Layer/Group/Document Color Management Logic Problem

[shijan]

I just moved this question from other thread to discuss here...

As you may know PhotoLine supports non-destructive color management and allow to transform color spaces between Layer, Isolated Group and Document.





The only thing i still really don't like about Layer/Group/Document color management logic is the current "simplification" that brings confusion and slowdowns when use complicated Layer/Group/Document color management chains. I noticed this in 22.90b16 https://www.pl32.com/forum3/viewtopic.p ... 675#p49675

In earlier versions it worked very nice and simple: Set whatever you want ICC profile to Layer/Group/Document and it will remain there in any situation until you manually remove it.
But later based on someones feedback developers decide to change things and automate some things. So currently it is impossible manually force set same ICC profile to Document/Layer/Group. For example if Document set to sRGB and Layers set to sRGB, in Layers you will see empty fields instead of ICC profiles. It means that Layers use same ICC profile as Document (sort of bypass).

Problems start when you want to rearrange things or change Document/Layer/Group color management chain.

Let's say you want to change Document ICC profile but remain all Layers in sRGB.
In old versions logic when layers could remember their ICC profile instead of simply bypass, i just could set new ICC profile to Document and that's all.
But in current versions logic, changing Document ICC profile also will affect Layers ICC profile. So i need to change Document ICC profile and then set each layer one by one to sRGB ICC profile.

And if for some reason i switch Document ICC profile back to sRGB all layers became "bypass" again and everything became ruined again.


P.S. Also this "simplified" Document/Layer/Group color management logic looks confusing because it don't match to current bit depth management logic. If Layer and Document set to 8-bit and i change Document bit depth to 16-bit - Layer remains in 8-bit as expected.

[Hoogo]

I think I totally get the idea, and it makes sense to me.
You assign a color space somewhere, and it simply means "These data IS in this color space, so calculate accordingly"
And without a color space it's just "calculate", and just simply calculate ends with the color space of ... document, group, whatever it is attached to.
So I see that there can be a problem when a color space is removed and you regroup things.

I have a more practical question:

When I was doing composings, I didn't care about color space. Some elements where own photos with knowsn color space, others were from other sources, space unknown. It didn't matter, this is a topic were you can adjust anything just by taste and looks.

It matters when it's about logos, CI and such things. At least it should matter, often you just get RGB values without naming the space. But the actual work is a matter of layouting given elements.

And I'm pretty sure that spaces matter a lot when you're preparing prints for customers that know their stuff. That work is either printing 1 picture, or maybe a little layout stuff.

=> What kind of work are you doing where you mix color spaces that ask for such regrouping? It sounds like combining elements of different spaces, and you don't want to create a group in document space to collect these elements.

[shijan]

=> What kind of work are you doing where you mix color spaces that ask for such regrouping? It sounds like combining elements of different spaces, and you don't want to create a group in document space to collect these elements.

I mostly use this for film (and paper) scans. I keep source image in original scanner input color space and set some wide gamut color space to document for editing.
I also sometimes create isolated group and set it to Lab. So i can use some tools in Lab inside that group and same time some other tools in RGB outside that group.
Sometimes i set Isolated group to same ICC profile as document but in Linear gamma. This also allow to use some tools in more accurate way. For example this is useful for WB adjustments https://www.pl32.com/forum3/viewtopic.p ... 041#p50041 or for image resize https://www.pl32.com/forum3/viewtopic.p ... 566#p49566

I usually record actions, but that disappearing ICC profile slowdown things even for single action recording. So it is not a huge problem if some chain is already well established and recorded to action. But it is a problem when experiment and rearrange layers here and there, group and ungroup things, and in some moment ICC profile is just gone from the layer, but i didn't noticed this, and something goes wrong, and i need to look what was missing and where, and need to shift attention to things that not related to color experiments at all. It is just huge waste of time to set same ICC profile again and again after every group/ungroup because it automatically disappears.

By the way, it was another part of this request described earlier here https://www.pl32.com/forum3/viewtopic.p ... 729#p47729
The idea was to make things more user friendly and use same visual logic in Document and Layer Attributes panels. For my opinion if make ICC Profile filed always visible in Layer Attributes with indicator "ICC profile - None" it could improve and speedup things.

All those things are more like UI and usability improvements, but not a pure technical problems. So it is always better to discuss and ask as many opinions as possible. I personally may suggest add user preferences like on/off "Auto hide bypassed ICC profiles" so user can choose the way he likes to work.