Anyone have a list of common "color managed" (IE., wide gamut-OK) apps?

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dderidex

Supreme [H]ardness
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Oct 31, 2001
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Seems information is rather spotty on this. Only apps I seem to find "for sure" are:

- Adobe Photoshop
- Firefox 3.5 (with config switched on)
- Windows Vista and Windows 7's "Picture Viewer"
- Media Player Classic with color management plugin

But that's a pretty short list! There are a LOT of common apps or shells I can't find details on:

- Flash?
- Silverlight?
- Windows Media Player?
- PowerDVD?
- Any games at all?
- iTunes?
- IE9?
- Chrome?

==========================================
EDIT: Starting to work on a list. I'll try to keep this up...

OSX
  • Quicktime: YES
  • Photoshop CS5: YES
  • After Effects CS5: YES
  • Default image viewer: YES (since Snow Leopard)
  • Default DVD Player: YES (since Snow Leopard)
  • Default desktop/UI environment: YES (since Snow Leopard)
  • Safari: PARTIAL (tagged images, only...not UI elements such as HTML or CSS colors)
  • Final cut: NO

Linux
  • gimp: YES
  • Flash plugin: NO
  • gthumb: NO
  • vlc: NO
  • xine: NO
  • mplayer: NO
  • eog: PARTIAL (eog pays attention to images with color profiles but won't let you specify sRGB color space for images without a profile)

Windows 7
  • Photoshop CS5: YES
  • After Effects CS5: YES
  • Quicktime (7.6.8): YES
  • Default image viewer: YES
  • Gimp: YES (with plugin)
  • Office 2010: YES (believe it or not - at least, tested in Word 2010, Onenote 2010, and Excel 2010)
  • FastPicViewer: YES (thanks monitorrat!)
  • PhotoMechanic: YES (thanks monitorrat!)
  • Adobe InDesign: YES (thanks monitorrat!)
  • Media Player Classic: YES (with some shader scripting applied)
  • Irfanview: PARTIAL (.jpg format only, per monitorrat)
  • Safari 5 for Windows: PARTIAL (tagged images, only...not UI elements such as HTML or CSS colors, untagged images get nothing)
  • Firefox 3.6: PARTIAL (no changes needed, supports color profiles freshly installed...but needs tweaking for non-tagged images. Even then, support ICC v2 only, not v4.)
  • Firefox 4, beta 6: PARTIAL (same as Firefox 3.6)
  • Internet Explorer 9 beta: PARTIAL (supports reading ICC v2 and ICC v4 tagged images, but seems to convert them to just the sRGB color space, rather than what the display is set to use)
  • Flash 10: PARTIAL (pays attention to images with color profiles but won't let you specify sRGB color space for images without a profile...presumably, must be used in browser that supports it, too. Note that, while Flash technically supports it, the app still has to be written for it, which almost nobody seems to bother doing.)
  • Internet Explorer 8: NO
  • Google Chrome: NO (as of 9.0.597.107, no color management support at all)
  • Premiere Pro: NO
  • PowerDVD 7: NO
  • PowerDVD 8: NO
  • Windows Media Center: NO
  • iTunes 10 interface: NO* (* Note that while the UI is definitely NOT...pretty much anything you play in it uses Quicktime, which APPEARS TO BE)
  • Default desktop/UI environment: NO
 
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Probably need to organize the results per operatiing system. Here's what I've found so far:

For OSX&Windows&linux:
firefox, thunderbird: YES (config switch for images without color profile)

For OSX:
quicktime: YES
default image viewer: NO
final cut: NO (can you believe it?!)
photoshop: YES

For linux:
flash plugin: NO (even when under firefox with gfx.color_management.mode=1)
gthumb: NO
gimp: YES
eog: PARTIAL (eog pays attention to images with color profiles but won't
let you specify sRGB color space for images without a profile)
 
Irfanview

This is a fast picture viewer, often updated. It provides CM support, can be configured for tagged pictures only and forced for untagged too.
 
darkaura said:
Irfanview

This is a fast picture viewer, often updated. It provides CM support, can be configured for tagged pictures only and forced for untagged too.
Click to expand...
For windows, I haven't tried it, but gimp should provide a free alternative viewer that also can edit ala photoshop.
 
bad144 said:
For windows, I haven't tried it, but gimp should provide a free alternative viewer that also can edit ala photoshop.
Click to expand...

