I finally got a grasp of how to manage colours in photoshop. For those of you who are new to it, basically it's all about making sure colours appear as they should on my computer screen so that after I do my editing on a picture, colours show up properly on my final print from my printer and, when I post the picture on the web, shows up properly on your computer monitor. Ever wonder why after you post pictures on the web they look washed out and just plain bland? Read on...
In photoshop, keep your working colour space as Adobe (1998)!! That's it! Easy!
If you're going to post the image to to the web, once you're done editing, the final step should be convert to sRGB. Most web browsers are unaware of colour space so any picture left in Adobe (1998) shows up washed out. Adobe (1998) has a wider colour gamut then sRGB so you still want to make sure your original pics are in Adobe (1998) to retain all that colour depth. Of course for the colours to show up properly during processing in photoshop you'll need to have your monitor calibrated properly. (I got a used calibration system for $100 to do this).
If you're going to print your picture, leave it as Adobe (1998), get a colour profile for your printer/paper combo and use that. Adobe (1998) has a colour gamut wide enough for most printers so leave it there.
Simple stuff.....amazing what you can learn from the internet. See below for example pictures of what I'm talking about. Both pictures are the same photo with the same colours. One was left as Adobe 1998 and the other I converted to sRGB before saving. Open them in new windows side by side and the differences will really stand out.
On another note, I've made it my goal to make my own personal website by the end of the summer.
If all goes as planned, I'll do it all myself from scratch and it'll include a flash intro and definitely an image gallery.
I'm currently learning:
Dreamweaver
Fireworks
Flash
Photoshop (I know it, but always learning!)
I'm enjoying learning this stuff! Taking the picture is only half the battle, knowing what to do with it after is a whole different story.
Monday, March 06, 2006
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