Issues with Color Picker in InDesign: HSB and RGB Confusion Leading to Unexpected Colors

[Zebra Jamie]

When I open the color picker to adjust a shade, I usually automatically do so in HSB, since I usually want a lighter or darker shade of what I'm working on. But if I don't actually click on the radial buttons for the HSB value I'm working on, InDesign will give me some wild colors! It seems to be confusing HSB and RGB somehow--but I don't know why or how, since I'm editing in the HSB boxes.

As an example, let's say I want a darker version of this blue:

So I'm going to go to brightness and reduce it to 50%. This is what I get:

Like I said, if I toggle the button to "B" instead of where it starts out in"R," it's snapps back and starts behaving again:

It's not a huge problem, but it's still kind of annoying. Does anyone else experience this?

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[Eugene Tyson]

When you edit the colour in the Colour Picker - it's starting point is the the swatch in the swatches panel.

If the Swatch is in RGB or CMYK or HSB etc. that's what is selected when starting off.

When you edit the colour - the swatch colour doesn't change. 

What you're doing is making a new colour outside the document swatches - which is not associated with any swatch.

Edit a CMYK colour in the Colour Picker - it asks to add a CMYK Colour

--------------------------

What you've done is edited a RGB colour in the Colour PIcker

That's why it shows the RGB dialog when using the colour picker

If you make it a HSB Swatch then when you edit the colour in the Colour PIcker

it will bring you directly to the HSB edit of the colour

In essence, when you use the colour picker it starts at the colour mode present in the Swatch setting.

Here you see no Swatch associated with the RED

Colour Picker starts in RGB

Here you see HSB Red - not associated in the Swatches Panel

Edit the Colour Picker

It's in HSB

[Zebra Jamie]

Hi Eugene,

I work with swatches all day, so I know how to edit the swatches as well as non-swatch colors. (I can even load palettes from other InDesign documents, create and load palette files, and use the color find/replace tool.) The problem I'm running into is that the HSB settings within the color picker aren't working how they should. 

It doesn't matter if I'm starting from a swatch color or from an untethered color. It doesn't matter if I start in HSB, RGB, or CMYK. The problem remains. 

Your last screen shot actually displays another part of the problem! You'll notice that when you have something colored with your HSB Red swatch and you go to adjust it in the color picker, the bottom "original" color is peach instead of red.

I've got the same problem.

Here's an example: I'm going to start out with this orangy-red as an HSB swatch, custom named as "Marker":

I have colored a random square with it, and let's say I want to make it a little darker, so I open the color picker:

But what's this? Even though it is the HSB swatch, the "original" color is showing up as BLUE. Not Marker red.

Here's another weird thing, if I pick another color, like purple or green, and then click on the light blue, it will still send me back to the original Marker red, even though the original color displayed isn't right. So I guess it's functional, as long as I don't need to compare my new color to my old color during the color picking process.

Maybe it's just me, but I work with a lot of colors and a lot of swatches that are HSB, RGB, and CMYK every day, and this sort of buggy color conversion feels like it belongs back in the days of CS6, not in InDesign2024. There is obviously something wrong with how InDesign handles HSB colors.

Am I out of touch? Is digital color conversion really that hard to program?

[Eugene Tyson]

Yes - the same thing is happening for me

You can report bugs here

https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601180-adobe-indesign-bugs

And sorry, we have no way of knowing what level you are at in terms of InDesign, the question seemed quite basic and I explained it best I could. 

The swatch not updating is a another issue - you can report bugs.

[HARSHIKA_VERMA]

Hi @Zebra Jamie,

Thank you for reaching out and reporting the issue. We would like to escalate and investigate the issue to the team. Screenshots are help, however, could you please also record a video of the issue and share with us here for better understanding? 

I am assuming it's happening with all files and not with a specific file. Please also share the version of InDesign installed on your machine and the details of your operating system.