Yes, for Windows.

I also use Gimp, it's very good for being free. The point is that if I just want to watch a picture, Irfanview will open much faster, since is very light, near instant speed.
 
darkaura said:
Yes, for Windows.

I also use Gimp, it's very good for being free. The point is that if I just want to watch a picture, Irfanview will open much faster, since is very light, near instant speed.
Click to expand...

Right, but on Win 7, the built-in Picture Viewer is *already* color managed, so...you don't need a third-party app for that.
 
dderidex said:
Right, but on Win 7, the built-in Picture Viewer is *already* color managed, so...you don't need a third-party app for that.
Click to expand...
So... Probably need to further limit the list criteria to the best-of-class color managed apps in the various categories (standalone jpeg viewer, jpeg editor, hd video player, non-linear editor, etc.)
 
bad144 said:
So... Probably need to further limit the list criteria to the best-of-class color managed apps in the various categories (standalone jpeg viewer, jpeg editor, hd video player, non-linear editor, etc.)
Click to expand...

Wow, that...that would be its own list - LOL! Let's focus on trying to get together a list of *commonly* used apps (and referring to built-in ones as often as possible), and specifically pull out 'best in class' later.

I think you'll find we've got enough of a headache just trying to put this list together!
 
dderidex said:
Wow, that...that would be its own list - LOL! Let's focus on trying to get together a list of *commonly* used apps (and referring to built-in ones as often as possible), and specifically pull out 'best in class' later.

I think you'll find we've got enough of a headache just trying to put this list together!
Click to expand...
I don't know what you mean, as my suggestion about best of class was to limit the scope of the lists instead of having them be meaninglessly broad.

Some more linux datapoints for wide gamut video playback:
vlc, xine, mplayer: NO
In other words, none of the feature rich video players support wide gamut :(
 
dderidex said:
Seems information is rather spotty on this. Only apps I seem to find "for sure" are:

- Media Player Classic with color management plugin
Click to expand...

How sure are you about this one. I remember reading about MPC & wide gamut when I had a wide gamut monitor for a short time.

It was a very manual process entering a load of shader over-ride corrections. Is this what you are talking about or is there actually a plug in that will read a color profile now? If so where is it?
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=11705891&postcount=1
 
Snowdog said:
How sure are you about this one. I remember reading about MPC & wide gamut when I had a wide gamut monitor for a short time.

It was a very manual process entering a load of shader over-ride corrections. Is this what you are talking about or is there actually a plug in that will read a color profile now? If so where is it?
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=11705891&postcount=1
Click to expand...

Ahhhh...yeah, looks like it is the same thing. Another link, with a more simple-friendly set of steps, here.

Actually getting my lp2475w, today, so will have to see how annoying this really is. I'm coming from a pretty crappy TN panel, so maybe it will still be 'good enough' to me in non-color managed apps, even if it isn't "correct"? I dunno, I somehow doubt it. Will be interesting to see how much of a pain this ends up being...

(Gotta say, I'm really surprised all that was posted something like MORE THAN TWO YEARS ago, and nothing has improved??)
 
Here is an interesting site that lets you test your browser color management.

Based on that, I can say in Windows 7:
- IE8: None at all
- Chrome: None at all
- Firefox 3.6: ICC profile v2 only, ICC profile v4 not supported
- Safari: both ICC profile v2 and ICC profile v4 supported

Funny...Apple does the best color management in a Windows browser!

Anyone got a good .qt file for testing color managed video?

I'm watching 'Star Trek' (2009) side-by-side via Netflix streaming and in iTunes (a la Quicktime), and...well, Netflix's colors are *far* more blown out than iTunes. Well, I mean, Quicktime.

