Photoshop converts photo from Adobe 1998 to Display P3

[MarkWall41]

When I work a photo and choose to Save a copy in Mac 12.6.1, it saves it as a Display P3 without the option to change it to Adobe 1998 which is what photoshop CC 2021 used to save them as.  How can I make photoshop stop doing this?

[D Fosse]

Is the profile embedded in the original? At default settings an embedded profile will always be preserved and Photoshop will never change a profile on its own.:

(the other two optional policies are potentially very damaging and should IMO be permanently removed)

Keep track of your embedded profiles here:

[NB, colourmanagement]

Photoshop should always save an image file with the document profile embedded, see D.Fosse post for where to see that.

So you work on an image that’s Adobe RGB, save (with embed profile checked) then open the image in Photoshop and its become P3?

If so that’s not right

If Photoshop is misbehaving, a reset might help

Perhaps try a thorough reset of Photoshop preferences?

(read this entire post before acting please)

Resetting restores Photoshop's internal preferences, which are saved when Photoshop closes.

If they become corrupt then various issues can occur.

Here’s some info on how to do that:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/preferences.html

Manually removing preferences files is the most complete method for restoring Photoshop to its default state: 

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/preferences.html#Manually

Note re macOS: The user Library folder is hidden by default.

To access files in the hidden user Library folder, see here for how to access hidden user library files.

https://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/global/access-hidden-user-library-files.html

Unexpected behavior may indicate damaged preferences. Restoring preferences to their default settings is a good idea when trying to troubleshoot unexpected behaviors in Photoshop. check out the video

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/preferences.html#reset_preferences

Learn how to access and modify Photoshop preferences and customize per your frequent workflows

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/preferences.html

And here’s an earlier forum discussion as an aid to understanding

https://community.adobe.com/t5/photoshop-ecosystem-discussions/quick-tips-how-to-reset-photoshop-pre...

You may want to backup your settings and custom presets, brushes & actions before restoring Photoshop's preferences.

Here is general info about that:  https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/preferences.html#BackupPhotoshoppreferences

Before you reset your preferences

in case of future issues, I suggest you make a copy as Adobe may need one to check problematic references. 

Quit Photoshop.
Go to Photoshop's Preferences folder

Preferences file locations: https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/preference-file-names-locations-photoshop.html\

  [on MacOS see: Users/[user name]/Library/Preferences/Adobe Photoshop [version] Settings

  Note for those on macOS: - be aware that the user Library folder is hidden by default on macOS.

  https://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/global/access-hidden-user-library-files.html

  In the Finder, open the “Go” menu whilst holding down the Option (Alt) key.

  Library will now appear in the list - below the current user's “home” directory. ]

Now you can drag the entire Adobe Photoshop [Version] Settings folder to the desktop or somewhere safe as a back-up of your settings.

Note for those on macOS:

Preference preservation is affected by macOS permissions,

you’ll need to allow Photoshop ‘Full Disk Access’ in your Mac OS Preferences/Security and Privacy

It may even be time to reinstall Photoshop.

It’s recommended that you use the Adobe CC cleaner tool to remove all traces first.

(See above about preserving preferences though! Its worth preserving them unless they are corrupted.)

https://helpx.adobe.com/creative-cloud/kb/cc-cleaner-tool-installation-problems.html

Uninstall Photoshop BUT make sure to choose the option “Yes, remove app preference”.

Once that process finishes, start the installation process and look into the “Advanced Options”. Uncheck “Import previous settings and preferences” and choose to “Remove old versions”.

I hope this helps

neil barstow, colourmanagement net :: adobe forum volunteer

google me "neil barstow colourmanagement" for lots of free articles on colour management

[MarkWall41]

Now I'm really confused.  My Canon R5 is set to Adobe RGB, my image browser PhotoMechanic 6 is set to Adobe RGB 1998 so the images going into photoshop should be Adobe RGB but when I click on a file on my desktop, the preview shows Display P3 so it's not Photoshop thats changing it but can't figure out where that profile is coming from.  Even when I select a preview of an image shot with a totally different camera 3 years ago it shows the same.  (screen shot below) Scratches head....

[D Fosse]

A raw file does not have a color space. It is encoded into one in the raw processor (ACR/Lightroom).

The camera setting for color space only applies to camera-processed jpegs, not to raw files.

The desired color space for the rendered RGB file is set in ACR / Lightroom.

