Converting from sRGB to AdobeRGB

[Colin30187875eszd]

Hello there

     After previously working in RGB on Photoshop and being repeatedly dissatisfied with the conversion to CMYK results when printing (the blacks always looking washed out) I decided to work thereafter in CMYK. 

Now when I recently completed my latest art piece, I also discovered the gamut warning option. In using it, I realised that a lot of my art piece was out of gamut so I made a copy of the art piece and systematically began altering the hues and saturation levels of all the many different elements. And in the end, I managed to correct a decent chunk although there was still a good chunk remaining too which brings me to my next point.

    In discovering the gamut warning option, I also became aware of sRGB and AdobeRGB. Now for my part both my embedded colour profiles and working spaces are sRGB IEC61966-2.1 and U.S. Web Coated (SWOP) v2 but in reading about AdobeRGB, it became clear that it has a bigger colour gamut than sRGB. So my question is this: if I converted from sRGB to AdobeRGB, although I know it would not add colours that weren't there to begin with, would it at least mean that those colours that are out of gamut be able to be seen, either wholly or in part? Sorry for the rambling nature of this message but I'm still rather shaky with all this (as you can likely tell!) Many thanks!

     Colin

[kglad]

in the future, to find the best place to post your message, use the list here, https://community.adobe.com/

p.s. i don't think the adobe website, and forums in particular, are easy to navigate, so don't spend a lot of time searching that forum list. do your best and we'll move the post (like this one has already been moved) if it helps you get responses.

<"moved from using the community">

[Colin30187875eszd]

Sorry about that. Looking through the list I'm not fully sure which is the best one to put the message on. A Photoshop one would be best I feel but there's a lot of different choices and I don't know which one would best suffice  😬

[kglad]

(no problem. your post is in the color management forum where experts have already responded.)

[Monika Gause]

A lot of this would depend on Exactly what content you are working with? Drawing illustrations, photos ...? 

Generally working in CMYK is not the best of ideas. That's what a softproof is for.

So you calibrate your system, set up the color management to your needs, work in RGB, use the soft proof, make hard proofs where necessary and then have the color converted in the final steps. And as desired by the printing service or your collaborators.

You want to learn aboiut color management. There are courses on LinkedIn (not for free).

[Colin30187875eszd]

You see Monika, I didn't like working in RGB because of the issue I raised with the black tones and working in CMYK has definitely improved this. And if I'm being very honest, there's an awful lot about the process that I simply don't understand as I simply don't understand half of the explanations. I must admit it's all very confusing.

[Monika Gause]

That's why I recommended a color management training. If you are producing artwork for professional printing, then you need to understand all that goes into it.

What kind of artwork is it that you are producing?

[Colin30187875eszd]

Here's the piece in question 

 

[Colin30187875eszd]

And here's a further two showing a copy of it; one showing the out of gamut parts before any alterations and another showing it after the alterations 

 

 

[Colin30187875eszd]

Here's a pic of the image in question

[Derek Cross]

Are you producing artwork for printing by a commercial CMYK printer or are you printing to (say) your desktop inkjet printer that has CMYK plus facilities?

[Colin30187875eszd]

Hi Derek

    I'm producing artwork for printing at home so I can view the pluses and minuses and then having corrected them to the best of my abilities, then send them to a professional printer 

[Derek Cross]

Have you spoken to your printer about profiles etc?

[Colin30187875eszd]

Not as yer as I dint have a finalised printer in mind. To be fair I've just ordered a better printer to help give me a more accurate idea of what sort of quality i can expect out of the print ie twice as many inks and better paper. I fully understand that my final product will lack the sheer exact vibrancy that it has on screen so I'm realistic about that but I can't help wondering if switching from sRGB to AdobeRGB in the meantime might release some of those out of gamut colours. I haven't done so yet as I'm aware that this could be a bad step on my part and that's why I'm seeking the advice of much wiser heads such as your own first 😊

[Derek Cross]

The thing is, you may set up your image to print nicely on your desktop printer but that may not translate successfully to your commercial printer. Are you printing just a few copies commercially or a larger quantity, say 500 copies?

[Colin30187875eszd]

Initially just a few as I'd like to see the finished quality first before printing en mass. It'd be handy first though if I could reduce the out of gamut colour parts, that'd be a great help!