(The iTunes interface, itself, is pretty obviously NOT color managed...my album cover-view list is...oh, man, it's painful. Eye burning, even. NOT pretty. But content *played* in iTunes, which is via Quicktime....well, it seems fine, actually.)
 
All this grief is why I always recommend people avoid wide gamut screens if they can.
 
Snowdog said:
All this grief is why I always recommend people avoid wide gamut screens if they can.
Click to expand...

Kinda throwing the baby out with the bathwater, there, though.

I mean, on the apps that it does work on...it looks VERY NICE. And it has only really been since the Windows 7 launch that pretty much *every* decent monitor (with a few exceptions, but becoming fewer) started featuring it. And since IE9 already supports wide gamut, too...how much anyone want to bet Win7 SP1 finally "gets it right" and we don't have to deal with this crap, anymore?
 
dderidex said:
Kinda throwing the baby out with the bathwater, there, though.

I mean, on the apps that it does work on...it looks VERY NICE. And it has only really been since the Windows 7 launch that pretty much *every* decent monitor (with a few exceptions, but becoming fewer) started featuring it. And since IE9 already supports wide gamut, too...how much anyone want to bet Win7 SP1 finally "gets it right" and we don't have to deal with this crap, anymore?
Click to expand...

For the apps that work, all you are doing is getting back to sRGB properly displayed. On an sRGB monitor like mine every app looks like that. Zero grief and everything looks fantastic.
 
Snowdog said:
For the apps that work, all you are doing is getting back to sRGB properly displayed. On an sRGB monitor like mine every app looks like that. Zero grief and everything looks fantastic.
Click to expand...

Not all apps. I spend probably 80% of my time on the PC in Photoshop CS5, which definitely benefits from this...

BTW: IE9 tested out using the above image with no issue at all. It also doesn't quite "flatten" the colors as much as Firefox (looks much more like Safari), so I think Microsoft actually knocked it out of the park, this time.
 
dderidex said:
Not all apps. I spend probably 80% of my time on the PC in Photoshop CS5, which definitely benefits from this...
Click to expand...

Marginally. Most people end up using their photoshop work in sRGB when they are done, so it is largely irrelevant even to most photoshop users. You may actually make use of a wider gamut final work product, but you would be the exception.

Probably less than 1% have any realy use for a wide gamut panel and we have the misfortune of having them largely polluted with wide gamut.
 
Ultimately, I'm switching over to Firefox from IE9. While IE9 *does* support both ICC v2 and v4 profiles and Firefox only supports ICC v2...this only makes a big difference in images tagged with one or the other.

The real issue that makes a difference, though, is that once the profile is loaded, the browser seems to RENDER the images in different color spaces.

Taking a look at an image in Photoshop CS5, with the appropriate profile used, compared to Firefox or IE9...well, on images that Firefox actually SUPPORTS the profile, it just plain does better.

I think the overall way IE9 is rendering images is just...I dunno. It seems to read the image profile correctly, but then render in sRGB, anyway, regardless of what the monitor is set for? It's strange.

Safari is still the best, hands down - but it really has such spotty support for web standards on the PC, that I think Firefox is probably the best bet for wide gamut monitors, at the moment.
 
dderidex said:
I mean, on the apps that it does work on...it looks VERY NICE.
Click to expand...

You mean, it looks the way we all assumed it would look in the first place and the same way it has looked for the last decades? (although with some loss in quality due to the fact that we are still dealing with only 8 bit panels)
 
brumwald said:
You mean, it looks the way we all assumed it would look in the first place and the same way it has looked for the last decades? (although with some loss in quality due to the fact that we are still dealing with only 8 bit panels)
Click to expand...

Ah, but why let the past hold us back! "Harrumph, harrumph, my games werk jus' fine on my Voodoo-thingamajig-2, what's this 'OpenGL' and 'Direct3d' nonsense...the 'Glides' has always werked before...harrumph, harrumph"

Thing is, the wide gamut displays DO look better than sRGB displays on the apps that support them. And there really isn't any reason that more apps...or, at least, the Windows desktop, do not...
 
