Adobe Photoshop CS5 for Photographers - Martin Evening [281]
Incorrect sRGB profile tags
Some digital cameras won't embed a profile in the JPEG capture files or worse still, embed a wrong profile, yet the EXIF metadata will misleadingly say the file is in sRGB color mode. The danger here is that while you may select Adobe RGB as the RGB space for your camera, when shooting in JPEG mode the camera may inadvertently omit to alter the EXIF tag which stubbornly reads sRGB.
This can be resolved by going to the Photoshop menu and choosing: Preferences File Handling… If you check the ‘Ignore EXIF Profile tag’ option, Photoshop always ignores the specified camera profile in the EXIF metadata and only relies on the actual profile (where present) when determining the color space the data should be in.
Profile mismatches when pasting
One problem with having images in multiple color spaces open at once concerns the copying and pasting of color data from one file to another. Whenever you copy and paste image data, or drag copy an image with the move tool, it is possible that a profile mismatch may occur; although this will very much depend on how you have the Color Management policies configured in the Color Settings (see Figure 12.26). If the Profile Mismatches: Ask When Pasting box is unchecked in the Color Settings and a profile mismatch occurs, you will see the dialog shown in Figure 12.27. This asks if you wish to convert the color data to preserve the color appearance when it is pasted into the new destination document. If the Profile Mismatches: Ask When Pasting box is checked in the Color Settings, then you will see instead the dialog box shown in Figure 12.28. This dialog offers you the choice to convert or not convert the data. If you select ‘Convert’, the appearance of the colors will be maintained when you paste the data and if you choose ‘Don't Convert’ the color appearance will change but the numbers will be preserved.
Figure 12.26 The Profile Mismatches settings in the Color Management section of the Color Settings dialog will influence Profile Mismatch behavior.
Figure 12.27 If you attempt to paste image data from a document whose color space does not match the destination space (and the Profile Mismatches: Ask When Pasting box is unchecked), this dialog warning alerts you to a profile mismatch between the source and destination documents. If you click OK, Photoshop converts the data and preserves the color appearance of the image data.
Figure 12.28 If the Profile Mismatches: Ask When Pasting box is checked in the Color Settings dialog and you attempt to paste image data from a document whose color space does not match the destination space, this dialog warning gives you the option to ‘Convert’ the colors (as in Figure 12.27 above), or ‘Don't Convert’ and preserve the numbers instead.
Saving a Color Setting
If you have configured the settings to suit a particular workflow, you can click on the Save… button to save these as a custom setting that will appear in the Color Settings menu the next time you open this dialog. When you save a setting you can enter any relevant comments or notes about the setting you are saving in the text box (see Figure 12.29). This information will then appear in the Color Settings dialog text box at the bottom. You might name a setting something like ‘Client annual report settings’ and write a short descriptive note to accompany it, reminding you of situations where you would need to use this particular custom setting.
Figure 12.29 Custom color settings can be loaded or saved via the Color Settings dialog. The relevant folder will be located in the username/Library/Application Support/ Adobe/Color/Settings folder (Mac OS X) or Program Files/Common Files/Adobe/Color/ Settings folder (PC). When you save a custom setting it must be saved to this location and will automatically