PSP X6 Colour Management

[bananahead]

The purpose of this post is to document what happened with my case and to request that other people also report issues to Corel.

I am one of the people who found that PSP X6 has problems converting embedded colour spaces.

After some difficulties I eventually got a case number which meant that I could get some support.

I supplied a problem description and sample files to first level support. This is the reply that I received:

The file was saved as 16 bit TIFF with ProPhoto as the color space, this one is a big factor because PaintShop Pro (X5 or X6) has its own color space and is only supporting RGB color space. It is normal for PaintShop Pro to convert your image to sRGB because that is the embedded color space. Also, I suggest you to contact ProPhoto to know what do they support or if they support PaintShop Pro.

Please be advised that color shifting is normal due to the color space that is being used by a specific program (e.i. PaintShop Pro). Colors that are not within the range of RGB color space will be determined as imaginary colors.

I then said that this wasn't ok and got passed to level 2 support. And this is what I got back:

As far as I understood the topic correctly, you use a certain colour profile. This makes it difficult, because we have no support for colour management for no Corel software (even our Draw customers who work with Draw in a professional way need to ask somebody who knows how CM works.

That PSP has some problems with professional colour profiles is known. Regarding the engine, nothing has changed and PSP X6 still uses the default RGB profile for Windows and the same engine as X4 and X5.

Again I persevered and it got passed to the development team.

I have received reply from the development team and learned that there have been made changes to the tiff engine because of other issues related to tiff.
Eventually these changes may have an impact on your problem with ProPhoto.

Unfortunately, from a point of support view, there is nothing that we can do. I will keep an eye on your issue and collect more data.

I asked when there would be a fix and got this back

Because it's not a failure in PSP directly but when you use another color profile, and there are only a very few customers that have that problem, there will no fix solution. Currently, the development team can't work on that topic, because there are other things more important. Sorry I have to say as it is.

Now I have asked for a refund.

[Samoreen]

Thanks.

I was evaluating the product and immediately saw that Color Management was non functional. If they consider that it's not a bug, they can remove the "Pro" from the product's name. This is a show stopper for me.

[pwt]

I agree that this is a serious issue and I have made a report to Corel too.

It seems to effect 16bit (but not 8bit) TIFs and PSDs. There is a workaround which is to set the color working space in PSP to your preferred space e.g. ProPhoto. Then if you export your tif in ProPhoto space, it can be opened and edited in PSP with the correct colors. (The thumbnails still look wrong though as I guess they are not color managed).

I know that this is what you have already identified but am just adding my confirmation and how I am dealing with it.

[chromiumdomium]

You've saved the day thanks for that.

It means I can do my raw editing in lightroom, export a tif in prophoto to PSP, do my bit editing, and return to LR for finishing.

Thank-you

[Colorblast]

Hi pwt, you mentioned that you can set the color working space in PSP to your preferred space e.g. ProPhoto. How do you do that? I've looked through the preferences and Color Management tab of PSP and can't see where or how to do that. Could you possible provide some steps for this process. Many thanks.

[Samoreen]

Hi pwt, you mentioned that you can set the color working space in PSP to your preferred space e.g. ProPhoto. How do you do that? I've looked through the preferences and Color Management tab of PSP and can't see where or how to do that.

Please have a look at this page : http://product.corel.com/help/PaintShop ... ingle=true .

Note that no Prophoto profile is installed by default (unless I missed something). You should already have a Prophoto profile in your ICC folder if this is your target working color space.

Strangely enough, the manual doesn't cover the Preferences and the Color Management settings. Not very serious.

[Colorblast]

Thanks Samoreen, if anyone's missing the ProPhoto profile from their PC, I've Googled a site here that has the profile(s) available to install to your PC.

https://sites.google.com/site/chromasoft/icmprofiles

This was the key I was missing. We'll see if this makes any difference. Cheers.

[Simone Corel UK]

We have escalated the problem about pictures and embedded ProPhoto profile. The development team is looking into it.

[chromiumdomium]

That's great news, thank-you.