The default image viewer in Mac OS X (Preview.app) definitely has full color management. Untagged images aren't corrected, but you can assign the sRGB profile to an image to view it as if it were tagged with sRGB. It also has a soft proof option to see how the image will fare on other devices.

Also, since Snow Leopard, most of the UI is color-managed. That includes window elements, scroll bars, Dashboard widgets, the desktop background, and icons, although you have to restart the Finder for the icons to adapt to the new profile. The Dock is still a bit flaky with color management though, as if the icons are cached unless you recreate them.

Safari has color management for tagged images only. It does not correct HTML and CSS colors, and it does not correct untagged images. Firefox does the same by default, but it has an option that can enable full color management, although it doesn't seem to support v4 profiles.

The DVD Player in Mac OS X is also color-managed.
 
dderidex said:
Ah, but why let the past hold us back! "Harrumph, harrumph, my games werk jus' fine on my Voodoo-thingamajig-2, what's this 'OpenGL' and 'Direct3d' nonsense...the 'Glides' has always werked before...harrumph, harrumph"

Thing is, the wide gamut displays DO look better than sRGB displays on the apps that support them. And there really isn't any reason that more apps...or, at least, the Windows desktop, do not...
Click to expand...

Only if you use wide gamut material. And since the vast majority of content is sRGB there is nothing but issues and drawbacks with a wide gamut monitor for normal use.

Buying a wide gamut monitor just because it's "the new thing" is just retarded.
If you have a specific use for it or happen to like the oversaturated colors then fine. Most in the know do buy wide gamut displays only because of the lack of alternatives.
 
ToastyX said:
The default image viewer in Mac OS X (Preview.app) definitely has full color management. Untagged images aren't corrected, but you can assign the sRGB profile to an image to view it as if it were tagged with sRGB.
Click to expand...
If you have to edit all your srgb jpegs to embed a color profile or 1 by 1 apply a profile at run time every time you view the jpeg, and furthermore the app is defaulting to the opposite of the norm (jpegs from the internet without any profile are typically srgb), then I'd hardly call that full color management.

firefox&thunderbird at least let you configure the default. It would be nice if you could also override the default for the off-cases where an image is really rgb instead of srgb, but fails to have an embedded color profile. So ideally:
- sensible and/or configurable default for images with no embedded profile
- easy to flip the profile decision the other way on a per image basis (should be as easy as rotating an image)

preview.app aint there yet.
 
There seems to be a common misconception in this thread amongst naysayers that only wide-gamut monitors have color space issues. But RGB monitors, have a gamut that is > srgb as well. Those monitors, just like wide gamut monitors, also don't display srgb images quite as intended.

On the flip side, much video content (eg NTSC) is far closer to RGB color space than sRGB, so if you stick your head in the sand and stay with an sRGB monitor, or just use your wider gamut monitor in sRGB mode, then you have color space issues viewing dvd, blu-ray, or broadcast video.

So no mater which kind of monitor you choose: srgb, rgb, or wide gamut, if you care about the colors you view, you should care about color space management. Knowing which applications support color management is one of the first steps, and for the most part is woefully documented.
 
Of course. But the differences are that wide gamut displays have presented us with unprecedented differences for normal use, differences that even make you wonder which color you are supposed to be seeing.

Had there only been proper support for wide gamut...
 
Just a small suggestion to the OP: I would make a distinction between applications can that are profile aware and can display images correctly on a high gamut monitors 'out of the box' and those that require hacking and tweaking (beyond a simple checkbox or two) to get them to display images correctly (maybe) with more advanced setups (like Media Player Classic).

From experience anything beyond a simple checkbox (and even just requiring that) means that a large percentage of the user base is never going to use that feature.
 
bad144 said:
There seems to be a common misconception in this thread amongst naysayers that only wide-gamut monitors have color space issues. But RGB monitors, have a gamut that is > srgb as well. Those monitors, just like wide gamut monitors, also don't display srgb images quite as intended.
Click to expand...

I see more misconceptions from this post than from others.

First: There is no such thing as RGB color space. So I have no idea what you are talking about.

Monitors that are intended to be standard sRGB color space can naturally be off a bit off and may require calibration. But calibration works in ALL applications. The need to profile an sRGB monitor are usually non existent.

