Monitor calibration vs Soft Proofing

[thegios]

Operating System

1. Windows 11

I have a hardware calibrated monitor that comes with its software for windows: each calibration is stored in the monitor and an ICC file is generated and stored in Windows, when I change calibration on the monitor the Windows software also loads in Windows the related ICC file.

I can calibrate the monitor in sRGB, aRGB or Native (monitor is wide gamut), and we all know that LrC works in ProPhotoRGB and that the general web works in sRGB.

Although it takes effort I believe the best workflow is:
- calibrate monitor in Native
- ensure (just to be sure) that the related ICC file is loaded in Windows
- NB: colours in Windows UI will be super saturated but who cares
- edit in LrC the picture to my liking and export in JOG with embedded sRGB profile, forget about how it may look in sRGB on any average display: people will be looking at your picture from any sort of device, you have no control
- in case of printing, do soft proofing with the ICC file of the output you're going to use (printer + paper + ink), typically provided by the printing shop

Yet, many still suggest to calibrate twice in native and aRGB and to use either one depending if output is for print or web.

 

[clee01l]

A properly calibrated monitor is IMO essential to having a good printed paper copy.
If the colors that you see are not true, then the colors that get printed will be off too.
SRGB and AdobeRGB are generic color profiles and will never match the output of your monitor. Any icc color profile provided by the manufacturer is still generic and is an average of the color capabilities of that manfacture's model As a monitor ages, the colors produce drift away from the factory specifications.

A colorimeter is a device that reads and measures the color transmitted by your monitor. It is accompanied by software the will produce color profile that matches your monitors capabilities for TODAY and for the near future. It works this way.
The App sends a series of pure colors to the monitor and the Colorimeter reads the color as transmitted by your monitor. If for example the app sends a pure red signal (FF0000) and the colorimeter reads EE4B2B (Bright Red), The the app will compute an adjustment to bring the transmitted color to FF0000 OR the nearest to FF0000 that your monitor can produce. It does this for a full range of color values including Black (000000) and White (FFFFFF). It will then generate an icc color profile current for your monitor. You can apply this icc color profile to your display the same place in Windows where you ight apply AdobeRGB.
When in place your monitor will transmit as near as possible the colors that Lightroom or any other app is sending.

Now what does that have to do with printing you ask? Monitors are a transmissive media and printers are a reflective media. Printers require different type of icc color profile These are specific to the printer, ink AND paper being used. Glossy prints and Matte prints affect the ink reflected in very different ways. Also the "white" of the paper will vary from creamy white to bright white and everything in between. Most paper manufactures willproduce the icc profile for your paper and printer

Monitors are a transmissive media and printers are a reflective media. and the eye perceives these in different ways. Soft Proofing is a way the Lightroom can emulate your printer and paper reflected color using the transmissive media of your monitor. This is why it is most important to make sure that your monitor is sending the best color signal so that your prints will look close to what to are adjusting the image to in the develop module.

If you are planning to print your own images, Invest in a good colorimeter tool and app and use the soft-proofing option in Lightroom print module to get the rendition you want.

 

[thegios]

A properly calibrated monitor is IMO essential to having a good printed paper copy.
If the colors that you see are not true, then the colors that get printed will be off too.
SRGB and AdobeRGB are generic color profiles and will never match the output of your monitor. Any icc color profile provided by the manufacturer is still generic and is an average of the color capabilities of that manfacture's model As a monitor ages, the colors produce drift away from the factory specifications.

A colorimeter is a device that reads and measures the color transmitted by your monitor. It is accompanied by software the will produce color profile that matches your monitors capabilities for TODAY and for the near future. It works this way.
The App sends a series of pure colors to the monitor and the Colorimeter reads the color as transmitted by your monitor. If for example the app sends a pure red signal (FF0000) and the colorimeter reads EE4B2B (Bright Red), The the app will compute an adjustment to bring the transmitted color to FF0000 OR the nearest to FF0000 that your monitor can produce. It does this for a full range of color values including Black (000000) and White (FFFFFF). It will then generate an icc color profile current for your monitor. You can apply this icc color profile to your display the same place in Windows where you ight apply AdobeRGB.
When in place your monitor will transmit as near as possible the colors that Lightroom or any other app is sending.

