Documentation - Colour Management

[Incredible_hand16B8]

I'm behind the curve on some features in Premiere Pro. I decided today to catch up on the recent changes in colour management. I started with the article on display colour management. This one article gives the impression that as Adobe innovates on features, the quality of documention gets worse.

https://helpx.adobe.com/premiere-pro/using/color-management.html

Fundamental Subject Issue:

It should be noted that is article is specifically about display colour management. But throughout, it drops this specific distinction which has the possiblity of creating confusion. One example: the second section is titles "Set up color management", by which it actually means "Set up display color management".
The “Effect of color management on a project” section is actually only talking about Viewer Gamma in spite of its title. It doesn’t mention mercury transmit … is transmit affected by display colour management or not? Also it would be good to actually have a section that does discuss 'the effect of colour management on a project' (ie. what aspects of a project are affected by colour managment and how so).

Version Information
Why is the user guide outllining information for features which are only available in Beta releases? Except that as it explains, this feature is now available outside beta. Except it doesn’t tell you which version of Premiere Pro this page of information applies to. Version 23 is currently supported by Adobe. Does this page apply to version 23 of Premiere Pro?

Grammar
“Now you can also access Preferences under Lumetri Color”: “also” means in addition to something you've already reference. (It is immediately explained what the other point of access is, but "also" is poor grammar in this construction).

Poor and Inconsistent Wording
“In an 8-bit signal, the 20 lowest Rec. 709 codes are crunched into the 7 lowest sRGB codes. For 10 bit, the 78 lowest Rec. 709 code values are crushed into the 28 lowest sRGB values.”
The word “codes” here is a poor choice - the second choice of “values” is clearer. But why use two different words to refer to the same thing in this comparison. Clarity is important. Poor choices like this are throughout the text.

Conflicting & Incomplete Information
“Access Preferences settings under General preferences or under Lumetri Color settings found in Premiere Pro (Beta).”
The sentence immediately before this explains explains you don’t need to be in the beta to have settings available in Lumetri.

There are 2 different sections on viewer gamma, giving 2 different sets of information. Which section does Adobe expect users to read and accept?

"Display Color Management works for both internal and secondary computer monitors used as part of the OS desktop.” I guess this doesn’t work on Windows machines?  Edit: my comment here not warranted.

Inccorrect information
The page directs users to “Check the VRAM of your GPU” and “Check if your GPU drivers are up to date” … except this doesn’t apply to Mac users, of course. But the page doesn’t explain that.

“Enabling color management makes the Rec. 709 video appear closer than a broadcast monitor.”
What is this supposed to say?

The "screen grabs” at the end are presented uncritically … I believe they are illustrations to mimic the effects of colour management. If so they should be labelled as such (not as “screen grabs”)

Other issues

There is a weird oscillation throughout this text between not enough technical detail and too much technical detail (which is poorly presented). Good technical writing presents an overview of concepts and actions so it can be understood quickly, as well as technical details which is there for those who need more detailed understanding. The entire section on Rec.709 in sRGB colour space is a disaster in this regard. (Edit: Rec.709 in sRGB could be presented as an example of the kind of transformations that are done in colour management, rather than a definitive explanation.)

But I have the sense after reading this that it is overall really incomplete - I don’t really have a sense that I clearly know how display colour management fits into the larger picture of colour management workflow and tools - how it interacts with project, clip, sequence clip, and sequence settings.

R.
@Kevin-Monahan 

[Kevin-Monahan]

Hey @Incredible_hand16B8,

There's a lot to chew on here, and you've done great work exposing some of the shortcomings in documentation with these constantly changing features. Thanks, man!

I will alert the relevant product team members, and they can work with our docs team to resolve these issues.

@Alexis Van Hurkman, can you please take a look at this thread? @eric escobar might also want to have a look here.

Thanks,
Kevin

[Kevin-Monahan · Accepted solution]

Hello @Incredible_hand16B8,

I filed this documentation bug on your behalf today. Thanks for creating it.

Cheers,
Kevin

[R Neil Haugen]

THANK YOU for all the work you're doing examining the lack of accurate, usable information on so many things in Premiere. I found at NAB that Alexis is now in charge of color, whatever his title is. He was the chief author for the incredible Resolve manuals for a couple generations of Resolve, so maybe he can assist getting Premiere users better documentation.

Especially, "RI", as your focus is always for in usable documentation for various workflows.

I can probably answer one question. Yes, Transmit Out is covered by Viewer Gamma and DCM settings. It's the same image as the Program monitor, not a "clean feed".

You are totally correct that their documentation conflates screen color management with project, sequence, and clip CM. NOT helpful.

I had to push real hard at NAB 2023 to find out simply the order of transforms. For instance, if the color space transform was completely before any effects, including "source" effects, or if the effects are applied to clip data prior to color space transforms. And if the display transform is after all Souce, clip, and sequence changes to the image.  The order of processing matters.

I got one staffer finally to stand and think it through, who finally said the order is Lumetri controls changes applied to original clip data, then the color space transform, then display transform. So changes from the Lumetri controls changes are supposedly processed, then that data is 'fed' into the say HLG to Rec.709 transform that is used for the sequence, and the display transform is last. And further, the display transform is not added to the final processing of the image at export. It's just for viewing the pixels on the screen as set for the user.

Well ... I hope that's the case, but ... as they don't publish any of this, as BM does with Resolve, "we" have to go on trust. Not my favorite thing, you know?

I'd rather have hard, and correct, data.