My sRGB monitor is calibrated and profiled. But it is so close that it is visually impossible to see the difference between color aware applications and normal applications. So it works 100% seamlessly in all applications. This is the massive benefit of standard gamut. All applications behave exactly the same displaying standard colors.

With an non standard gamut panel there will be a jarring difference between color aware applications (few) and everything else that won't read profile. So you open an image in photoshop it looks fine, you then go to use it in another application and the colors will be off.

So this is the critical advantage of a standard gamut monitor. Consistent natural color across all applications. No worries, no aggravation.


On the flip side, much video content (eg NTSC) is far closer to RGB color space than sRGB, so if you stick your head in the sand and stay with an sRGB monitor, or just use your wider gamut monitor in sRGB mode, then you have color space issues viewing dvd, blu-ray, or broadcast video.
Click to expand...

Again. Still no RGB color space, so I don't know what you are referring to. Beyond that you are mis-characterizing the issue completely.

Yes NTSC color as defined in 1953 is quite different, but it isn't used anywhere!.

Blu-Ray and HDTV both use Rec 709, which is Identical to sRGB.

Now the one actual difference is SDTV which has for decades been using SMPTE-C. This is slightly different from sRGB/Rec 709, but is small enough that you probably couldn't tell and since this involves conversions between two well known standards can be handled by software/equipment easily.

So the real bottom line is that if you have an sRGB monitor, everything you look at will have consistent and natural color with zero grief.
 
After effects CS5 (Win/OSX);

Get precise, predictable color in After Effects with support for high dynamic range (32-bit-per-channel floating point) color, including ProEXR files, ICC-based color management tools, and now color lookup tables (LUTs).
Click to expand...

I think Premiere pro CS5 is the same.

Apparently any program using the Adobe Color Engine CMM module which can be used with any program using Color Management Mmodules to use a common CMM throughout...apparently (I don't havee a wide gamut screen).
 
bad144 said:
If you have to edit all your srgb jpegs to embed a color profile or 1 by 1 apply a profile at run time every time you view the jpeg, and furthermore the app is defaulting to the opposite of the norm (jpegs from the internet without any profile are typically srgb), then I'd hardly call that full color management.
Click to expand...
JPEGs tagged as sRGB are displayed as sRGB. You don't have to embed a color profile unless there's no color profile in the first place. Apple's philosophy is to leave untagged images alone because untagged images have no color space information, so assuming sRGB might not be the right thing to do. You might not agree with that, but that doesn't mean it lacks color management. It'd be nice to have the option to set a default color space though, but very few programs have that ability, which is why wider gamut monitors are a pain.

dderidex said:
You are beginning to make me frustrated with Windows...for the first time I can think of...
Click to expand...
There's no Blu-ray support in Mac OS X though.
 
ToastyX said:
JPEGs tagged as sRGB are displayed as sRGB. You don't have to embed a color profile unless there's no color profile in the first place. Apple's philosophy is to leave untagged images alone because untagged images have no color space information, so assuming sRGB might not be the right thing to do. You might not agree with that, but that doesn't mean it lacks color management. It'd be nice to have the option to set a default color space though, but very few programs have that ability, which is why wider gamut monitors are a pain.
Click to expand...

Right, I guess that is what I was getting at with that - it seems rather that this would be a safe assumption.

I mean, if it's not tagged...what *else* would it be? Only sRGB makes sense...
 
ToastyX said:
There's no Blu-ray support in Mac OS X though.
Click to expand...

Curious on one more OSX thing, though.

iTunes 10, on Windows, is very definitely NOT color managed. The album art (either in 'coverflow' or tiled format) is very much left as-is, in eye-burning over-saturation.

Is this the case in OSX, too? Or is iTunes for Windows just a gimped version?
 
iTunes appears to be color-managed in Mac OS X, although I'm not sure what color space it's using for the album art. I think it uses the Generic RGB profile, which assumes the album art has a gamma of 1.8 and a gamut close to sRGB. I took screenshots, which are also color-managed in Mac OS X, then stripped the color profiles to get the actual color values to illustrate the difference:

itunes-color.png


I picked something red to make it obvious.

