Color Anomaly with Graphics

[John_Allred]

Hi!

I made some arrows in another application with transparent backgrounds. Everywhere I viewed the arrows, their backgrounds were transparent. But upon importing into Premiere Pro, one didn't retain it's transparency.

I experimented with formats and color spaces and, always a problem only with the red arrow. White & yellow worked fine. Finally, I shifted the red in the file from C: 0  M:100  Y:100  K:0 to C:2  M:100  Y:73  K:0, and it worked fine. The white, with C:0  M:0  Y:0  K:0, and yellow, with C:0  M:0  Y:100  K:0, both imported with transparent backgrounds intact.

I understand what the problem was and found the solution. But, can anybody tell me why? 

Thanks so much!
John

[Michael Grenadier]

what application did you use to create the file?  Very simple with a photoshop file with layers... since Premiere is also an adobe product.

[John_Allred]

I specifically did not mention in which app the graphics were created, and I don't consider it relevant.  Thanks.

[Michael Grenadier]

Gotta disagree with you on that.

[John_Allred]

I decided to test your assertion, that the result might be different if using PS to create the graphic.

What do you know? The exact same settings that I described above produced the exact same results in Premiere Pro, using PhotoShop. That is, an arrow created with transparent background in PS with the color, C: 0  M:100  Y:100  K:0  produced a white background. An arrow produced the same way in PS but with the color, C:2  M:100  Y:73  K:0, produced a transparent background in Premiere Pro.

[Michael Grenadier]

how are you importing the file into Premiere?  and what color space are you using in photoshop?  guessing CMYK which is probably the source of the problem.  convert to rgb.  cmyk is a format for printing not for video.

[John_Allred]

Regardless, two images imported with transparent backgrounds and two did not. I take your point about  importing CMYK into Premiere Pro, but it is obviated by the fact that the differences in backgrounds on import are tied to precise color values, not color space. Yes. All files were created with CMYK color space.

[Michael Grenadier]

if the file is saved as CMYK, premiere will have issues with it.  Have you tried changing the color space in photoshop to RGB and then importing into Premiere?  

[R Neil Haugen]

Premiere is sRGB and Rec.709 ... and will not work correctly with CMYK files. That some of them worked is the wonder, not that some didn't.

It's simply a practical thing. You have to work with files Premiere can work with correctly.

Neil