Is my monitor profile being used correctly in Photoshop and Lightroom?

[Goodland]

Hi all,
Today i stumbled upon something that puzzled me.  I have a 24" imac which i've been calibrating with Color Vision's Spyder 2.  I've never had stellar results with matching my photos on my imac to my prints with my epson r1800, yet, through trial and error i've been able to eek out a decent workflow for printing.  I had an image open in photoshop today and was scrolling through some of my previous monitor profiles (System Preferences\ Displays\ Color) to see the effects they have.  In doing this i noticed a profile that was made about a year ago which made the photo on my screen match its print very closely.  However, after choosing this as my monitor profile in system preferences and then clicking back into photoshop the image colors and brightness changed...almost back to what it had been before choosing a different monitor profile.  i went back and tested this with other profiles and they all did a similar thing.  However, it seems my desktop wallpaper is affected by changing the profile.  

I'm pretty sure my preferences are set up correctly in photoshop and lightroom.  Do these programs just kind of take your monitor profile and interpret them along with adobe, prophoto rgb to provide you with a workspace?  I was really stoked when i saw my photo match its print so closely when scrolling through profiles in system preferences, is there anyway for photoshop and lightroom to see it that way?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.    Thanks!

[Desmond]

The monitor of iMac before the latest led backlit version are far too bright. My 24" when set to lowest brightness is about 230-240 cdm. What you need is around 120 (depend on you viewing condition) for softproofing. Print will be darker than you see from than the monitor. If your problem is dark print this is the reason and you need another monitor. If your prints show color shift, may be other problem.

[Goodland]

The monitor of iMac before the latest led backlit version are far too bright. My 24" when set to lowest brightness is about 230-240 cdm. What you need is around 120 (depend on you viewing condition) for softproofing. Print will be darker than you see from than the monitor. If your problem is dark print this is the reason and you need another monitor. If your prints show color shift, may be other problem.

I understand this.  I just noticed that, for example: if you open an image in photoshop, then open system preferences / displays / color and scroll through different monitor profiles the image in photoshop changes color, brightness, ect. depending on the profile.  Well if i then, after choosing a profile, click on the image to get back into photoshop, it changes and looks different than it did when i was scrolling through monitor profiles in system preferences.  

Is this what happens for others?  Is photoshop supposed to do this?

[Desmond]

Yes, I tried and your result is repeatable on my iMac. I guess it is due to when we switch on the display preference panel, it is still running on the original profile, the preview of the new profile is achieved by another layer of conversion as a simulation. It is not going through the same CCM routine and the simulation is not accurate.

[SteepTrails]

I understand this.  I just noticed that, for example: if you open an image in photoshop, then open system preferences / displays / color and scroll through different monitor profiles the image in photoshop changes color, brightness, ect. depending on the profile.  Well if i then, after choosing a profile, click on the image to get back into photoshop, it changes and looks different than it did when i was scrolling through monitor profiles in system preferences.  

Is this what happens for others?  Is photoshop supposed to do this?

Are you seeing any differences between Lightroom and Photoshop?  Just last night I noticed a problem when switching between the two programs (it was late last  and I haven't tried trouble shooting it yet); I'm using the NC 2690 cailbrated with SV2...  I noticed the color was suddenly over-saturated when viewing images in LR2, but when I opened the same images in PS CS4 the color was fine.  I'd seen this over-saturated shift in LR2  before and just re-calilbrated the monitor, fixing the problem.  But this was the first time I noticed a difference when switching between to two programs.  So I'm wondering if what you're experiencing is related to what I saw?  I'm not going to be able to do the trouble shooting until late this evening, so I'll check back in late tonight or tomorrow.

Thanks for any feedback.