LR4.1 to Photoshop 5.1 strong green cast in the Photoshop saved tifs in LR4.1

[BrianWoolf]

Recently upgraded to Lightroom 4.1, using it with Photoshop 5.1 on a newer IMac. I photograph badges, police, fire and security, a few times a year and LR works very well for this, for the past few years.

In LR 4.1 and photoshop, I am getting a strong green/cyan cast on the tiff files that are going back into LR and I have no idea where this is coming from. Never had this problem in LR2.5 and LR3.5/6.

After getting all the badges photographed, a 3 shot bracket, plus multiple brackets to solve problems. In LR 4., I  made a new user preset for "process 2012/LR4.1" and began to process the files. I choose the best file of the first badge and sent it into photoshop, from my new user preset. In photoshop, I straighten the perspective and make sure the badge is perfectly straight and save it as a tiff, with it's correct badge #. I have made no color corrections at this point. I then go back to LR4.1 for the next badge. The new tiff file is right next to the raw file that I chose , but it now has a horrible green cast!!!!  This file looked fine in LR4.1 when exporting and fine in photoshop when saved as a tiff.

So where is the problem coming from - LR4.1 or Photoshop? I began by using LR4.1 default colorspace ProPhoto, could this be the problem. I did switch somewhere in the middle back to the Adobe RGB 1998 colorspace, that I used all the time, and this improved things a bit. I doubt that LR4.1 would be applying the preset to the tiff file again and if it did the preset should make the gold in the badge golder, yellower not green.
One of the things I wanted to achieve, is to print contact sheets of the badges, using the tiffs, from LR4.1. After doing more work on the badges in Photoshop and saving them. I do get reasonable color contact sheets from LR4.1, but there is still some green cast in the golds.

Any Ideas or help is appreciated,
Thanks in advance,
Brian Woolf

[madmanchan]

What happens if you press the "Reset" button for the tiff in Lr?  (e.g., in Develop).  Does the cast go away?

Eric

[BrianWoolf]

Eric,
   Thanks for the lead, I did try the reset button and it seemed to work, but on closer inspection problems. It did get rid of the green cast but left the badge looking a dull, dirty gold or yellow. On a hunch, I exited LR and opened PS/CS5.1 and opened the badge file that LR just adjusted. It was a dirty, dull yellow just like in LR but this was the final stage 3 tiff, with all the color corrections, which were now gone. I closed the file and did not save it, went back to LR and un-did the reset button, restoring the odd color. Exited LR and back into PS and open that file again. The colors were now correct. That was scary.

   Here is a screen grab from LR4.1, showing the problem. The three smaller files are the raw files, shot with a 12 megapixel Nikon D300. They are rather dense and reddish because I made the tactical error of choosing the Gamma to be 2.2 when I set up and calibrated my new computer a month ago. Being a Mac user since 1991, I always used Gamma1.8 and all the previous badges were done with that gamma. After doing all the photography past this past saturday, I took a look at some of the old badge files and found them quite washed out. Since I match new badges to old to get matching color, I re-calibrated to Gamma 1.8, so all the new raw files are a bit dense and rather reddish. So far I am unable to get the good gold I want using LR's controls but they didn't look this bad (the raw files) when I did them using gamma 2.2
   On the lower right is a badge, 1st stage, with no color corrections made, just saved with the badge number and it has the  horrible green cast. The other two large badge are finals, stage 3, all corrections made including color corrections. They still have a green flavor to them and print slightly off color as contact sheets from LR.

   The solution is not to use ProPhoto rgb colorspace but rather the old Adobe rgb 1998. With everything in Adobe rgb space, I sent a badge file to photoshop and then saved it as a tiff, back in LR and the colors match. On saturday, when I was finishing the badges, I did not close and reopen LR when I changed it to Adobe rgb 1998, so it was probably still using ProPhoto rgb.

   Just to explain my stages after shooting the badges and importing them into LR4.1:
Stage 1 - exporting the raw files from LR into PS and saving them with the badge number
Stage 2 - sizing the files to 100% of actual size
Stage 3 - doing the color corrections, matching color to previous badges, this is the final stage

By the way, I do have all the LuLa LR videos 2.5, 3 and now 4, never saw anything like this on them but I could have missed something.
Thanks, Brian

[Nigel Johnson]

They are rather dense and reddish because I made the tactical error of choosing the Gamma to be 2.2 when I set up and calibrated my new computer a month ago. Being a Mac user since 1991, I always used Gamma1.8 and all the previous badges were done with that gamma. After doing all the photography past this past saturday, I took a look at some of the old badge files and found them quite washed out. Since I match new badges to old to get matching color, I re-calibrated to Gamma 1.8, so all the new raw files are a bit dense and rather reddish. So far I am unable to get the good gold I want using LR's controls but they didn't look this bad (the raw files) when I did them using gamma 2.2

Brian,

There is definitely something wrong with your system. When viewed in a colour managed program such as Lightroom or Photoshop the images should look identical whether you calibrate your system using gamma 1.8 or 2.2 as the colour management system will adjust the displayed image to compensate for the different display settings. In addition the gamma setting should not affect the colour, only the tone of the image.

This colour management problem needs to be sorted out first before attempting to find out what other problems you have, if indeed correcting your colour management problems does not solve them.

Can you please say which OS version you are using and what software/hardware you use for calibrating your display. This could help track down why your system is not correctly using the display profile.

Regards,
Nigel.

[BrianWoolf]

Nigel,
   Thanks for your help/advice. Will be glad to give you my specs. I am running a 2.75 GHz intel core i5, 21.5" Imac with 16 gigs of ram and Mac OS Lion 10.7.2. I have a second monitor hooked to the Imac for better color, an older 20" Apple Cinema Display. For calibration I use a Datacolor Spyder3Pro unit.

   I do not claim to know everything and am often surprised by how much there is to know and what I don't know but I would have to disagree with you that i have problems with my system. I would agree that there is a potential problem with LR4.1 and ProPhoto RGB colorspace, in my case.
   I have solved my problems by not using ProPhoto RGB colorspace and going back to my old standard Adobe RGB 1998, in both LR and PS. With Adobe RGB 1998, the colors in LR and PS now match accurately and I can go back and forth as much as i want with no color problems. I am photographing these badges for internet use, file use and later to be printed in a catalog, so rgb colorspace and later cmyk colorspace are what is needed.

   Also, I work as a photographer for a small printing company and we print catalogs and everything from postcards to posters on the premises. I am one of the people responsible for the quality and color accuracy of our printed product, so I do know the basics of color management but I would not claim to be an top of the line expert.

   I do appreciate your trying to help and I would gladly take a look at anything you might suggest.

Thanks, Brian