The Merits of sRGB as "The Universal Color Standard"

After reading this page you may decide to have done with Color Management and ignore the subject altogether. This may be a perfectly reasonable position to take. That's because if you are happy with images in the sRGB color space, color is - in effect - pre-managed for you in many contexts.

Consider the following:

• The sRGB standard has been around for a long time.
• Most computer systems, applications and the Internet assume sRGB for images. For Internet distribution and display (as in a browser), sRGB is required and will be the standard for decades to come, even when all browsers become "color aware".
• By default, scanners, cameras and other image sources produce sRGB images with other image spaces (notably aRGB) available as an option which must be explicitly chosen.
• The vast majority of LCD monitors can render sRGB images but not aRGB or other larger color spaces.
• Printers are usually defaulted to sRGB.
• Image processing software such as Photoshop will initially expect sRGB
• Criticisms notwithstanding, sRGB delivers fine images. It's a good standard.
• sRGB makes for a very comfortable fit with 8 bits/channel images. aRGB and other large color spaces may require using 16 bits/channel. Your computer and software may not be able to handle these large image files.
• You don't need to splurge on an expensive, wide gamut monitor. Just about any old cheap monitor will be good enough.

The general rule for color managed workflow is that if your image was created in the "xRGB" workspace ("x" denoting any arbitrary color space), you stay in that workspace for processing it and then for displaying it (monitor or printer). If you are creating sRGB images, your system probably assumes this already or will require minimal adjustment to make it do so. Snap your photos, optimize them in Photoshop/Paintshop, etc. and print/post or whatever. For the most part, forget about color management.

Ken Rockwell pooh pooh's color management altogether as a waste of time. He shoots only JPG's, at 8 bits/channel (that's all JPG's support anyway) and enjoys the worry-free defaulted sRGB workflow from start to finish.

This may be for you, especially if you shoot mainly for the snapshot album or Internet. Just ensure everything in your system is set to expect sRGB. Choose this for your printer and make it the Color Workspace for your imaging package (Photoshop, let's say). It's probably set as a default anyway. Your camera came out of the box set to sRGB. You are good to go although you might want to do the following:

• Properly calibrate your monitor
• Adjust printer output brightness for best compatibility with the viewing environment. This is pretty much a trial-and-error step.

The Merits of Getting Involved

Why do color management?

This site is partly about craftsmanship in photography and how to produce the best possible results whether shooting for the photo album or for making exhibition prints. If you are fussy about image appearance you may notice some shortcomings with the above "sRGB approach".

• Some colors lacking vividness or saturation
• Color balance in prints may be somewhat off.
• Inadequate detail in both shadows and highlights
• Degraded appearance of images originally created in other color spaces (you will be having to deal with more and more of these in future).

Nit-picking? In some ways, but why not try taking advantage of the best technology has to offer? If you care about fine images you may find the extra effort worth it. Besides, color management is not that difficult. Once you have your system set up to go that route and understand some of the options you will need to exercise, it is almost as easy as using the old assumed standard - sRGB.

Deployment of color management is not a "cold turkey" choice. sRGB is a proper, formal color space standard. A fully color managed environment will deal correctly with sRGB images without any exception having to be made for them. In fact, that is part of what color management is all about ... moving images from anywhere to anywhere without changes to their appearance and with minimal manual intervention required.

Some color management is unavoidable. For example, most printers come with a large set of profiles each of which is unique to a particular paper. The printer has no idea what paper you load so it is necessary (for best results), to explicitly inform the printer drivers or printing application of which profile to use. Doing this is a manual color management step. A few printers are now able to read the paper type using something like a bar code on the back side and choose a profile for you but this capability has yet to be standardized and is uncommon.

Color managed environments are a benefit to everyone but especially to the discerning photographer wanting to put a bit of additional effort inot making the best of his talent and equipment.