Photos yellower when save from Photoshop to Lightroom

[howdego]

I use Lightroom 4 and CS6 on a win7/64 PC. When I edit a Lightroom photo in CS6 and save it back to Lightroom as a PSD, I notice that the PSD is more yellow than the original Lightroom image. This is verified in the PSD histogram, where the yellow portion is a little larger and uniform than the RAW version histogram. Lightroom is set to export in 16 bit AdobeRGB (1998), and Photoshop is also set to edit in 16 bit AdobeRGB (1998). My monitor was calibrated about a month ago, so that is unlikely to be the problem. Can anyone tell me why this might be happening?

 

[Tony Jay]

Welcome Howdego.

You may be having gamut issues.
I would not using AdobeRGB to export to PS or to edit in PS - ProphotoRGB is the way to go.
As an experiment try setting up Lr and PS to use ProphotoRGB and see what happpens.

Tony Jay

 

[howdego]

Changed the output in Lightroom and the color space in Photoshop to ProphotoRGB. Shift to yellow remains, as before. My monitor, btw, is a decent 5 year old flat screen, but it only supports srgb, as most do. Might there be another setting in Lightroom or Photoshop that is adding warmth to the photo that I have not spotted?

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Is the photo more yellow just in PS, or also in LR once you've reimported?

Assuming it's also in LR, go to Develop, hold down shift and press the Reset (Adobe) button where the normal reset is usually, and see if that does the trick.

 

[howdego]

AHA!

I applied the reset(adobe) to the PSD version in Lightroom, but there was no apparent change in color to me. (How does the reset differ from reset(adobe) anyway? However, when I opened the (unreset) psd back into Potoshop using the edit in command, and also opened the original Lightroom RAW image into Photoshop, and compared both with the edited Lightroom RAW version , I see that both Photoshop images are a little yellower than the edited Lightroom image. So it appears that he yellow is coming from Photoshop as soon as I open it there. Any idea why this is happening and how to get the programs in sync?

 

[howdego]

Tony Jay,

Did as you suggested. See the 11:39 post. I haven't used ProphotoRGB as my monitor is not even close to supporting it. However, I rarely print my photos. Instead I make movies with music and titles and output them in hi-def (bluray) format. Not sure if my hi-deg TV supports the Prophoto gamut, or if the Proshow program I use to produce the shows does either.

 

[Jim Wilde]

Can you post a screenshot of your Photoshop Colour Settings (Edit menu)? May be a clue there....

 

[Tony Jay]

Tony Jay,

Did as you suggested. See the 11:39 post. I haven't used ProphotoRGB as my monitor is not even close to supporting it. However, I rarely print my photos. Instead I make movies with music and titles and output them in hi-def (bluray) format. Not sure if my hi-deg TV supports the Prophoto gamut, or if the Proshow program I use to produce the shows does either.

Using ProphotoRGB has nothing to do with what you can see on your monitor. There is no monitor in existance that can remotely approach the gamut of ProphotoRGB.
The idea of using ProphotoRGB as the working space in Lightroom and Photoshop is to provide a container large enough to prevent you losing any colour from imported images.
When you make derivative images for any purpose that is the time to assign either AdobeRGB or sRGB depending on the purpose intended for that image.

It seems to me that you need a primer on colour management - try Andrew Rodneys book on colour managment for photographers.

Tony Jay

 

[howdego]

Can you post a screenshot of your Photoshop Colour Settings (Edit menu)? May be a clue there....

I used the icon on this reply to send a snip of the color settings dialog box. Let me know if you got it. BTW, I hit ok when I changed the rgb setting to prophotorgb. Did not hit save. Did it still work?

 

[howdego]

Using ProphotoRGB has nothing to do with what you can see on your monitor. There is no monitor in existance that can remotely approach the gamut of ProphotoRGB.
The idea of using ProphotoRGB as the working space in Lightroom and Photoshop is to provide a container large enough to prevent you losing any colour from imported images.
When you make derivative images for any purpose that is the time to assign either AdobeRGB or sRGB depending on the purpose intended for that image.

It seems to me that you need a primer on colour management - try Andrew Rodneys book on colour managment for photographers.

Tony Jay

Tony Jay,

I've read numerous internet articles on color management, as well as Evening's and Kelby's Lightroom 4 and CS6 books. Still, I can't find a consensus on which color space to use. So I settled on AdobeRGB. I guess you disagree. At the moment, I am most concerned with sharpening in Lightroom and Photoshop (I currently sharpen as the last step in Lightroom and then usually add a little more in Photoshop as my last step using smart sharpen). Be coincidence, I will be going to the local bookstore this afternoon to compare Schewe's Digital Negative.... and Fraser and Schewe's Real World Imaging. I will purchase one of those.

