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Color management workflow questions

polycounter lvl 12
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Racer445 polycounter lvl 12
Since I've had some free time over the break, I've purchased a calibrator and have been focused on getting my color workflow down. Everything I've found has been dealing with offline rendering so I think a new thread is warranted for this particular question.

3DS Max, like many other modeling programs, has very limited color management, especially in the viewport. The viewport of course, is what I use to preview my art assets using shaders like everybody else does. My color management understanding is fair, but the one thing I'm still super iffy about is getting textures into the Max viewport with correct color.

The following is my current color workflow for game art. I doubt this is "correct," but it seems to work.

1. Make textures in photoshop in an PSD profiled to Monitor RGB
2. Save textures as TGA using the script vQuickPSDTGA from vTools
3. Color looks fine on the model in the Max viewport
4. Take screenshot with printscreen, paste into a Monitor RGB document. Color is the same as Max and the original texture.
5. Convert to sRGB and save for web etc. Send screenshot to client/upload to web. Pack up TGA textures and send to client.

This results in TGAs that match the profiled Photoshop document (TGA doesn't obey profiles,) textures that look the same when applied in Max, and screenshots that match that output. This works great, but my issue is that it seems everybody says to NEVER EVER EVER save images as Monitor RGB, but if this is the only way to get proper color in a non-managed program like Max, is it OK?

In addition, when I need to send textures and screenshots out to a client, is it OK to send them those TGAs and the sRGB profiled screenshots?

Color management is a tricky subject and there's tons of conflicting opinions about it, so perhaps these answers would clear some things up for me, thanks for the help again, pals.

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  • sprunghunt
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    sprunghunt polycounter
    Racer445 wrote: »
    This results in TGAs that match the profiled Photoshop document (TGA doesn't obey profiles,) textures that look the same when applied in Max, and screenshots that match that output. This works great, but my issue is that it seems everybody says to NEVER EVER EVER save images as Monitor RGB, but if this is the only way to get proper color in a non-managed program like Max, is it OK?

    In addition, when I need to send textures and screenshots out to a client, is it OK to send them those TGAs and the sRGB profiled screenshots?

    Color management is a tricky subject and there's tons of conflicting opinions about it, so perhaps these answers would clear some things up for me, thanks for the help again, pals.

    Colour management is for making your source image look like your output. In the case of games your output is the monitor. So save it in monitor RGB!

    I tend to just turn colour managment off. It's a feature for graphic design and print - not for making games.
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