When I export from Photoshop it becomes over saturated, why?

[northgarden]

So I can change the preview setting to legacy Macintosh (no color correction) and it becomes the same as shown in photoshop. But when I export it becomes over saturated. It's the same if I save for the web or regular save. I use sRGB for photoshop and the picture is sRGB. I have the newest MacBook pro. Any suggestions?

[Mylenium]

Lack of color management. That's all there is to say about this. You are using a color profile or have tweaked your settings to deviate from standard sRGB and are not telling PS about it by ways of establishing a manged environment. Conversely, things like 10bit color and wide-gamut monitors will always require CM. You have to do a bit of reading on the subject. there are no easy explanations. Typically a good start is to reset any customizations you may have made to your monitor settings and then take it from there...

Mylenium

[D Fosse]

Mylenium  wrote

there are no easy explanations

Repeating that is actually not helpful and only perpetuates the myth that color management is "difficult". It isn't. There are usually very simple and straightforward explanations for most, if not all, color management problems.

Instead of constructing imaginary walls, we should be helping people over the small initial hurdle.

[D Fosse]

You have a wide gamut display, and are viewing it in an outside application that doesn't support color management.

When you send sRGB numbers into a larger color space like a wide gamut display, without any color management remapping, the colors "balloon" outwards and cause oversaturation.

All wide gamut displays (including the recent Apple DCI-P3 displays), require full end-to-end color management to work as intended. Unfortunately the vendors (including Apple) never inform customers about this - probably because it could potentially hurt sales.

This means you must use color managed software only, and you must have a valid display profile on system level, for those applications to use. A calibrator will make that for you. The generic profile that comes with MacOS is just that - generic and roughly ballpark. Any adjustments you make to the screen will invalidate the profile.

[northgarden]

Thanks for the great answers! I understand now I should do color correction on my screen and I will do it. But for now, is there any way to just tell photoshop to match the colors outside of photoshop so I can get the same colors without over saturation? Does this mean everyone that run PS on their macs needs to buy a color correction tool to use PS? Why can't I just download the correct display profile? All the screens are the same..no?

[Benjamin Root]

northgarden  wrote

...is there any way to just tell photoshop to match the colors outside of photoshop so I can get the same colors without over saturation? ...

That's not something you'd want to do. Photoshop is a color managed application, therefore Photoshop will display colors correctly... (That is, as close to correct as your monitor is showing you, of course.).

The truth of the matter is this: If you edit images in Photoshop with a fully color manged system (the universal standard), you see correct color. In the same way, everyone else will see the color as close to correct as their system is to the standard. If, however, you edit to an incorrect view, you have just thrown in another variant, and, no matter what, the color will not be as intended. As a side note, any prints will be off, too.

...Does this mean everyone that run PS on their macs needs to buy a color correction tool to use PS?...

Need to? No. Should they? That would depend upon how serious the individual is about their work. Your average Joe, probably not. Any professional would do well to buy a hardware calibrator

...Why can't I just download the correct display profile? All the screens are the same..no?

Unfortunately, every monitor is different. This is especially true with mass production monitors. As Dag mentioned, the shipped monitor profiles are just a ball park. Not at all perfect. A color calibrator will create a tuned profile for your exact monitor.

Also keep in mind a monitor can change with age, so recalibrate periodically.

[northgarden]

If, however, you edit to an incorrect view, you have just thrown in another variant, and, no matter what, the color will not be as intended. As a side note, any prints will be off, too.

I just don't understand. If I bring the same picture I just exported (the over saturated one) back into PS it should go back to normal no? because it's a color managed space?  The color isn't a little over saturated its wayyy off. Is there any chance I have a setting in PS wrong?

[D Fosse]

northgarden  wrote

Why can't I just download the correct display profile?

You already have a display profile that is as good as anything you can download.

But if the application isn't color managed, it won't read the profile at all. It will just ignore all profiles and send the numbers straight through, without any correction. That's why I said you need to use color manged software only.

[northgarden]

hmm, if I open the over saturated jpeg that I just exported, into PS again where there is color management its still over saturated... How can that be since its color managed software?

[D Fosse · Accepted solution]

You've most likely stripped the profile, using Save For Web or Export. For some unfathomable reason this is still the default setting in both modules. You need to manually check "embed profile". A regular "save as" preserves the profile.

When you bring an untagged file (without profile) into Photoshop, the working space kicks in whatever it happens to be. If the file was created in a different color space than the working space, anything can happen.

As long as the profile is embedded, that will always override the working space (unless you've changed any color settings, which you should never do until you know what you're doing!).

Adobe's policies on this are strangely schizophrenic. The graphic applications have always been the industry standard in color management - but as soon as it comes to anything web-related, it's as if they never even heard about color management. Haven't they registered that most major web browsers have been color managed for ten years by now? It makes no sense.