alternative workspaces and profiles....

I've read a bit before about Joseph Holmes workspaces/chroma variants (profiles) but spent a bit more time reading about them http://www.josephholmes.com/profiles.html and wonder if anyone here is using them or has used them.

Diane

once i started using DxO for processing selected images i got hooked on his chrome 100 space. i then added dcam3 to that. and finally, since my bulk workflow for my 5d raw files is c1 with magne's profiles to jpg i got his adobe rgb spaces as well. i shoot mostly nature and landscapes and love the deep rich color i can get with them, especially the chrome and the dcam3. i was spending time in the hue and saturation adjustment layers in ps fine tuning and fiddling, but now i use the included profiles to speed up my workflow. i could probably live with just one of those 2, the chrome because i had it first, but i was curious about the new ones. i like having the adobe because then the vast majority of my stuff is available to it in ps.

Marian,

I really like what you are describing and it appears to have considerable value to your work. Are these Magne 5D profiles?

Asher

I've used the original Ekta space and the Chrome 100.

Ditto everything Marian said above. The HSB based saturation tool on photoshop was intended more for graphics and signage than photography. So as one increases saturation there is a hue shift as well. The Chrome and other new spaces eliminate this. And it is easy to work with them.

I find they are a huge benefit for landscape/gardenshots as these tend to respond better to a significant (20% or more) increase in saturation than a building or portrait. A 4, 8 or 12 percent change can make a huge difference in a portrait.

Well worth the money.

Stephen

www.stephenpace.com

Asher,

No, these are working colorspaces like prophoto or adobe RGB. See my post above.

I think Alain Briot has written about these as well.

Stephen

It's about what Margulis calls 'false profiles'.

You'll find Alain's article about J. Holmes Chrome 100 here: http://www.outbackphoto.com/workflow/wf_87/essay.html

I have Chrome 100, DCam4, aRGB Chroma Variant Set, ProPhoto Chroma Variant Set.
All of Holmes' profiles include a proprietary 1024-point TRC, that according to Joseph is "very carefully designed to match the tonality of perceptually linear printers".
More info here http://www.josephholmes.com/propages/SpacesandSets.html

Stephen has put into words what i was trying to express...that shifts in hue follow increasing saturation in ps. so all my fiddling was both time consuming and frustrating. i highly recommend reading the links Herman posted, the several pages devoted to this on the joseph holmes web site, and alain's outback article. my conversion happened as i was working on a series of sea lavender shots and was having trouble getting the colors in them to take possession of the composition visually. i processed a shot in DxO and sent it to tiff with a chrome 100 working space. then i took that file into ps and assigned a +20 chroma variant (part of the set you get with each space). just opening it in ps was a treat for my eyes, and i was even more excited when i added the variant! it made the shot work for me.
and, like Stephen, i find that landscapes usually can take 20% or more but portraits and people need much less. and not every shot needs or even benefits from this. just today i tried it on a shot, and it did nothing. so very much shot-dependent.
as to Asher's question about my workflow...my bulk quick first-pass of processing from raw is done in c1 using magne's 5d profiles, and converting them to adobe rgb workspace, as i had done before, but now if desired i can open them in ps and quickly assign the adobe variant profile to increase saturation. at this point i might see some that i think could benefit from reprocessing in DxO (or c1) to chrome 100 or dcam3, and these are redone.

You assign the variant profile, not convert to it?

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net

Nill Toulme said:

You assign the variant profile, not convert to it?

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net

Click to expand...

You let the RC convert to the base version of the profile, and you adjust saturation by assigning chroma variant profiles.

Herman

joseph holmes' instructions on his web pages are very clear on this process, convert to the base version, then assign the variant. of course, if it's going onto the web for instance, you will ultimately convert to srgb as usual. but since the real goal of these profiles is the print there is no need to convert again, at least for me printing from photoshop. they display correctly in photo mechanic (my browser of choice). if i'm sending it on to a client however, i usually convert the final image to straight a-rgb because some alternate viewing programs can't deal with the chroma variant profile.

This all sounds very intriguing, but $85 is kind of stiff for experimentation. Could y'all post some examples of what you're accomplishing with it?

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net

Take a look at www.hutchcolor.com

They have 4 or 5 free colourspaces available for download and they all serve a specific purpose.

I think the key is to use a colourspace which has a wide enough gamut to to prevent clipping at capture / conversion stage. So absolute colour matching is maintained.
If for instance you shoot in sRGB, moving to a wider colourspace will serve little benefit. Whereas using high end drum scanner to capture ektachrome would. Although saying this if you merge images in 32bit land for HDR then I suspect having a wider working colorspace would be useful.

If you get the chance download the excel spreadsheet that is provided. It shows the phosphor co-ordinates and whitepoints of various colorspaces and you can compare them against each other.

Its an interesting topic as i've just spent this evening playing with a new toy, a spectrocolorimeter for printer profiling. What a difference its making to my Lyson CIS on Ilford Gallerie paper.

What I'm trying to do (self learning perspective) is to visualise and overlay various colourspaces e.g. custom dSLR profiles, printer profiles and workspaces (Adobe and those above) in a gamut viewer and see where gamut clipping will force pereptual and relative colormetric conversions.