 

[Bryan Conner]

Tony Jay,

I've read numerous internet articles on color management, as well as Evening's and Kelby's Lightroom 4 and CS6 books. Still, I can't find a consensus on which color space to use. So I settled on AdobeRGB. I guess you disagree. At the moment, I am most concerned with sharpening in Lightroom and Photoshop (I currently sharpen as the last step in Lightroom and then usually add a little more in Photoshop as my last step using smart sharpen). Be coincidence, I will be going to the local bookstore this afternoon to compare Schewe's Digital Negative.... and Fraser and Schewe's Real World Imaging. I will purchase one of those.

The reason that I choose ProPhotoRGB over AdobeRGB is that in the future technology may include monitors capable of displaying colors beyond the scope of AdobeRGB. Even today, many inkjet printers have color sets that can not be contained in the AdobeRGB color space.

As far as the books are concerned. Both The Digital Negative and any of the Bruce Fraser/Jeff Schewe books are well worth the purchase price. Are you referring to Real World Image Sharpening when you say "Real World Imaging"?

Good luck on your quest to solve the yellow problem. I have no idea at the moment....but if I think of something, I will share.

 

[howdego]

Bryan,

The second book was, if fact, Real World Image Sharpening. I spent time studying both books yesterday, and they both are excellent. I decided that the Real World book suited my needs better right now, but I found that a lot of the advice in some chapters was based on Lightroom 2 and I think CS2. I know that Schewe updated this second edition of the book in 2009, but, since Lightroom especially, and Photoshop have been improved in the last two years, I am concerned that this version does not reflect the latest capabilities of the programs. So I haven't purchased yet. Any idea if I am being too particular?

 

[howdego]

TNG,

Did the screenshot provide an thoughts? Another thought come to mind. The Windows color space is set to sRGB, but Lightroom and Photoshop are set to AdobeRGB or Prophoto. Don't know why that would make the Photoshop PSD picture more yellow than the Lightroom RAW though.

 

[Jim Wilde]

No, afraid not. The settings look perfectly normal to me.

Not sure I understand when you say that the Windows colour space is set to sRGB....how do you calibrate your monitor?

 

[howdego]

JIm,

Uh Oh! Thats no good!

Windows has a color management panel in the Control Panel that shows the monitor in use and, in the advanced tab of that panel, the device profiles available. I have never touched this panel. On my computer, even thought I NOW have the Lightroom export and Photoshop color settings set for Prophoto RGB, this Windows control panel says the monitor is set for sRGB. I don't know how this affects the windows software, or the function of my NVidia GTX 560 video card. Any idea if I am supposed to change the selection if I change the Adobe color space?

Also, I checked the RGB histogram readouts for a couple of pictures, comparing the Lightroom version and the Photoshop version, in order to verify my observation of the yellow shift. In all cases, the Red and green channel go up a little in Photoshop, and the blue channel goes down a little. For example, the R G and B channels in Lightroom for a single spot are 84.5, 78 and 70.02 respectively, while the same spot in Photoshop was 85.3, 78.4 and 68.3. Shouldn't they be the same if I made not changes in Photoshop?

I calibrate my monitor using the Spyder4 Pro.

 

[Jim Wilde]

In the Color Management dialog, the Advanced tab shows you the Windows Color System Defaults, which will usually be sRGB. However, in the Devices tab, your Spyder calibration should be over-riding those defaults and you should find that the profile generated by the calibration should be set to default. This is a screenshot of the Devices tab in my Color Management dialog, for one of my monitors. Notice that "Use my settings for this device" is checked (that's key to over-riding the system sRGB default), and below in the profiles the default profile is set to one of the custom profiles generated by my own Spyder calibration. Your Devices tab should look something similar, does it?

I really can't explain the differences you see between LR and PS, I'm afraid. One question....I assume that PS/CS6 is updated to the latest version of the ACR plug-in (7.3)?

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Sorry for disappearing! Ok, let's narrow this down a bit. Let's work with B&W images for the minute, as it takes a lot of different things out of the equation, including the monitor profile.

Turn a photo to B&W in LR, then do 2 things:

1. Edit in Photoshop and check the RGB readout - should be equal numbers across the board of course.

2. Export the photo as ProPhotoRGB and open that into PS and check the RGB readout again. That takes ACR out of the equation, which would be a possible factor.