[Conrad_C · Accepted solution]

…should be Adobe RGB but when I click on a file on my desktop, the preview shows Display P3 so it's not Photoshop thats changing it but can't figure out where that profile is coming from.  Even when I select a preview of an image shot with a totally different camera 3 years ago it shows the same.  (screen shot below) Scratches head....

By @MarkWall41

I see this too on my Mac…selecting a raw file in the Finder, from a Canon camera released 15 years ago. reports Display P3, a color space not used at the time the camera was released.

(This might be the longest expansion of “it depends” ever written, because it really does depend on a lot of things…)

I think Display P3 is being reported by macOS using its built-in raw processing engine, and Display P3 is probably the default RGB color space of macOS (as it is now in iOS too). In other words, the Mac Finder is reporting Display P3 because that’s the default RGB color space it uses if you process the file through any Apple software (Apple Photos, Apple Preview…). It needs to assume something, since as is well established, raw files have no RGB color space because they have not yet been processed into RGB. So it assumes the OS default. But that doesn’t apply to how Adobe software will process it.

And Macs using an earlier version of macOS/Mac OS X probably would have reported that same raw file as sRGB, because that was the macOS default before Macs starting shipping with wide gamut displays.

I do not think that’s connected to why you’re seeing Display P3 in Photoshop, because Adobe applications use the Adobe raw processing engine.

To sum up things so far, you can see different readings about its color space which can all be simultaneously “true” for the same raw file:

• In the Mac Finder, it says Display P3 probably because you are using macOS to inspect an unprocessed raw file, so macOS assumes its default Display P3 color space.

• In Photoshop, the initial color space for a formerly raw file is set by what converted the file for Photoshop. If you used Camera Raw to convert it, the export color space setting there determines the color space. That can be different from the setting in Lightroom Classic.

• In Photoshop, the Save As/Save a Copy commands save using the same color profile that’s already embedded in an image. If an image doesn’t have an embedded color profile, Photoshop embeds the color profile of its current working space for that color mode. So a file will show Display P3 in Save As/Save a Copy if it either already has a Display P3 profile embedded, or (less likely) if it did not have one embedded but Display P3 is the RGB working space in Edit > Color Settings.

• In your camera, setting the color space to Adobe RGB typically affects a file in three ways: The color space if the camera was set to save JPEG files, the color space of a preview image it generates for a raw file, and in some cameras it sets the color space (and therefore the limits) of the RGB histogram and clipping warnings in the camera viewfinder. But as D Fosse said, this will not affect how the raw file converts in later software. Because the raw file doesn’t yet exist as RGB data, it cannot use any RGB color space (only its preview can).

So your file was set in the camera as Adobe RGB, but that doesn’t affect the actual raw data, or how the macOS raw engine interprets it by default, or how the Adobe raw engine interprets it by default.

The answer to your question involves tracing it back to the export color space setting in whatever software converted the raw file and passed it on to Photoshop, and then whether Photoshop Color Settings were set to change that color space to something else upon opening the file. The questions D Fosse asked could help clarify what happened at those stages.

[peterm34359157]

Raw files do not actually have a color space. Color spaces only get applied in the pocessing step of rendering/exporting a tiff or jpeg or psd out of the raw processor.  I suspect that what is being displayed to you as the files 'color space' is just your current raw processors export colorspace setting. You can change the colorspace setting of the raw processor before you render/export your file.

[Davidtoby]

Hey Everybody.  By the dates of these P3 questions I can tell it's happening to a lot of people suddenly.  None of the previous answers helped me so here's my answer:

The new Camera Raw seems to be set to default to P3 even though we're shooting Adobe 1998 RGB in our cameras.  It's easy to fix:

Open an image from Bridge or wherever you go to Photoshop from.  When the Camera Raw opens, look at the very bottom of the screen.  It lists your Workflow Settings.  I bet it says P3.  simply click that line, and in the dialog box that comes up change the P3 default back to Adobe 1998.  Then save your change.  In my case doing that one time seems to have fixed it. Now your bottom-of-screen workflow line in Camera Raw will say Adobe 1998 like we want. 

[TheDigitalDog]

The new Camera Raw doesn't default to P3, and it always converts from raw to whatever you select for it in Workflow Options. You can build as many presets as you wish. You select that, and that's what you get:

Workflow options presets

[MarkWall41]

That’s what fixed it for me too.

MarkWallheiser.com