The Mana World Forums

Do we have a standard colorspace for graphics?

A very minor change to a tileset was displayed with slightly different colors in a web browser. We figured out that the image itself is unchanged, but the metadata for the second one defines a colorspace (which the previous tileset lacked).
Before
After

I don't know if the TMW software cares yet, but it seems easier to agree on some colorspace now than to clean up a mix of things later -- and this really could cause two artists to use subtlely different colors if we don't agree on a colorspace.

Thanks to Reid for noticing this. She summed it up best:

The simplest solution would be forbid images from having one explicitly. I'm pretty sure the client ignores them, so any graphics editors should have to deal without as well.

o11c wrote:The simplest solution would be forbid images from having one explicitly. I'm pretty sure the client ignores them, so any graphics editors should have to deal without as well.

In digital photography, all images are rendered (which is necessary to even display on a screen) in a colorspace. Therefore, every image editor uses a colorspace, whether it is specified by the image, by the human, or by the software defaults. Different editors default to different colorspaces; sRGB and Adobe RGB are the most popular ones.
Colorspace is so important that one of the first things serious photographers do with a new camera is to set the colorspace to what their workflow uses.

I know nothing about pixel images, but if colors are important, then I assume the colorspace in which those are rendered is also important -- maybe too important to leave to chance.

It seems in Preferences is Color Management. When I checked it, it had "Color Managed Display" and I'll attempt the edit again with "No Color Management". Not sure if this works, but if it does, I suppose that would be the solution.

Are we absolutely positive the client will ignore color space, gama, etc?

Wombat wrote:It seems in Preferences is Color Management. When I checked it, it had "Color Managed Display" and I'll attempt the edit again with "No Color Management". Not sure if this works, but if it does, I suppose that would be the solution.

That only applies to GIMP.

Mana plus takes care of gamma ( setup, Visual tab)
It is impossible for TMW to have a standard colors space as color space you use is hardware (ICC profile) dependent. Adobe RGB, sRGB, Pantone... are trials to have a conventional encoding for absolute colors which cannot be rendered by the color models. They render correctly only on compatible hardware.

PNG can include an ICC profile.

Nard wrote:It is impossible for TMW to have a standard colors space as color space you use is hardware (ICC profile) dependent. Adobe RGB, sRGB, Pantone...render correctly only on compatible hardware.

What hardware would a graphic artist use that doesn't support all Adobe RGB, sRGB, and maybe Pantone?
(I don't know if my PCs support Pantone.)

It is not a question of colorspace supporting, (almost everycomputer supports pantone with proper software) but of hardware rendering. Provided that we all had all the same monitors and system (let's forget printing), thus use the same colorspace the displayed images we get would also be different as color perception depends also on environment. We would also need that all our respective graphic chains are calibrated, in the "standard" color space. To have a better idea of what I mean, go to a HDTV shop and look all the images of the same channel with default setup, it is eloquent (HDTVs are supposed to have the same colorspace standard). CRTs are supposed to be better than TVs, only supposed . To my experence, colorspace begins to be useful only when exchanging data from a calibrated graphic chain to another calibrated graphic chain. Not to say that you may not like the look of a calibrated CRT rendering.

Nard wrote:It is not a question of colorspace supporting, (almost everycomputer supports pantone with proper software) but of hardware rendering...To my experence, colorspace begins to be useful only when exchanging data from a calibrated graphic chain to another calibrated graphic chain.

If we were preparing to print and display at an exhibit, I agree that we need accurate and precise color rendering.
I have calibrated my home computers for photographic work, although not as thoroughly as you describe.

In this case, I think we need consistency, not accuracy. If your monitor has a sickly green tint, then one tileset will appear as badly green as another. As long as your new work matches the existing, TMW shouldn't care.
Where we could get tangled is if one tileset is loaded in Adobe RGB and another in sRGB, and the artist adjusts the colors to match across the colorspaces.

We don't have to decide on a specific colorspace. TMW could strip that metadata from files, so that each file is rendered the same (unknown) way. For all I know, that's what every Real Pixel Artist does. My experience is with photography, not drawing.

In our case consistency means (video games) only CRT accuracy, which should make the problem simpler. To insure consistency, all TMW graphic designers should calibrate their crt with the same image, with same screen resolution, and with the same display calibration device or at least with a calibration device. Calibration dev is is a 100 to 300 US $ investment... :/ . I am not sure that the result is worth the effort. A wiki guideline page about color profiles, and maybe indicating good references on screen calibration could be enough.
Edit: I also cannot see a way to be sure that the common player has set his CRT to the right ICC profile... and if it is desirable.