Re: Me = Failing at getting colour management to work :(

[Pascal de Bruijn <pmjdebruijn pcode nl>]

On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 9:32 PM, Anthony Batchelor <tony ynottony net> wrote:
> Hi all,
>  I've been trying to get colour management to work for a while now (on
> and off for a couple of months) and am having pretty bad results.
>
> ATM, I'm just concerned with getting things looking correct and
> consistent on the screen, and in the future will also be setting up a
> printer and a scanner.
>
> My monitor is an LG M227WD, for which I have the supplied colour
> profile.  The software I am trying to use is:
>      * Gnome Colour Manager: 2.30
>      * Gimp: 2.6.10
>              * with UFraw: 0.16
>      * Shotwell: 0.7.2
>      * rawstudio: 1.2
>
> In GCM, I have my monitor set to use the supplied M227WD.icm file and
> have set this as the system default.  The working space RGB is sRGB
> IEC61996-2.1 and the CMYK is Fogra27L CMYK Coated Press.  Rendering
> intent are both set to Perceptual.  Apply display correction and Set
> profile for colour managed applications are both checked.

Well first, you need "special" settings on your monitor for the
included ICC to be valid at all... Often this is just default
settings, other read the README included with the ICC, or your
display's manual.

Please beware, and the ICC included with your screen is very likely
not really accurate, it's just better than nothing... nothing else :)

> Whenever I try to load an image into these programs, the colours are
> different in each of them.  Also, on some photos, the colours seem very
> different from how they appear on my cameras screen (and how they looked
> in real life).
>
> Is there something I'm doing wrong?  How do I set it up correctly?  I
> can't find any web site that goes into the details of setting up colour
> profiles correctly and setting up all the usual apps to use them.

Well first, not all applications are color managed by default, GIMP
for example has it disabled by default. So make sure you check the
application settings. GCM only supplies defaults to the applications
as far as they honor them.

Second, when processing RAW images, the RAW processor has built in
color profiles (color matrices) which were usually calculated by Adobe
for your camera. And the color transforms Canon or Nikon do, are
proprietary.

Regards,
Pascal de Bruijn