These three photos are experiments in color spaces. All photos were exported from Aperture as TIFFs in the ProPhoto color space. This color space is huge and preserves reds, pinks and orange tones that are clipped in Adobe RGB1998 and clipped much more in sRGB IEC61966. ProPhoto is the perfect working space for print destinations but far too large a space for web. When uploaded to the Internet, it is displayed within an sRGB space and that results in huge color shifts and loss of information. Converting from ProPhoto to another space before uploading does not have this dramatic a result.

From left to right, sRGB IEC61966, Adobe RGB1998 and ProPhoto. Sadly, there is image loss and the vibrant colors of ProPhoto are deadened completely.

Processing the same image with lowered exposure in RAW to try and lower the amount clipped during conversion to smaller color spaces resulted in more detail maintained. You can see the difference clearly in the three bud group in the center of the photo.

This time the image was saved as a JPG in the Adobe 1998 color space. There is significantly less image loss in the reds though some clipping does occur and all channels are blown to some extent but only in a very limited area.

Conclusion:

Process images completely differently when they have a web destination. Drop exposure, do not increase curve in the 192 tone area and drop it slightly in the 64 area. This applies to any image with reds, oranges, pinks. Cool hues do not experience the same clipping rate.

After checking the color yet again, what looks good on the Mac is very washed out on a Windows browser so I tried the same technique as before with the initial adjustments, then exported from Aperture into Photoshop and immediately converted to Lab Color to adjust Curves and Sharpening.

Then it was switched back to RGB mode and an immediate conversion to sRGBIEC61966 color space for web before resizing and saving as a JPG.

Colors are more intense on the Mac (I adjusted the gamma on the Mac to 2.2) and look slightly over the top to me but in Windows they seems more accurate.

This would explain why so many images on the web look over-saturated on the Mac. One of these days I’ll hit the key to getting it right!

This time, the only change was to reduce the Lab Color adjustments by 50% and once it had been converted to the sRGB space, to confine the saturation boost to 8.