Colors change when turning off primary screen (Windows 10)

[Joris Debonnet]

I bought a new laptop, a Dell XPS 17 9700. It has a fantastic 17" display (4K and support for HDR), but most of the time, I am using my older, larger 24" Samsung S24E650C display (HD and without HDR).

When I open a file in Photoshop while my primary (Dell) screen is on, everything is fine. This is regardless of whether I am editing on my primary or secondary screen.

But when I turn off the primary screen, the colors in the document suddenly change, even if the document was open on the secondary screen. This happens while Photoshop is still running, and it never moved between screens. It just happens as I look at it. I assume something in the OS changes, and it has an effect on Photoshop.

How might I prevent this from happening?

[Omar.Fathy]

Every screen has it's own color profile and color settings.
Try toi edit the screen color setting but the best way is to set your photoshop color profile to the same color profile of the screen you are using.

[davescm · Accepted solution]

"the best way is to set your photoshop color profile to the same color profile of the screen you are using."

Sorry but that is bad advice and just turns off colour management.

Colour management for screen use requires two things.

1. A document profile describing the color space in which the document has been created. Typically this might be sRGB, Adobe RGB, Pro Photo etc  You do not need to change this as you change monitors as it only describes the document color space.

2. A monitor profile which describes the way your specific monitor displays colors.  Then the colour management system in Photoshop can convert the document colour values to display correctly on your monitor.

The monitor profile is set in the operating system and loaded into Photoshop when Photoshop starts. There is a separate profile for each monitor.  It sounds like when you are switching off a monitor, your system is now displaying using monitor "a" and Photoshop is converting using the profile for monitor "b". Remember, Photoshop loads the profiles from the operating system, when Photoshop starts.

The simplest answer is to choose which monitor(s) you are going to use and switch them on or off accordingly, then start Photoshop. Or if you need to change the monitor configuration , do that then close and restart Photoshop. It should then pick up the correct profiles.

Dave

[NB, colourmanagement]

Hi Omar

"the best way is to set your photoshop color profile to the same color profile of the screen you are using."

Sorry to disagree, but that is really bad advice as it effectively switches off colour management.

That's really NOT a good thing to do.

neil barstow, colourmanagement.net :: adobe forum volunteer
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[Omar.Fathy]

Sorry, 
Exactly, you are right, Changing the color profile will convert all values and we are using it for the final output not for previewing. It depends on which printer, ink type or final output screen.
So it will Change color values. It is 100% correct.

[D Fosse]

That's not really the point. The point is that color management always requires two profiles, one source and one destination. In this case the source is the document, and the destination is the monitor. One color space is then remapped into the other, thus preserving color appearance.

If the two profiles are the same, the whole operation cancels itself out. Nothing happens; no remapping, no profile conversion. In other words - no color management. It doesn't even matter what the profile is. Nothing happens.

[NB, colourmanagement]

Omar

that’s a very confusing answer, I hope D Fosse has clarified in his reply to you. 

what I wrote is earlier absolutely correct:

you wrote:"

"the best way is to set your photoshop color profile to the same color profile of the screen you are using."

Sorry to disagree, but that is really bad advice as it effectively switches off colour management.

That's really NOT a good thing to do.

As D. Fosse wrote - its wrong because it just cancels out colour management. 

Disabling colour management like that MAY give you an appearance you expected but its not the RIGHT appearance, for that we need an accurate display profile and the correct image tag (embedded profile)

I hope this helps

thanks
neil barstow, colourmanagement.net :: adobe forum volunteer
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