Now what does that have to do with printing you ask? Monitors are a transmissive media and printers are a reflective media. Printers require different type of icc color profile These are specific to the printer, ink AND paper being used. Glossy prints and Matte prints affect the ink reflected in very different ways. Also the "white" of the paper will vary from creamy white to bright white and everything in between. Most paper manufactures willproduce the icc profile for your paper and printer

Monitors are a transmissive media and printers are a reflective media. and the eye perceives these in different ways. Soft Proofing is a way the Lightroom can emulate your printer and paper reflected color using the transmissive media of your monitor. This is why it is most important to make sure that your monitor is sending the best color signal so that your prints will look close to what to are adjusting the image to in the develop module.

If you are planning to print your own images, Invest in a good colorimeter tool and app and use the soft-proofing option in Lightroom print module to get the rendition you want.

Why are you explaining me what I already know?

 

[clee01l]

Why are you explaining me what I already know?

Because you make this statement:

- NB: colours in Windows UI will be super saturated but who cares

 

[thegios]

Because you make this statement:

And what's the correlation?
It is a fact: if you calibrate a monitor in aRGB or worst in Native color space, since the Windows UI is not color amnaged, that Windowes UI will look super staurated.

 

[thegios]

Because you make this statement:

And BTW I am not asking any question, especially related to printing.

What I am saying is that

- I calibrate my monitor in its native space
- I edit in LrC my pictured to my liking
- Do I need to publish the picture on the web? I export in JPG with a generic sRGB embedded profile, I don't do any soft proofing since I cannot control how/where my picture will be viewed by people (crappy laptop display, iPhone, Android phone, tablet, TV)
- Do I need to print it? I ask the print shop for the ICC of the printer/paper/ink combination, I soft proof my edit against the simulation with the proint shop profile, I adjust the editing to match the simulation, I export in TIFF/JPG with aRGB embedded profile and send the file to the print shop

 

[clee01l]

It is a fact: if you calibrate a monitor in aRGB or worst in Native color space, since the Windows UI is not color amnaged, that Windowes UI will look super staurated.

It is not a fact. The Windows UI is not an issue. It is the app that is color managed or NOT. Saturation is not at play at all with a color profile. AdobeRGB is a generic standard developed initially for print media because CRT monitors could not display the full color space that print media was capable of at the time. CRT monitors had a gamut that fell within the generic sRGB profile. With the introduction of LED monitors a wider range of colors was possible. You will see monitors advertised as "Wide color gamut with 100%sRGB, 99% DCI-P3 and 99% Adobe RGB coverage". They are referring to the colors inside these triangles. Apple monitors use the generic DCI-P3 color profile, but still need to be calibrated regularly. If you have a wide gamut monitor, it will likely conform to one of the generic standards but it will stll need to be recalibrated regularly to continue to produce the most accurate colors.

If you look at this chart, the triangles represent the colors visible in various color space gamuts. Your monitor has an RGB gamut triangle that falls somewhere inside this chromacity chart. You need to tune your individual monitor to produce the correct color that the app is sending. To do this, you need a Colorimeter tool and app to create a color profile that tunes your monitor to the correct colors. Otherwise a color pixel sent by the app won't be displayed in its true color

 

[thegios]

It is not a fact. The Windows UI is not an issue. It is the app that is color managed or NOT. Saturation is not at play at all with a color profile. AdobeRGB is a generic standard developed initially for print media because CRT monitors could not display the full color space that print media was capable of at the time. CRT monitors had a gamut that fell within the generic sRGB profile. With the introduction of LED monitors a wider range of colors was possible. You will see monitors advertised as "Wide color gamut with 100%sRGB, 99% DCI-P3 and 99% Adobe RGB coverage". They are referring to the colors inside these triangles. Apple monitors use the generic DCI-P3 color profile, but still need to be calibrated regularly. If you have a wide gamut monitor, it will likely conform to one of the generic standards but it will stll need to be recalibrated regularly to continue to produce the most accurate colors.