The left is while using the Generic RGB profile as my display profile, which is what I assume it would be if left uncorrected.

The middle is while using my monitor's color profile, which is calibrated to 2.2 gamma and has a gamut close to sRGB. The album art gets a little lighter to display it as 1.8 gamma while maintaining similar saturation.

The right is when using the AdobeRGB profile as my display profile. The album art gets a little lighter to display it as 1.8 gamma, and it also gets desaturated a bit to compensate for the larger gamut. It looks less bright due to less saturation.

If I choose a profile that has an even wider gamut, it becomes even more desaturated, which tells me it's handling gamut conversions properly.
 
ToastyX said:
iTunes appears to be color-managed in Mac OS X, although I'm not sure what color space it's using for the album art. I think it uses the Generic RGB profile, which assumes the album art has a gamma of 1.8 and a gamut close to sRGB.
Click to expand...

Well, for reference, here is the same thing in iTunes 10 on Windows 7:

sadness.jpg


EDIT: Actually, I can't get a screenshot to show it. In iTunes, the reds are *completely* oversaturated. Brilliant, eye-burning red. But no matter what app I use to save the screenshot (Paint, Win7 snipping tool, Photoshop...with or without embedded profile), it looks fairly close to your pictures in any browser I use. Not sure I understand why...

EDIT #2: Okay, got it...kinda. I saved a copy of the image with no color profile. I have Firefox set to manage any image, including untagged images...so it still actually looks correct in Firefox. However, Safari and IE9 both do not do anything at all with untagged images, and it looks about as blown-out in those as it does in iTunes.
 
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ToastyX said:
JPEGs tagged as sRGB are displayed as sRGB. You don't have to embed a color profile unless there's no color profile in the first place. Apple's philosophy is to leave untagged images alone because untagged images have no color space information, so assuming sRGB might not be the right thing to do. You might not agree with that, but that doesn't mean it lacks color management. It'd be nice to have the option to set a default color space though, but very few programs have that ability, which is why wider gamut monitors are a pain.
Click to expand...
Untagged images may or may not be srgb but assuming they need no color space adjustment on a wide gamut display is more likely than not the wrong choice. I certainly wouldn't call this an example of an application with "full color management" as you did. Yes, many applications have this same problem, luckily there are a few working choices.

Here's an example bug report against eog for this very problem, where the problem is understood:
https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=554498
 
bad144 said:
No mater which kind of monitor you choose: srgb, rgb, or wide gamut, if you care about the colors you view, you should care about color space management. Knowing which applications support color management is one of the first steps, and for the most part is woefully documented.
Click to expand...

This is incorrect. You really don't need to worry about which applications support color management with sRGB monitors. That is what makes sRGB grief free. No worries about needing to find an application to just get back to normal colors. You get normal color everywhere.

My sRGB monitor is calibrated/profiled. I can put up an image in color managed application right next to the same image in an non managed application. There is no difference.

Do this with a wide gamut monitor and there will be a huge difference between the color managed and non managed application.

With wide gamut to get normal colors you absolutely need profiling and color managed applications (which are in the extreme minority). OTOH With an sRGB monitor, color managed and non managed applications will look identical.

There is absolutely no equivalence between the problems trying to use a wide gamut monitor, and the trouble free experience using an sRGB monitor.
 
dderidex said:
Do you have any idea what you are talking about?

I can GUARANTEE you that I can create an image tagged in Adobe RGB that looks *fantastic* in print, and if you compare it between a color managed application and a non-color managed application, it will look quite different, indeed, on an sRGB monitor!
Click to expand...


Already answered in post #36, quoted so you won't need to click:

http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1036404988&postcount=36
Snowdog said:
You can make something look wrong on an sRGB monitor, but it takes effort.

You would need to actually create the non standard content yourself, because all standard content (Games,movies, images, internet, applications) is aimed at sRGB.
Click to expand...
 
Key word being close. Dont get me wrong, I would rather not have a wide gamut panel as well.
 
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