Hi Bruce Banner
Thanks for the additional video. You actually touch on a variety of topics in the video which would be worth exploring such as I think that there several separate topics i.e. color space, bit depth, and file format are talked about in ways that makes me think that they are strongly coupled to each other. The topic of 16 bit and 8 bit is to the first order independent of using TIFF vs JPEG (other than JPEG only supports 8 bit).
However, the key topic I think should be focused on is the difference in what your eyes are seeing on your screen between two side by side images that other than soft proofing adjustments would be identical. If we can get to root cause on your issue then it could be productive to move on to other topics (just using the divide and conquer approach)
Note that since I do not have your monitor (or even a wide gamut monitor) what I see by its nature could be different and I am trying to take that into account. Note that observations of color differences could be related to a number of factors in the color management pipeline from hardware, software, and including your eyes (optical illusion).
I want to first rule out a couple factors such as potential issues with your monitor and also optical illusion. The reason I want to focus on that is you are seeing color differences in areas that are not even targeted as being out of gamut in your original. To the first order, that should not happen especially if you are using "relative" intent. Yet you are seeing differences. On my screen (albeit not a wide gamut monitor), I did not see any differences between the two images per se. I even took your video image, overlayed the left and right images and used the difference blend and it also showed that there was no significant difference. That is not conclusive because you went through video software and that was viewed on my computer.
Sooooo, here is what I want you to try out and will only focus on Lightroom
1) In the soft proof panel download the ProPhoto RGB profile and select that profile for soft proofing. Also use relative intent when soft proofing to ProPhoto RGB. When soft proofing to the same profile as the color space of the original image should not produce any shift in color.
Follow the same steps you did before in viewing the original and proof side by side for differences. If you see perceived differences (and there should be none), they we are dealing with a much narrowed space of issues. Those could include a software bug, hardware display issue, or optical illusion (many sources). Please report on what you see and look for any differences between any part of the two images using different magnifications.
2) This next test is to try and help rule of software proofing issues.
- Create a separate test image to make these changes in Lightroom (easiest is to create a virtual copy)
- Make sure soft proofing is turned off
- Hold down the shift key in the Develop Module and in the lower right corner click the button that says "Reset (Adobe)". This will reset all Lightroom settings for this image
- Click on the icon that brings up the side by side Before and After screen. These should be identical because you are viewing an image with zero adjustments
- Do you see any differences in the left image and the right image? If you do, we can rule out soft proofing issues and this would further narrow down the problem
3) Third test
- Using this Virtual copy, create yet another virtual copy
- Go to the Library module and set the display (and zoom if needed) to view the first virtual copy with the second virtual copy side by side.
- Do you see any differences between the two images? There should be none
- This test eliminates any software issues in using the before/after viewing in the Develp module. Note that in the Library module all images are viewed in Adobe RGB yet both images should be treated the same. There should be no differences
Please report on the above experiments. This will help narrow down where to focus the differences that you see. If you need more details or images of what I am requesting in 1,2, or 3 just let me know.
John Wheeler