As rightly said by our expert Eugene, please also submit the issue on the InDesign Uservoice page and share the link with us here for tracking purposes.

We will try our best to help.

Thanks,

Harshika

[Zebra Jamie]

Hi Harshika, Here is a video of my experience.

I have also submitted a bug report here: https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601180-adobe-indesign-bugs/suggestions/48575441-issues-with-co...

[rob day]

Hi @HARSHIKA_VERMA , I can replicate the bug @Zebra Jamie is reporting in CC2021, so I assume it exists in the subsequent versions.

Pick a color from the Color Picker and Add RGB, Lab, and HSB versions of the color—here I have HSB, Lab and RGB versions of the same saturated orange:

Fill an object with the RGB version, and open the color picker—the bottom preview swatch matches the chosen RGB swatch and fill:

Same with the Lab Swatch and fill:

 But with the HSB swatch and fill I get this instead of the expected match:

[Zebra Jamie]

Hi Eugene, I get it. My original question didn't really have anything to do with the swatches function (and this problem persists whether I'm working with swatches or not), so I was a bit confused why I was getting lectured on how those worked. Maybe I wasn't clear enough in my explanation of the problem.

I just wanted to see if I was the only person who noticed this bug. It's just really annoying. 😝

[Eugene Tyson]

Yeh, I could only explain it. Your original screenshots you have RGB selected and adjusting the HSB levels. 

I thought that's what was confusing you. 

But I guess it's a bug. I can replicate it here.

Never noticed.
I never use the colour picker.

I adjust colours with swatches all the time. 

[Zebra Jamie]

I work with a lot things for print utilizing the unique brands of about 55 clients every month, which is a lot of colors. I should probably work more in CMYK colors, but I honestly haven't had a problem with RGB to CMYK conversion, and it prevents my clients from asking "why are my colors so dull?" a hundred times. 😆 Anyway, while I have the base palette for each client, sometimes I need a different shade or tint to make a graphic pop or text readable. Desaturating, lightening and darkening a color is so much easier with the HSB sliders than RGB (or any of the others). But then it gets all funky on me, requiring to extra steps to make it behave.

I'm kinda surprised no one else has noticed.

[rob day]

I'm kinda surprised no one else has noticed.

The reason I don‘t save HSB colors and swatches is they are effectively RGB colors—HSB color is color managed with the document’s assigned RGB profile (there are no HSB profiles), and if you Export a page with HSB colors to PDF/X-4 with No Color Conversion they will inspect as profiled RGB colors in AcrobatPro.

So I do the same as you (I prefer the H space view) and when I have the color I want, I put my cursor in one of the RGB or CMYK value fields to save the color or swatch in the desired space. With that workflow I don’t see the bug.

[Zebra Jamie]

That makes sense. So if you open up the color picker on something with an RGB swatch, do you automatically hit the HSB view right away before adjusting anything?

I usually just pop into the text box for either saturation or brightness and use shift+arrow keys to go up or down by 10 to get a quick shade/tint. It's only when that doesn't create a good contrast that I need the view space to pick a color. Just different workflows, I guess. ☺

[rob day]

do you automatically hit the HSB view right away before adjusting anything?

Yes. I also like the L space view—ROYGBIV hue is counter clockwise around the center, and saturation is from the center to the corners

[rob day]

Hi @Zebra Jamie , Also if it isn’t clear, the radio buttons and the value fields have two different functions. The radio buttons determine the Color Picker’s Space View, and the selected value field determines the space of the color you choose.

So I can choose to pick colors in the HSB’s Brightness view and add an HSB swatch, or I might want to pick in the HSB view, but create or add a CMYK color or swatch—to add a CMYK Swatch, I have to put my cursor in one of the CMYK fields:

Also, there is no CMYK Color Space View (because of the 4th channel), so if you click on a CMYK color in the Swatches panel, the initial space view will be the R view when you open the Picker.

