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Washed Out JPEGs

mbrant
Greetings,

I'm using Capture One LE version 3.7.4.179 to process raw files from my Canon EOS 20D.

I find that the resulting JPEGs from the conversion are universally darker and more washed out (less color saturation) than the inputs. I've tried to compensate for this by 'overexposing' the pictures in the exposure tab and increasing the color saturation, but then I'm really just guessing at the outputs - the resulting images in Capture One are really harsh. I don't think it is a stretch to say that I expect the output image to look like it does within Capture One.

I have to believe that I have some incorrect settings or I'm doing something wrong - I can't believe this is the way it is supposed to work.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
-Mike
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Comments

7 comments

Date Votes
  • littlemike
    Hi Mike,

    What are your settings are in Workflow > Show Color Management Settings?

    And on the Process tab, what do you have selected in the "Color management workflow" box?

    -- mike elliott
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  • mbrant
    Hi Mike,

    Thanks for helping.

    Here are the settings you requested:

    Workflow > Show Color Management Settings:

    Camera Product: Canon EOS 20D
    Camera Profile: Canon EOS 20D Generic
    Output Destination (Working Space): sRGB IEC61966-2.1
    Web Destination: sRGB IEC61966-2.1
    Monitor Profile: ColorPlus Profile.icm

    Process Tab>Color Management Workflow: Embed Camera Profile

    -Mike
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  • Christopher
    [quote="mbrant" wrote:
    Process Tab>Color Management Workflow: Embed Camera Profile

    There's your problem. The color gamut for the 20D is HUGE. So big that the profile causes any color represented in the file to be multipled several times when being decoded by an ICC aware application. The problem comes when you view the image with a program that does not use color profiles. The values stored in the file don't get scaled upward and everything looks very dull.

    So two options: Use a color managed application for opening the output when embedding the camera's profile. Or use sRGB which fits nicely in the 8-bit RGB space, and requires no scaling.

    An additional note: when embedding the camera's profile only 16-bit TIFFs should be used as the file destination. Color banding can result if there are only 8-bits of data with which to work. Modern DSLRs have a color gamut larger than even AdobeRGB. You should look at using Kodak's Pro Photo RGB as the working space in your image editing software.
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  • mbrant
    Thanks Christopher,

    I'll try changing the output to sRGB. I'm sharing the photos and I can't control what programs others are using to view them. This seems like the best solution.

    I've read in other posts that there are third parties that are selling custom camera profiles. Is this something, in your opinion that is worth pursuing?

    -Mike
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  • mbrant
    Christopher,

    One more question. You state that I could 'fix' the problem by switching the output to sRGB. If I go to the process tab > Color Management workflow drop down, my choices are:

    - Convert to Destination
    - Embed Camera Profile
    - Convert to Generic Grayscale
    - Convert to Web Destination

    Am I correct in assuming that "Convert to Destination" is what I should choose?

    -Mike
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  • Christopher
    Have a look at your settings post. The profile selected at the "Output Destination (Working Space)" will be the color gamut applied when "Convert to Destination" is chosen. And the "Web Destination" is the "Web Destination" 😊

    The default for the Output Destination is Adobe RGB, and Web Destination is sRGB.

    You are correct that sRGB is what programs that don't understand color profiles expect.

    As for using camera profiles that others have made. It seems many people are happy with the results they've gotten with third party profiles. I think the profile for the 30D (the camera I currently use) that is included with Capture One does an incredible job and producing wonderful looking images. Does it produce accurate colors? I don't know. But it does produce pleasing colors.

    I mentioned a rather inexpensive way of creating your own profiles in the "Creating Camera Profile?" thread: http://forum.phaseone.com/viewtopic.php?t=2625
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  • mbrant
    Thanks again, Christopher.
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