View attachment 27157

If you look at this chart, the triangles represent the colors visible in various color space gamuts. Your monitor has an RGB gamut triangle that falls somewhere inside this chromacity chart. You need to tune your individual monitor to produce the correct color that the app is sending. To do this, you need a Colorimeter tool and app to create a color profile that tunes your monitor to the correct colors. Otherwise a color pixel sent by the app won't be displayed in its true color

Geez I know all this. The Windowes GUI is NOT color managed, therefore if a monitor is calibrated in aRGB or native the Widnows UI will look supersaturated, like MS office.

I do regurarly calibrate my monitor, but when calibrating a monitor you have to choose as target colorspoace sRGB, aRGB or Native.

 

[clee01l]

Geez I know all this. The Windowes GUI is NOT color managed, therefore if a monitor is calibrated in aRGB or native the Widnows UI will look supersaturated, like MS office.

I do regurarly calibrate my monitor, but when calibrating a monitor you have to choose as target colorspoace sRGB, aRGB or Native.

I guess I don't understand what your issues is. When calibrating a monitor, the calibration app generates the color profile. You do not Choose one during calibration. It is then used by Windows for your monitor for all of your apps like Lightroom or your browser or Office..

 

[Johan Elzenga]

Hi Clee, I’m not a Windows expert but I think the OP refers to this: if the Windows UI is not color managed, then it will most likely assume that the monitor is sRGB. That means it will use sRGB color numbers to display things like the icons in your task bar. But if the monitor is really a wide gamut monitor, then it will use those sRGB numbers and display them in the native wide gamut color space. That means the icons will look super saturated. When wide gamut monitors first appeared, I noticed this in MacOS too, but the MacOS UI was color managed quite quickly after that.

 

[clee01l]

Hi Clee, I’m not a Windows expert but I think the OP refers to this: if the Windows UI is not color managed, then it will most likely assume that the monitor is sRGB. That means it will use sRGB color numbers to display things like the icons in your task bar. But if the monitor is really a wide gamut monitor, then it will use those sRGB numbers and display them in the native wide gamut color space. That means the icons will look super saturated. When wide gamut monitors first appeared, I noticed this in MacOS too, but the MacOS UI was color managed quite quickly after that.

Unfortunately I have not kept up with Windows settings since ugrading to my first iMac over 10 years ago. Perhaps mistakenly, I thought the Windows UI took its color settings from the color profile assigned to the monitor. I've only had wide gamut monitors for 3-5 years and I have always calibrated them. I never noticed UI color issues perhaps because by the time I got a wide gamut monitor, MacOS was already handling this correctly.

It would seem to me that WindowsOS still have a setting to adjust the display profile just like MacOS.

Here is the MacOS setting screen where I assign individual color profiles to my 3 displays. There should be something similar in WindowsOS

 

[Gnits]

1. I always use my most recent calibration profile for my monitor display. I wish to have my monitor display the biggest range of colours possible.
2. Since my introduction to the colour management I was shocked that at the time most browsers were not colour managed.
3. As a result… I never ever regarded the Windows o/s and the majority of apps to be colour managed.
4. I made sure any apps I use for editing or image presentation or printing are colour managed.
5. For large or expensive prints (either printed my self or sent to a fine art printer) I will check for out of gamut colours and soft proof for the target papers and printers.
6. It seems Microsoft Edge defaults to using Light or Dark themes, with a user setting possible to default to sRGB. I am not sure if you can get Edge to use the monitor profile or any other profile.
7. The P3 profile is now more relevant to a lot of people as most if not all Apple devices conform to this. I was unable to get a spec for the recent Samsung Galaxy phones. I was curious.
8. I make sure that my monitor can handle AdobeRGB… as I know the printing services I use work with this profile.
8. I still regard a real world test print as my definitive reference as to the final colours for an image. An sRGB version of this is fine for my web and email needs.

To respond specifically to the original post…
I will only use the most recent calibration profile of my screen… and will softproof or test for out of gamut colours using Lightroom when dealing with new papers or unusual subject colours.