[Derek Cross]

My point is that proofing on your desktop printer (especially if it's a CMYK Plus one) may not be helpful for matching basic CMYK commercial printing. Also note converting from sRGB to Adobe RGB might be like pouring half pint into a pint bottle – you may need to go back to your original RAW images, also will your monitor be able to display Adobe RGB accurately?
All things to consider.
There are some colour management experts on this forum who I'm sure will be joining in and be able to give you better advice on this thorny issue!  

[Colin30187875eszd]

That'll depend on the quality of the prints first I reckon. In the
meantime, it'd be nice to reduce some of the out of gamut colours
beforehand which would be a great help! 😊

[D Fosse]

What kind of monitor do you have? If it's the standard traditional type - not wide gamut - it can't reproduce any colors outside sRGB anyway.

First of all - don't even touch CMYK until you know with confidence which CMYK profile to use. There is no such thing as a "standard" CMYK. The Photoshop default, US Web Coated SWOP, is not valid outside the Americas, and even there not necessarily right. CMYK is always tied to a specific offset print process: certain inks on certain paper stock, on an offset press calibrated to a certain standard. Ask the printer which profile to use.

So assuming you have the correct CMYK profile:

You'll often hear that CMYK is "smaller" than sRGB, but it's not as simple as that. The primaries are shifted 60 degrees, so there are some CMYK colors that are outside sRGB, and some sRGB colors that are outside CMYK. To cover all the CMYK colors, a relatively large RGB space is needed, like Adobe RGB.

But for soft proofing, you need to see all those colors. And then you need a wide gamut monitor - either one of those that are sold and marketed as "Adobe RGB", or the DCI-P3 varieties that are increasingly sold now. These two are very similar with about the same total gamut volume, the primaries are just not in exactly the same place.

If your monitor is a standard gamut sRGB-type, soft proofing is of little practical use.

[Colin30187875eszd]

Hi there 

   Many thanks for taking the time to respond. With regards the monitor, I work on a HP Pavilion laptop so really I can't tell you anymore than that I'm afraid. 

    The reason I started my last two pieces in CMYK from the off is that the blacks, when converting from RGB to CMYK, always looked washed out, even when practice prints were made at a professional printer. So instead I decided to work straight off from CMYK and the first piece I did, printed off initially at home on my old bog standard Canon MG3250, looked surprisingly good, particularly the blacks. But with regards the exact type of CMYK Profile that a professional printer might use, wouldn't it be a case of altering the proffered settings on Photoshop prior to sending a copy to them? I do have two copies of my latest piece, one utterly untouched from finishing it, the other a copy I've been trying to reduce the out of gamut grey warning areas on to see what can be achieved. Would I be right I'm thinking then that it might be best when sending a copy off to a professional printer to make sure the CMYK Profile I've got it saved as matches that used by the professional printer and that I send off the untouched original piece to see what exactly it comes out looking like? Apologies if I'm.way off on all of this, there's just so much to remember! 

       Regards

             Colin

[Derek Cross]

What kind of professional printer are you going to use – for example, is it one that does photograph prints or one that does digital/litho printing?

[Colin30187875eszd]

I've only sent copies out of my RGB to CMYK stuff last to a few printing companies last year just to see how they look in practise so I don't have an established go to professional printer as yet

[D Fosse]

CMYK will never be full black.

Every print process has a limit for total ink. If you just put down 100% of each ink, it will smear and not dry properly. So there's a limit, known as "Total Area Coverage" (TAC). Usually this limit is somewhere around 300%. TAC is built into all CMYK profiles, so that if you convert from RGB you cannot go over. When you convert back you see it doesn't go down to 0-0-0.

On top of this comes diffuse surface reflectance from the usually semi-matte coated paper, all contributing to the impression of rather "weak" blacks. This is something that you just have to take into consideration and work with. My own way to tackle it is to calibrate the monitor's black point to be a visual match. Then I know that what I see is what I get.

[Colin30187875eszd]

There's definitely a lot to consider with the whole colour process for sure. Im guessing each different way of doing it has its own positives and negatives. For what its worth, the blacks so far on my last two pieces do look noticeably better, if only to me. That's an interesting comment on calibrating my screens black point however; is this difficult to do?

[D Fosse]

Not if your calibrator can do it. If it can, the black point should be somewhere around 1.0-1.2 cd/m², for a white point around 120 cd/m². That's a total contrast range of 100:1 or so, which is realistic for offset print.

If it can't, but you still have a way to adjust the black point in the monitor's OSD controls, you can just use your eyes. Get a sample from a similar print run, and adjust manually. If it looks right, it is right.