OK, to answer @George’s question… no, I did not try the legacy working colour space for the very reason @KeithRJ stated.
To me, it sounds like starting with a JPEG input because a 14-bit RAW has too many colours. It doesn’t make sense to me. Surely the more precise the input, the better the conversion engine can work. If you don’t like the area of your circle to have so many decimal places, use less places of Pi.
Now, @Wolfgang’s suggestion of trying another provider might be worth considering. Though I’m not stuck with their layouts — I built my own custom layout in Affinity Publisher and for the most part I know what I’m doing in that software. So, it is fun.
It’s only the colour handling that I have trouble understanding fully. Specifically what is meant by out of gamut in soft proofing, and what, if anything, to do about it. Also, I guess editing the exposure and contrast to suit paper.
I’ve also had conflicting advice on whether to embed the profile on output from PhotoLab, or whether to only use it in Soft Proofing to “preview” and letting Affinity deal with the conversion, once, on final press-ready output.
The trouble I have with selecting another provider is another whole learning curve on available products, input requirements, etc.
My suggestion is to simply turn on softproofing for sRGB and edit to what looks good for you. Use the colour detail slider to taste. No embedded profiles required and a simple workflow
Layout your book and export as pdf at 300dpi. The colour conversion to paper profile will be handled by the print company’s printers and should come out just fine.
Most print houses are very well equipped to handle sRGB in the best possible way.
Colors that exceed a smaller color space get lost with the conversion. There is not much you can do about it.
If for example in Photoshop you use the Rendering Intent perceptual, all colors in the image get squeezed and shifted so that they fit into the smaller color space. This simple method keeps the overall impression of the different colors and often changes the overall contrast.
With Rendering Intent relative colorimetric only those colors that exceed the target’s color space are affected. You compress and shift only this subset of colors, which are then moved to the edge of the destination color space. In other words, you only loose detail rendition for those affected color … and it is advisable to take measures if one wishes to preserve some of that detail → PL.
In PhotoLab you can “desaturate” those affected colors, so that they fit into the smaller color space.
For RAW files and linear DNGs, we have the “Protect saturated colors” slider (Color TAB), otherwise in the Export window the “Preserve color details” checkbox – or the option to use “Soft proofing” with the ability to adjust the Preserve color details Intensity accordingly.
A much larger color space can create more problems than a less smaller color space. By example for me legacy=wide gamut + color rendering.
That is exactly what PhotoLab’s soft-proofing feature is designed for. – Before the conversion (Export), you get an on-screen simulation showing what the colors will look like after the conversion to the smaller color space.
Things are not made simpler or more reliable by discarding intense colors – such as by using DxO’s legacy working color space (ARGB) – but rather by reducing oversaturation in a controlled manner while preserving the necessary details.
This is for conversion to the sRGB color space (without a rendering intent in PL).
→ more on soft-proofing with a paper profile in my (next) reply to @zkarj
→ Simulate paper & Ink ( = adjust the White Point accordingly )
The red overlay in PL indicates that a color lies outside the color space of a specific target (e.g., outside the sRGB color space, or the color space of a printer / paper) – in other words, it is “out of gamut” (outside the range of reproducible colors).
To avoid a loss of detail, color saturation must be reduced – or rather, a balance needs to be found, as I tried to describe.
When soft-proofing with a paper profile, the simulation also displays the expected brightness and contrast (or the lack thereof) – as well as the paper’s white point (reflecting a cool, neutral, or warm paper tone) – thanks to the additional simulation of paper and ink.
Please handle the latter with care. Its purpose is to align the screen display with the appearance of the printout.
Ideally, you should be familiar with the paper – meaning you need to know how it renders tonal values – and the viewing conditions must also be correct (monitor brightness and contrast need to be adjusted for a medium that does not emit light itself but merely reflects it).
I’ve also had conflicting advice on whether to embed the profile on output from PhotoLab, or whether to only use it in Soft Proofing to “preview” and letting Affinity deal with the conversion, once, on final press-ready output.
Um, I’ve tried to steer clear of this topic – like a cat prowling around hot milk.
You must avoid double profiling under all circumstances to prevent obtaining uncontrollable results !!
If you are printing images yourself, you can either let the application (PL, PS …) apply the appropriate paper profile (which I prefer) or use the printer driver.
When submitting images for printing, leave the work to the print service provider. The experts there know their equipment and materials better than we do – which means: do not apply a paper profile to your image.
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That said, when soft-proofing – especially with the notorious Blurb profile – you notice a great loss of color and contrast; while you can try to compensate for this, ultimately – I suspect – it is best to then convert / export the images in sRGB before sending it
OR like @KeithRJsuggested, you softproof directly with sRGB, adjust your images to taste and convert / export the image in sRGB before sending it …
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To be honest, I really don’t know what happens to an (embedded) paper profile when you prepare the file in Affinity Publisher for subsequent export as a PDF. Although I own a copy of the Affinity Suite, I have never used Publisher.
Addendum
For those who prefer watching videos: Here is a piece on the topic of “Soft Proofing Explained.”
The author demonstrates and explains soft proofing in Lightroom and Photoshop. If you encounter unfamiliar menus along the way, don’t let that put you off – simply keep watching.
Around the middle of the video, there is a 3D simulation to illustrate which areas fall outside the reproducible color space – the “out-of-gamut” areas - depending on the chosen output medium (such as matte vs glossy photo papers).
Finally, he demonstrates and explains a few image adjustments during the soft-proof preview before completing the printing process.