Its fascinating stuff and a little sad, but being in the northern hemisphere this time of year there isn't much light around after 4:00pm )

Yeh, John,

But it was a nice sunny day today, at least in the sun. I think I may have to look at this, if I decide to fire up my printer again.

Best wishes,

Ray

> What I'm trying to do (self learning perspective) is to visualise and overlay various colourspaces e.g. custom dSLR profiles, printer profiles and workspaces (Adobe and those above) in a gamut viewer and see where gamut clipping will force pereptual and relative colormetric conversions.

You might want to take a look at Norman Koren's Gamutvision http://www.gamutvision.com/. I'm a long time ColorThink user but I find Gamutvision pretty impressive. I've been testdriving Gamutvision when it was still in beta.

It currently uses LittleCMS as its CMM, but we might see the new Adobe CMM incorporated in the future http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/cmm/.

There's an article on Gamutvision on LL http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/accessories/fancy_graphics.shtml

> Although saying this if you merge images in 32bit land for HDR then I suspect having a wider working colorspace would be useful.

If you mean a wider working space just because of 32-bits HDR images, NO.

See the reply from Geraldine Joffre from hdrsoft/Photomatix here: http://www.outbackphoto.com/tforum/viewtopic.php?TopicID=2076

Nill Toulme said:

This all sounds very intriguing, but $85 is kind of stiff for experimentation. Could y'all post some examples of what you're accomplishing with it?

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net

Click to expand...

it is my hope to put some type of a demo together in the upcoming days. my current plan is to process an image in c1 and convert it to 3 color spaces (a-rgb, chrome 100, dcam3). a second step would then show these images with chroma variants assigned (ie., a-rgb +20, chrome 100 + 20, and dcam3 +20). i'll start a new thread with it, and leave word back here when it is up.

[/QUOTE]as to Asher's question about my workflow...my bulk quick first-pass of processing from raw is done in c1 using magne's 5d profiles, and converting them to adobe rgb workspace, as i had done before, but now if desired i can open them in ps and quickly assign the adobe variant profile to increase saturation. at this point i might see some that i think could benefit from reprocessing in DxO (or c1) to chrome 100 or dcam3, and these are redone.[/QUOTE]




Ooohh. I missed the mention of Magne's profiles. I thought Asher's question was about the Holmes spaces. Bad photohrapher, bad photographer.

Magne's profiles are great and I use them as well. Does anyone see a large difference between the C One generic 5D profile and the ones from Magne? For me, the difference both in color and highlight/shadow clipping is much less than the with the 1D II or 20D. Just wondering.

Stephen

.............

Magne's profiles are great and I use them as well. Does anyone see a large difference between the C One generic 5D profile and the ones from Magne? For me, the difference both in color and highlight/shadow clipping is much less than the with the 1D II or 20D. Just wondering.

Stephen[/QUOTE]

Thanks Stephen!

My question refers to the profile itself. Is this the generic camera profile for C1 your purchase from Michael Tapes at RawWorkFlow.com?

IOW, where do you profiles come from?

Asher

Asher Kelman said:

.............

Magne's profiles are great and I use them as well. Does anyone see a large difference between the C One generic 5D profile and the ones from Magne? For me, the difference both in color and highlight/shadow clipping is much less than the with the 1D II or 20D. Just wondering.

Stephen

Click to expand...

Thanks Stephen!

My question refers to the profile itself. Is this the generic camera profile for C1 your purchase from Michael Tapes at RawWorkFlow.com?

IOW, where do you profiles come from?

Asher[/QUOTE]

speaking for myself (but maybe Stephen as well) i use the profiles that Magne sells at his ETC site, not the generic 5d ones that come with c1. and i believe Magne has thoughts of redoing the 5d profiles (not that he'll probably have the time!), but i could be mistaken in that...

I also use Magne's profiles in C1---and have had them for all my camera bodies for several years. I much prefer them. I also use them (in a different package) for my now 'dead in the water' RSP. Magne's profiles make a good bit of difference for me--esp. reds and greens. This is one reason I doubt I'll be happy with LR--though, supposedly, one can 'calibrate' your camera.

I am still interested in trying Joseph's system though.

Diane

Marian Howell said:

it is my hope to put some type of a demo together in the upcoming days. my current plan is to process an image in c1 and convert it to 3 color spaces (a-rgb, chrome 100, dcam3). a second step would then show these images with chroma variants assigned (ie., a-rgb +20, chrome 100 + 20, and dcam3 +20). i'll start a new thread with it, and leave word back here when it is up.

Click to expand...

That would be very helpful Marion. I agree with Nill---its a bit steep to experiment (though I have done worse before LOL).

Diane

Asher

Ditto what Marian said again. I purchased them (Magne's Profiles) from either Michael or Magne directly. I find the Generic Capture One profile quite lacking. Magne's profiles and C1 is the best color combination I've found for my work. Add Joe Holmes' colorspaces and it is even better.

Here is a quick comparison for those interested. I don't have time to do a step by step, but it gives a good idea of what the steps I use can do. I think the saturated version may be too much but I wanted to use the +20% to show a significant difference. It does show how little a hue shift happens tho. IIRC the current offerings are completly hue shift free. The ones I am using in this example may have a very slight shift in some color groups (for those with better eyes than mine).

http://www.stephenpace.com/commercial.php Is the page on my site.

Stephen

well i made a stab at showing what these work spaces can do on a new thread
examples are posted.