Photoshop CS4 – Convert to sRGB

First impressions of Adobe Photoshop CS4 are quite nice. It is, as advertised, very fast. Dragging things around with the “hand” tool has an iPhone feel to it. In other words, there is acceleration involved. But, I noticed one thing quickly when trying to save some graphics for the web.

The dialogue box after selecting “Save for Web & Devices” has been revamped. And there is a new option for sRGB fanatics. sRGB stands for “Safe Red Green Blue.” Back in the days when monitors displayed far less colors it was extremely important to make sure that your web graphics were restricted to these safe colors. Personally, I don’t feel the need to adhere to these “safe” colors due to the fact that monitors and graphics cards are far more capable of displaying a wider spectrum of colors than they once were. But, some people still think it’s important.

Here is a screenshot of the new dialogue box:

Okay, so what does this all mean? Well, it means that if you are working with a typical RGB color palette and have this little checkbox selected, you might not actually get your desired color. This is simply because with sRGB selected, Photoshop is going to find the closest safe color to your selected color. I don’t recall how Photoshop defaults on installation, but you’ll definitely want to turn if off if you are more accustomed to the CS3 setup.

Conclusion

Is it a cool setting? Sure. It’s nice to have. I personally won’t be using it, but if you are at a firm that demands it or just like adhering to sRGB, then you have a nice fallback in place to ensure everything is safe. That should make some people happy.

Word.