 

[thegios]

1. I always use my most recent calibration profile for my monitor display. I wish to have my monitor display the biggest range of colours possible.
2. Since my introduction to the colour management I was shocked that at the time most browsers were not colour managed.
3. As a result… I never ever regarded the Windows o/s and the majority of apps to be colour managed.
4. I made sure any apps I use for editing or image presentation or printing are colour managed.
5. For large or expensive prints (either printed my self or sent to a fine art printer) I will check for out of gamut colours and soft proof for the target papers and printers.
6. It seems Microsoft Edge defaults to using Light or Dark themes, with a user setting possible to default to sRGB. I am not sure if you can get Edge to use the monitor profile or any other profile.
7. The P3 profile is now more relevant to a lot of people as most if not all Apple devices conform to this. I was unable to get a spec for the recent Samsung Galaxy phones. I was curious.
8. I make sure that my monitor can handle AdobeRGB… as I know the printing services I use work with this profile.
8. I still regard a real world test print as my definitive reference as to the final colours for an image. An sRGB version of this is fine for my web and email needs.

To respond specifically to the original post…
I will only use the most recent calibration profile of my screen… and will softproof or test for out of gamut colours using Lightroom when dealing with new papers or unusual subject colours.

Yes you got exactly my point.

Stepping back...

When you calibrate a monitor, you have to choose the target color space: sRGB, aRGB or Native.

The calibration will generate an ICC color profile that will be used by the OS to apply the correct adjustment as per calibration.

Lightroom works in ProPhotoRGB color space, the web works in sRGB color space, prints work in either aRGB or CMYC color spaces.

I read that some photographers suggest the following:
- calibrate your monitor with two settings: one for aRGB color space and one for sRGB color space
- if editing for the web, put your monitor in sRGB setting so that you can see how the photo will look like on a general sRGB monitor
- if editing for printing, put monitor in aRGB setting so that you can see how the photo will look like on wide color space

The above seems very stupid to me, and I prefer the following

- I calibrate monitor to it's widest native color space
- I edit the picture to my liking, regardless if it's meant for web or printing
- if picture goes on the web, I simply export in JPG with an sRGB embedded profile: who cares how it's gonna look, since I cannot control how someone will be looking at it
- if picture is to be printed, I do soft proofing in LrC using an ICC color profile provided by the print shop for the specific printer/paper/ink combination

The Windows part is just to say that when calibrating a monitor to a wide color space, since Windows GUI is not color managed, all Windows UI elements are going to look with a very high contrast and super saturated.

 

[Gnits]

I now understand your point.
Colour management is scary until the basic principle is understood, then most things fall into place. Terminology has a habit of getting in the way.

 

[clee01l]

When you calibrate a monitor, you have to choose the target color space: sRGB, aRGB or Native.

The calibration will generate an ICC color profile that will be used by the OS to apply the correct adjustment as per calibration.

Lightroom works in ProPhotoRGB color space, the web works in sRGB color space, prints work in either aRGB or CMYC color spaces.
.

I don’t under stand why you “have to choose” a color space. Referring back to the chart that i posted, What you are referring to as color space. Is defined by the envelope outlines of the various profiles. Your monitor HAS its own color space or envelope independent of any of the others. That is why a manufacturer will describe it a 99%sRGB, or DCI-P3.

Lightroom uses a variation of ProPhotoRGB as a computational work color space. IOW, individual pixels will be computed to fall inside the envelope of ProPhotoRGB. However when viewing an image created by Lightroom you will be limited by the monitor to color pixels that fall inside its colorspace or envelope. Pixels. Computed that fall out side this envelope but inside the Lightroom variation of proPhotoRGB will be displayed in a color along the edge of the envelope of YOUR monitor.

Only when you export a file to print or web will you define a color space that conforms to the target. All calculated pixel values from Lightroom will be adjusted to fit inside the color space you choose for the target. I.e the color space defined by the icc profile that gets applied to the file (sRGB or Adobe RGB or DCI-P3 etc.). Chrome and Safari primarily use the sRGB profile, while Firefox defaults to your operating system's monitor profile but can be configured to use sRGB. The standard for the web is sRGB, a universal color profile that most devices can display.

