Photoshop_ Select the Color Settings for Your Projects

#1 1.1. Select the Color Settings for Your Projects

#1 1.1. Select the Color Settings for Your Projects

Using Adobe Photoshop CS3 is an image-altering experience! You can work on images for print or for the Web. You can improve photographs, repurpose them, or create original designs. Because printed images and Web images have different limits on the range of colors that they can represent, you need to set the working color space for your project.

Photoshop's default color space is set to sRGB, a very limited color space intended to be viewable on even the lowest-quality monitor. sRGB is a good color space for preparing Web images; however, it is a much smaller color space than what better monitors can show and what printers can actually produce. Photographers and designers generally prefer the larger color space called Adobe RGB (1998), a good color space for working with photographs and projects that you plan to print.

In Photoshop CS3, you can easily choose your color space and save it as your own setting. Using the North America Prepress 2 settings and Adobe RGB (1998) will make your printed colors look much better.

 Click Edit.

 Click Color Settings.

The Color Settings dialog box appears.

 Click here and select North America Prepress 2.

 The RGB setting changes to Adobe RGB (1998).

The rest of the Color Settings dialog box changes to reflect the preferred working space for images that you print.

 Click More Options.

The dialog box expands.

 Click here and select Perceptual for photography or Relative Colorimetric for a graphic design project.

 Click OK.

Your color settings are saved until you reset your preferences.

Customize It! You can save your own Color Settings preset. The name of the preset changes to Custom when you deselect any check box or make any other changes. Click Save after customizing your settings. Type a name in the Save dialog box and click Save. Your customized preset appears in the Settings drop-down list, ready for you to choose. Try This! You can synchronize the color settings in other Creative Suite applications to match your saved custom Photoshop color settings. In Photoshop, click File and select Browse to launch the Bridge. Click Bridge and select Preferences (Mac) or Edit and select Preferences (PC). Click Advanced and click Enable Color Management In Bridge. Then from the Bridge, click Edit and select Creative Suite Color Settings. Click your saved custom color settings and click Apply.