You can set the default space view for new documents to your preferred B by opening the Color Picker with no documents open, and clicking the B radio button and value field, then OK.

[Zebra Jamie]

Hi Rob, I'm aware of how swatches work and the differences between HSB, RGB, LAB, and CMYK. The problem I'm trying to point out is that the values in the color picker aren't mathing right. You'll notice when you're working in the color picker that changing one of the RGB values makes the numbers in the HSB, Lab, and CMYK areas update--except for whatever reason, working in HSB doesn't display the right colors automatically.

This seems like a bug and I wanted to know if other people had to deal with this. Or maybe my machine is haunted. (There's a strong body of evidence for that theroy, too.)

[rob day]

If you are entering values rather than mousing in the color field, you have to tab or click out of the field in order to get the change—or, do you mean the appearance of the chosen HSB or RGB color doesn’t exactly match the color when it’s used on the page?

[Zebra Jamie]

Hi Rob, it's not a matter of exactly matching--it's a matter of not even remotely matching! Even when I tab or click out, if I'm working in an HSB field, it doesn't reflect anything close to an accurate color until I toggle the little round button to switch the view.

I wanted to see if it was maybe a setting I miss-set or if anyone else has had to do extra work to make the HSB give the right colors.

[rob day]

Ok, I see it when I start with an HSB swatch or color—the start color is random and doesn’t match the picked color. I don’t typically save HSB swatches, so I’ve never noticed it before. The work around as you suggest is to change the Color Space View, click OK and reopen the Color Picker.

[rob day]

I’m using CC2021, so it looks like the bug came with the new HSB Color Space view, which was introduced with CC2021.

[Zebra Jamie]

Yep, HSB swatches just don't play well with the Color Picker.

I've been working with InDesign since 2013, and been using it almost daily for the last 6 years. (I'm using InDesign 2024, currently.) I kept hoping someone else would notice the bug and fix it, but I guess I'm the first to get irritated enough to complain. 😝

[HARSHIKA_VERMA]

Hi All,

Thank you for sharing your input and reporting the issue. I have logged a bug for this issue for the product team to investigate further. If possible, could you please confirm if the issue is operating system-specific? It looks like it's happening on both Windows and Mac machines.

Thanks,

Harshika

[Eugene Tyson]

Seems to be not related to an OS.

[Nico Kobel]

Hi @HARSHIKA_VERMA 

Do you have any update on this? Currently having the same issue. 

Best regards

Nico

[Nico Kobel]

The current color in my color picker displays totally wrong. There is a big shift in hue and brightness of the color. It happens with every color, no matter the settings. Here is an example: Light gray displayed as vibrant blue. 

Since I'm already trying to fix another (maybe related) issue, I already have done the following: 

• Turning on/off all settings that affect color and color rendering
• Restarting InDesign and Computer (multiple times in between)
• Reset InDesign preferences 
• Totally reinstalled InDesign without saving the preferences
• Reinstalled NVIDIA graphics drivers
• Reset color management
• Some more...

Specs: 

• Windows 11 23H2
• InDesign Version 20.0.
• Dell XPS 17 1910, Intel Core i7-11800H, 64GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060

Any idea what's going on?

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[Abhishek Rao]

Hi @Nico Kobel,

Thanks for reaching out about the color picker issue you're experiencing in InDesign. I understand how frustrating this must be, especially after trying multiple troubleshooting steps. 

To further investigate the issue, could you please test this in a new InDesign document and let us know if the problem persists? Additionally, if you could share a screen recording demonstrating the issue, that would be incredibly helpful for us to understand what’s happening.

In the meantime, here’s a solution you can try: 

1. Go to Edit > Color Settings and ensure that your color settings are correctly set for your workflow (e.g., Adobe RGB or sRGB). You might also want to experiment with different settings to see if that resolves the issue.

Let us know how it goes, we will wait to hear from you. 

Best,  
Abhishek Rao