Assigning a color profile is only important when creating a file during export. Care should be taken to insure the pixel colors fit inside an envelope appropriate to the media. That is why a file destined to print needs a color profile defining a color space that the printer AND paper can produce. This is NOT AdobeRGB because Adobe RGB is a generic profile that covers most printers and papers can produce and not your specific printer and paper. Likewise, since the color capabilities of all of the monitors that will display your image are an unknown you choose sRGB color profile for those files because sRGB is the smallest envelope and most monitors today will display 99% sRGB

In summary best practice is to calibrate your monitor regularly and apply that profile so that it will provide the truest colors sent to it. Accurate color is needed in apps like Lightroom that compute pixels based on upon you observation of the develop results (or Soft-proofed adjustments)
If the Windows UI does not yield nice results, blame it on the inferiority of the Windows UI and accept that it is what it is. While knowing that your image creations will display or print accurately.

You might find this link helpful

https://www.benq.com/en-us/knowledg... web browsers,color manage Firefox and Chrome.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[thegios]

I don’t under stand why you “have to choose” a color space. Referring back to the chart that i posted, What you are referring to as color space. Is defined by the envelope outlines of the various profiles. Your monitor HAS its own color space or envelope independent of any of the others. That is why a manufacturer will describe it a 99%sRGB, or DCI-P3.

Lightroom uses a variation of ProPhotoRGB as a computational work color space. IOW, individual pixels will be computed to fall inside the envelope of ProPhotoRGB. However when viewing an image created by Lightroom you will be limited by the monitor to color pixels that fall inside its colorspace or envelope. Pixels. Computed that fall out side this envelope but inside the Lightroom variation of proPhotoRGB will be displayed in a color along the edge of the envelope of YOUR monitor.

Only when you export a file to print or web will you define a color space that conforms to the target. All calculated pixel values from Lightroom will be adjusted to fit inside the color space you choose for the target. I.e the color space defined by the icc profile that gets applied to the file (sRGB or Adobe RGB or DCI-P3 etc.). Chrome and Safari primarily use the sRGB profile, while Firefox defaults to your operating system's monitor profile but can be configured to use sRGB. The standard for the web is sRGB, a universal color profile that most devices can display.

Assigning a color profile is only important when creating a file during export. Care should be taken to insure the pixel colors fit inside an envelope appropriate to the media. That is why a file destined to print needs a color profile defining a color space that the printer AND paper can produce. This is NOT AdobeRGB because Adobe RGB is a generic profile that covers most printers and papers can produce and not your specific printer and paper. Likewise, since the color capabilities of all of the monitors that will display your image are an unknown you choose sRGB color profile for those files because sRGB is the smallest envelope and most monitors today will display 99% sRGB

In summary best practice is to calibrate your monitor regularly and apply that profile so that it will provide the truest colors sent to it. Accurate color is needed in apps like Lightroom that compute pixels based on upon you observation of the develop results (or Soft-proofed adjustments)
If the Windows UI does not yield nice results, blame it on the inferiority of the Windows UI and accept that it is what it is. While knowing that your image creations will display or print accurately.

You might find this link helpful

https://www.benq.com/en-us/knowledge-center/knowledge/web-browsers-color-management.html#:~:text=The most popular web browsers,color manage Firefox and Chrome.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Because when I calibrate the monitor my softwares asks me for calibration target parameters like gamma, black point and gamut (or color space) and as gamut I have different options: IO3, sRGB, aRGB or Native.

The idea being: if you edit mainly for the web then calibrate with sRGB as target gamut so when editing you will always see in screen how your picture will look like on the web because your monitor is calibrated to mimic an sRGB color space.

 

[clee01l]

Because when I calibrate the monitor my softwares asks me for calibration target parameters like gamma, black point and gamut (or color space) and as gamut I have different options: IO3, sRGB, aRGB or Native.

The idea being: if you edit mainly for the web then calibrate with sRGB as target gamut so when editing you will always see in screen how your picture will look like on the web because your monitor is calibrated to mimic an sRGB color space.

