying the main purpose of Color Profiling, I think.
Why is Nikon's conversion professional and Adobe's not? They are both just interpretations of the sensor data. Adobe's is actually colorimetrically more correct in many cases. Colorimetrically correct often means boring unfortunately. This has to do with the fact that our eyes are not color measurement devices but that we have brains interpreting the data. To get pleasing results, Color Profiling does not help as much as you'd like. My issue with the in-camera or Nikon software approach is that it locks you down creatively to the
creative choices the Nikon folks made. Now, be aware that in the Lightroom 2.0 forum the Adobe folks have hinted at major changes to the rendering engine that will bring colors closer to the vendor rendering. How they will do this is unknown right now.