color settings across adobe products has gotten messed up

[kevins28332196]

I noticed this the other day when viewing a pdf file in acrobat. The colors had shifted, see attached pictures. I tried fixing the problem in acrobat and couldn't figure it out so I uninstalled acrobat. Now I am viewing pdf's in chrome and everything looks fine.

Yesterday I ran in to the same problem in Photoshop. Any image I open in photoshop, the colors are shifted. It even looks correct in photoshops preview window, but when I open the file, the colors shift.

I had adobe support connect to my computer. They spent 30+ minutes trying to figure it out and did not really seem like they could figure it out either. So everything is still messed up. I even checked it in bridge and Lightroom and all the colors shifted.

I have uninstalled everything and ran creative cloud cleaner and reinstalled and I am still getting the same results. It is only happening in Adobe products.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Photoshop CC 2017

Windows 10

The top image is in the Photoshop preview area and the second image is when opened in Photoshop. The last image is the pdf, the red should be similar to the first image.

Thanks,

Kevin

[KanikaS]

Moving to Photoshop General Discussion​

[D Fosse]

That's most likely a broken display profile, probably one distributed through Windows Update.

This will only affect color managed applications that actually use the profile.

Do you have a calibrator? If you do, rerun it to make a new profile. If not, use sRGB IEC61966-2.1. You set this up in Windows Color Management. Relaunch the applications when done, they need to load the profile at startup.

[kevins28332196]

That is the profile I have as my default. I don't have a calibrator.

[jbm007]

If you do not have a color calibration hardware the set up your windows color management as Fosse has suggested.

[kevins28332196]

So since that already is my default color profile in windows and photoshop what should I do next?

[carolg39423085]

Hi, this is exactly what I'm experiencing and I just did windows updates. So these updates can actually mess up the color profile I had set? I'm a photographer and all of a sudden when I open my exported jpeg files to edit in any adobe program the color is weird with greenish dark or purple shadows and a weird matted look for example in hair. These same images are fine in windows preview and my Pixieset program on line etc. they change in adobe programs only. I haven't change any settings in my camera or those programs...  any other suggestions or is looking at the profiles the best first step? I have examples of the issue also. Thanks so much I have been ruling things out and searching for an answer, was thinking graphics card or monitor but my tech thought unlikely. Should I uninstall the last updates or manually check the profile and change it if it's incorrect?

[D Fosse · Accepted solution]

Simple checklist that covers all color management problems:

• Does the file have an embedded profile, and is the profile the correct one?
• Do you have a monitor profile that correctly describes the monitor's actual response, and is it correctly loaded by the application?
• Are you viewing in a color managed application that reads both these profiles and correctly converts from one into the other?

The fact is that if you can check these three, the file will display correctly. It has to.

The most common things that can go wrong are:

• The file is untagged, or viewed without color management. Makes a big difference with a wide gamut display, including iMac DCI-P3.
• The display profile is defective, or partially defective. Some conversions may work, and others fail.
• The application loads the wrong display profile in a multi-display setup. Most often seen in Mac OS.
• The GPU scr*ws up the conversion. Turn it off.
• The user tries to correct color problems by blindly fiddling with Color Settings. A recipe for disaster. Leave everything at defaults.

I'm pretty sure the answer is in one of the above.

[Eternal Warrior]

+1.

Fantastic answer @D_Fosse!

[Tagging doesn't seem to be working atm]

[D Fosse]

Thank you. Color management in a nutshell. Who said it was difficult?

[kevins28332196]

Thanks for all the help. I tracked it down and it seems to be fixed.

In windows color management, under the main "devices" tab it showed the correct profile. But under the "advanced" tab it had one of my print profiles selected for the device profile. I changed that back to the correct profile and everything is working.

Thanks,

Kevin

[D Fosse]

OK. The "Advanced " tab sets general policies and should never be touched. There is nothing there that ever needs to be changed.

The system default display profile is set in the "Devices" tab. The profile listed here is the one Photoshop and other color managed applications will use, and this is where you go when you need to replace a broken or suspect display profile.