 

[howdego]

Hope I did this right.



MY PS uses ACR 7.3.071, Lightroom 4.3 uses 7.3. I don’t know about the 071.


I made a virtual copy of a photo in Lightroom and converted it to B&W using the B&W panel. I opened the photo in PS and simply saved it to Lightroom as a psd. I compared a point in the virtual B&W and saved from PS photos. The RAW Lightroom version said 31, 31, 31 and the saved psd version from PS read 30.8, 30.8, 30.8. Note the difference.


I then exported the B&W psd to a folder as a psd with Prophoto colorspace. Then, I imported this new psd into same collection in Lightroom as the other photos so I could compare the RGB readout from the same spot. The exported in Prophoto B&W psd, now in lightroom, shows the same exact RGB readout as the B&W PSD from which it was exported. So now, no RGB changes.



So does that mean that the ACR used in Lightroom is not being translated properly by PS?

 

[howdego]

I have attached the two pages mentioned. I can only assume that the default profile was selected by the Spyder software, but I am not sure. This area of the system is a mystery to me. for example, the Advanced tab shows the profile to be standard sRGB, no indication that it has been modified by the calibration software. Is this of any value?

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Don't worry about the fact they were 0.2 different - at least for the moment. That could be as simple as a rounding error, one based on 5x5 pixels and one based on 1x1 pixels, etc.

But they were all equal - that's the important bit. That means there isn't ACTUALLY a colour shift going on. So now it's just a question of why you're seeing a difference. Might help to see a screenshot of both LR and PS open at the same time (i.e. overlap the photos in the same screenshot) so we can see what you're seeing.

 

[howdego]

Don't worry about the fact they were 0.2 different - at least for the moment. That could be as simple as a rounding error, one based on 5x5 pixels and one based on 1x1 pixels, etc.

But they were all equal - that's the important bit. That means there isn't ACTUALLY a colour shift going on. So now it's just a question of why you're seeing a difference. Might help to see a screenshot of both LR and PS open at the same time (i.e. overlap the photos in the same screenshot) so we can see what you're seeing.

Attached are two sets of pictures. The first for both sets is an edited Lightroom photo. The second is the same photo opened (e.g., edit in) in Photoshop . Note the shift in the sky to purple and the slight yellowing of the buildings.

 

[LouieSherwin]

Hi,

Looking at the screen shots I do see a difference in color mostly in the sky and not so much in the buildings. In any case I see from these captures that the file that is in photoshop is actually the psd that has been saved to disk. I am curious to see what would happen if you start again with your raw file in Lightroom and use the Cmd-E to open it again in Photoshop. You should see <file_name>.CR2 in the Photoshop image tab. In this case do you still see the color shift?

-louie

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Yep, I can see it, but I can't explain it. Any chance I could test that raw files complete with your settings? If that's ok with you, just hit Ctrl-S in LR to save a sidecar xmp file, and send that and the rw2 file via www.wetransfer.com to members AT lightroomqueen DOT com

 

[howdego]

Hi,

Looking at the screen shots I do see a difference in color mostly in the sky and not so much in the buildings. In any case I see from these captures that the file that is in photoshop is actually the psd that has been saved to disk. I am curious to see what would happen if you start again with your raw file in Lightroom and use the Cmd-E to open it again in Photoshop. You should see <file_name>.CR2 in the Photoshop image tab. In this case do you still see the color shift?

-louie

Louie,
'
I took another photo that I made no changes to whatsoever, opened it in Lightroom and then used Ctrl-E to open it in PS. The sky does not start out as blue as the other samples I sent, but you can see that the PS tower is a little yellower and the sky a little whiter in the PS version. One note that should make no impact but I am adding just in case: When I transferred the photos for this trip to Lightroom from my SD card, I must have set something somehow, as every photo got saved with a custom temp of 5500, exposure +.28, contrast +.24 and vibrance +6. As I did not edit this photo, those remain the lightroom settings for the attached. However, in the other images, I first reset the basic settings before the complete editing shown.

 

[howdego]

I performed the contl.-S command but I did not see where the xmp was saved. So, I just copied the RAW image and the XMP file from the windows folder and attached them to an email. I also attached a snip of the raw and PSD images as they appear in LR. Are you able to see all ok?


Howdego

OOPS! I see that you gave me a www address instead of an email address. wetransfer is not a valid email address, apparently. Do you want me to use the contact us link on the site?