Why am I always having to convert color when I use a different image editor?

[BadStar]

I'm using PE 2019. I am transitioning from using GIMP 2.8 so I still like to do somethings there. Every time I open a .psd file there it asks me if I will

convert the file to a different color scheme (or something to do with color anyway--I'm not on GIMP right now). What is that about and does it substantively

affect the image quality? Thanks.

[Jeff Arola · Accepted solution]

In the basic version of gimp from gimp.org it's best to convert the profile to use gimp's default sRGB.

According to what i've read gimp works best when editing an image if the image uses gimps default sRGB profile.

https://docs.gimp.org/2.8/en/gimp-imaging-color-management.html

https://ninedegreesbelow.com/photography/patched-gimp-compared-to-default-gimp.html

Photoshop elements is different in that it's generally recommended to edit an image in it's own color profile

then convert later if needed, depending on the intended destination of the finished image.

Pse 2019 opens the images with the embedded profile instead of converting, except in the case of camera

raw images that don't have embedded profiles. Then pse 2019 uses the profile set under Edit>Color Settings.

Also pse 2019 gives you a choice of assigning a profile if the image opened other than a camera raw image has

no profile (untagged) and Edit>Color Settings is set to Allow me to Chose.

For example, images posted on the web should always have an sRGB profile embedded.

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop-elements/using/setting-color-management.html

[BadStar]

Hi Jeff. Thanks for the really great answer. A fair amount of it went over my head, but I got the basics. I don't like the idea of losing color quality if I don't choose to convert to RGB in GIMP. (I am almost entirely concerned with making ebook covers, which will of course be displayed online. I just buy digital photos online at Deposit Photo and then make them into ebooks. No photography at all.) But what I'm wondering is if I shuttle back and forth between PE and GIMP (assuming I do convert at GIMP) am I going to be losing color and image quality?

But if I just resize in GIMP (or anything not colored related) I can just choose to keep the PE color info when I open a PE image in GIMP, right?

And I'm gathering (I'd never even heard of it) sRGB is really important for someone like me. So do all the images made exclusively in PE have sRGB? And so if I convert the PE files to RGB in GIMP I will lose sRGB, right? So maybe that's a good argument for staying in PE?

[Jeff Arola]

What profile are your images in photoshop elements?

(before you open them in Gimp)

You can tell by going to the bottom left of the Document Window, clicking on the small sideways arrow and selecting

Document Profile.

[BadStar]

Hi Jeff.

My Document Profile is:

sRGB IEC61966-2.1 (8bpc)

And I've been looking into this a little more. When I open a PE file in GIMP 2.10.8 and get the window (below), there is no choice to be made. GIMP is going to convert it, but it seems to me it also has sRGB, so maybe there will be no color loss?

[Jeff Arola]

Sounds like you'll most likely be fine.

They are actually two different profiles, but so similar you probably won't see any difference after converting to Gimps default sRGB profile. If you wanted to specifically keep the sRGB IEC61966-2.1 profile you would press Keep.

If you don't want that dialog to show every time you can go into Edit>Preferences>Color Management>File Open behavior and select Convert to RGB workspace.

[BadStar]

Thanks very much, Jeff. I think I've been over-complicating things. For somebody like me I don't think I need to know all the nuances of the configuration systems. I did an experiment and opened a PE-made .jpg in GIMP. I converted it. I made a change. I saved it. Then I opened the file in PE. It had the exact same sRGB profile as when it started. So I'm cool with converting everything in GIMP and I took your advice and chose the "convert to RGB" as the default.

One last question. "Black point compensation" is checked in the GIMP default. I read up about it. Says it is an algorithm that adjusts something in certain monitors. I was thinking to just leave it checked. Think that's okay?