My photo labs want me to send images in sRGB. Should I set my camera at sRGB too?

[Kfran]

My photo labs want me to send images to them in sRGB. I am wondering about how to set my camera. They tell me to set it on sRGB but i know RGB is a bigger profile. What color profile should I set my camera on. Is any one out there an expert on color profiles? 

[Crista]

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[Kfran]

I am using a Canon 5D Mark 3. I shoot in RAW only.

[kvbarkley]

If you have not changed it, it *is* in sRGB. There is no "RGB", the other option is AdobeRGB which has a wider Gamut.

RAW does not have a color space, so if you send them RAWs, the question does not make sense, since they can easily diaplay it however they want.

[Kfran]

Thank you for trying to address my question.

I shoot in RAW but process the images and send them to the lab in jpg format. So I am currently converting the images from my camera AdobeRGB to sRGB for the lab. My thought is to capture the broadest range of colors in the camera and have the full spectrum when I am processing them in RAW. I later do the conversion for the lab to accommodate their printing.

I am wondering if that truely takes advantage of the extra colors of the spectrum provided by AdobeRGB or is it pointless since I ultimately convert it to sRGB????

[kvbarkley]

If you shoot in RAW all the colors are preserved, no matter what color space is set. sRGB and AdobeRGB only come into play when converting to JPEG.

[RobertTheFat]

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@kvbarkley wrote:

If you shoot in RAW all the colors are preserved, no matter what color space is set. sRGB and AdobeRGB only come into play when converting to JPEG.

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The one possible advantage I can think of to setting the camera to a specific gamut when shooting in RAW is that if the photo editor sees the gamut specification in the Exif data, it may treat it as the default when creating a JPEG.

[diverhank]

For the 5DIII you can specify sRGB or Adobe RGB but I think it only affects the jpeg files.

You can set the appropriate color profiles in post processing.  For pictures to be printed at a photo lab, you should request the printer color profile and save your jpeg for printing using that particular color profile.  This is very important because most printers, even the professional ones have (relatively) a very limited color space and sRGB or Adobe RGB would have to be down converted to fit the printer profile.  Without a printer profile, you are at the mercy of the photo lab to convert the colors for you and there's more chance for the colors to be down-converted not optimally.

Even photolabs at Costco provide you with their printer profiles...any photo lab worth its name would have one, I'd hope.

[cicopo]

Another point to consider is "does your monitor have a setting to work in Adobe RGB?" most don't. If your monitor can't properly display Adobe RGB it's pointless to try to work in it.

[ebiggs1]

When you shoot RAW you do not assign a color space to the image. This is raw sensor data. The color space is attached to the image at the time of editing and output.  How much saturation a color area can have without losing detail and becoming one solid color mass is the reason to use AdobeRGB. Example, if the petals of a red rose image become featureless shapes of color, you have pushed that color beyond what the color space can differentiate. All the various reds that made up the texture of the petal have been pushed so that they are all now the same red. This is known as "out of gamut." It doesn't matter if you have a monitor or printer that can't handle the extra wide gamut of AdobeRGB, what it can handle will be better.  You can check this yourself by viewing the histograms of each. sRGB and AdobeRGB, the difference will be small but present, more or less determined by the photo in comparison.

But your color lab probably has their printers corrected for sRGB so you should do what they say.  Sometimes a professional lab does things we mere mortals don't or can't.  As for am example, it will do no good to u/l to Facebook or the web in AdobeRGB.  It will all get lost.