My Spyder software only asks for three things: Gamma (Gamma2.2 recommended), Whitepoint (6500K recommended) and Brightness (120cd recommended) If you are going to mimic sRGB why spend all that extra money for a Wide Gamut Monitor?

Two of my monitors are 1600nit HDR monitors, I can't possibly imaging dumbing down my monitor to conform to an outmoded standard.

 

[Replytoken]

Two of my monitors are 1600nit HDR monitors, I can't possibly imaging dumbing down my monitor to conform to an outmoded standard.

I see where the OP is coming from, especially in a Windows environment. I have a wide gamut NEC monitor that allows me to display in sRGB, Adobe RGB and Native, and I calibrated to Native so I could take advantage of what it offers. But I also understand that while somewhat dated, sRGB is still the common denominator when sharing images with the general public. The approach makes sense for the OP given the hardware and OS, and they are aware that when printing that this approach needs soft proofing.

Given the different operating systems, and their updated versions, a multitude of monitor choices, and different colorimeter software and hardware, calibrating monitors reminds me of the Picasso quote - "“Everything is a miracle. It is a miracle that one does not dissolve in one's bath like a lump of sugar."

--Ken

 

[clee01l]

The approach makes sense for the OP given the hardware and OS, and they are aware that when printing that this approach needs soft proofing.

I want to see from Lightroom the most accurate colors that my monitor can produce. This is why about 2 years ago I invested in 2 HDR monitors. If I am creating an export for general web consumption I will embed sRGB in the exported file. How does that affect the pixels in the image? All the pixels will be translated to conform to the sRGB envelop. Because I have used a Wide Gamut Monitor and Lightroom's MelissaRGB colorspace, some of the pixels will be adjusted to be in the range.
My browser, Safari will use the icc profile assigned to my monitor to display and the icc profile of and for the image being displayed if it has one.

Will some of my colors be off if the third party browser displays it differently? Yes, but in the words of the OP "who cares".

 

[Replytoken]

I want to see from Lightroom the most accurate colors that my monitor can produce. This is why about 2 years ago I invested in 2 HDR monitors. If I am creating an export for general web consumption I will embed sRGB in the exported file. How does that affect the pixels in the image? All the pixels will be translated to conform to the sRGB envelop. Because I have used a Wide Gamut Monitor and Lightroom's MelissaRGB colorspace, some of the pixels will be adjusted to be in the range.
My browser, Safari will use the icc profile assigned to my monitor to display and the icc profile of and for the image being displayed if it has one.

Will some of my colors be off if the third party browser displays it differently? Yes, but in the words of the OP "who cares".

I do not disagree, but with an expensive PC upgrade in the works, I will not be looking at monitor upgrades for some time. But I do appreciate that NEC offer several gamut display options as there are cases where it would be helpful. But, yes, I agree with you and the OP about wanting to see as much as I can, and not overly worrying about how others end up seeing sRGB images. I suspect that with Apple's market share, P3 is a lot more common these days with average phone users.

--Ken

 

[thegios]

My Spyder software only asks for three things: Gamma (Gamma2.2 recommended), Whitepoint (6500K recommended) and Brightness (120cd recommended) If you are going to mimic sRGB why spend all that extra money for a Wide Gamut Monitor?

Two of my monitors are 1600nit HDR monitors, I can't possibly imaging dumbing down my monitor to conform to an outmoded standard.

And that's exactly my point

On a side note, my monitor is hardware calibrated, meaning I can use any probe but I must use the monitors SW to calibrate.

My monitor also comes with the possibility to record three different calibrations, that can be recalled by pressing a button.

The only reason I see why you would tame down your wife gamut monitor into a narrower color space is to avoid soft proofing.

Say you record two calibrations: sRGB gamut and Native gamut.

If I need to edit a picture for the web, I set the monitor to sRGB, I open Lightroom (order is important) and I edit the picture being sure that what I see already on the monitor is what the picture will actually look on an an average device.

This does not solve the problem for printing, where soft proofing will always be necessary.

I prefer the other approach: monitor calibrated in Native, editing as I like, soft proofing before exporting in jpg with a generic sRGB profile is going on the web or with the lab profile if must be printed.