What does 'lock colorspace' do?

[Friksel]

In all three desktop apps there's this lock-icon that says in its tooltip 'Lock colorspace'.

When it's 'locked' we can still change the dropdown to other 'color models' and so probably to their connected color spaces in the settings (?).

I know about color spaces and models, but I'm not sure what this lock does. Couldn't find it in the help of Designer and nothing on this forum either.

What does this lock do?

[thomaso]

I yearn for a functioning color space lock since early betas. I see myself locked in the opinion this lock does nothing yet than to remind. Whomever.

k-only

cmyk

hsl

rgb

lab

In physics and optics it's not that one can switch harmless between those areas. Even though it might look appealing. A wave is not a pixel but every pixel has a wave.

Black is beautiful. And bright. But as long one can not detect whether its value is between 0, 100 , 127, -128 or 255 ... on 1 tint level, or on 2 or 3 or 4 ... how could one guess a colors' open end, without a lock?

[thomaso]

subtractive vs. additive

[walt.farrell]

From the Help (searching for Lock):

Quote

For any selected object, the Color panel will remember the color mode that the object was created in. Instead, using Sliders you can lock the color mode (e.g., CMYK sliders) to prevent the mode from changing. This avoids inadvertently swapping to another mode after using swatches or selecting a different object created with a different color mode. This lock only works on the current session; subsequent sessions will use the HSL color wheel as default.

 

[Fredrik M]

I have the same question, it does not matter which mode i'm in, i can change everything in the color panel anyway.

[Friksel]

6 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

From the Help (searching for Lock):

...

Thanks for finding this. I must have overlooked this.

I had to re-read this piece of help-text some times, but now I understand it. 

I was confused because of the (wrong) tooltiptext in the interface, saying 'lock colorspace'...

Actually what it does according to the helptext and what I see happening now, is that, when locked, the color panel is somewhat behaving like we would expect: after switching to a different view-mode to select colors it stays that way while working with all elements inside the document until we end the session (so close the file or quit the software).

But if we unlock it, suddenly every object has its color-panel-view-mode remembered from how it was during creation of the element. So if we create an element when the color-panel was in the RGB view mode (so we saw 3 r, g, b sliders) it remembers RGB-view-mode. So when switching between object-selections it also switches the color panel to the 'state'/color-panel-mode,  it was in when creating. So if we were selecting object B which was once colored using the 'HSL'-viewing-mode, it switches the panel from whatever viewing mode we were in to HSL.

To be honoust, I don't know when I would find this feature useful, but maybe it could help somebody that likes to work that way.

What I don't think is okay, is the name in the tooltip; that's confusing and misleading. It's saying 'Lock colorSPACE' and if I get the help-text right and based on what I now see what's happening, is that that's not at all what it is doing (and should not do!) now. The document has a colorSPACE, like sRGB, defined and I'm pretty sure we could not set elements inside that document to a different colorSPACE (like AdobeRGB or Wide Gamut RGB), because if that would be possible that would be madness all over the place, leads to a lot of confusing, unwanting conversions and would be very errorprone and lead to unwanted or unexpected results while exporting. So this has nothing to do with colorSPACES, not even colorMODELS the document is in.

[Friksel]

 

[thomaso]

Interesting. Could one tell please in what chapter the lock is mentioned? I had read the help text about Selection of Colour / Work with the Panel Colour  – but the lock is not mentioned in my German help text, I get German help only, even with English app language.

Unfortunately the help menu search doesn't show any help text results to me (only menu items).

  

 

[walt.farrell]

4 hours ago, thomaso said:

Could one tell please in what chapter the lock is mentioned?

Color Panel.

Though, interestingly, searching for "lock" in the online Help doesn't find it. And the text in the Designer Help differs from what I quoted above from Photo. Designer's Help says:

Quote

By default, the color space is locked when using Sliders (e.g., CMYK sliders) to prevent it from changing. This avoids inadvertently swapping to another mode after using swatches or selecting a different object created with a different color mode. When unlocked, the Color panel will remember the color mode that the selected object was created in. This lock only works on the current session; subsequent sessions will use the HSL color wheel as default.

 

[Friksel]

7 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

Color Panel.

Though, interestingly, searching for "lock" in the online Help doesn't find it. And the text in the Designer Help differs from what I quoted above from Photo. Designer's Help says:

 

Yeah, the help could definitely use some love. There are some important things missing and it's not always written in an easy to understand (and nice to read) way. Also some hyperlinks to other pages in the help would definitely help to dive deeper into the matter. Now it's all based on the search.

That said, it's great Serif got some help in their programs and it's nice to have a manual inside the app. With a little extra love this could be a very important source to get information.

[thomaso]

Thank you for the link to the help URL at serif.com. I haven't been aware it's also there.

Also, I have not noticed before Walt's hint that the lock indeed influences the color selector type.
I was confused by not locking color spaces and, even worse, regardless of lock on or off, I often get different, contradictory color values for a swatch. – For instance:

CMYK .afpub: If I double-click on a swatch of the default predefined ...

A.) Application palette "Greys", then I see 2-3 different indicators in:

1. the swatches name & tool tip: Black xx %
1.1. the popping up color selector: CMYK with K-only
2. the Color Panel: RGB sliders

If I now toggle in the color panel to the CMYK sliders then there it shows 4-c values, synchronously but contradictory to the K-only of 1.1.
If I export an object with such a "Grey" then it results in 4-c, not K-only, regardless what selector type is set in color panel before export.

 

B.) Application palette "Colors":

1. the swatches name & tool tip: HSL
1.1. the popping up color selector: CMYK
2. the Color panel: HSL

If I now toggle in the color panel to the CMYK slider then there it shows 4-c values which are different and contradictory to those in swatches panel:
color panel: cmyk  0  93 93 5
swatches p: cmyk 0  82 100 0

Again, an export results in the values from the color panel slider. What value do the swatches panel slider show?

 

C.) System palette "Web Safe Colors": do a search in swatches panel for "003":

1. with No document open: with double-click of any resulting swatch I get in the pop-up swatches panel RGB sliders the value 14 for the swatch name part 33.
2. with a document (Adobe RGB profile) opened: same as in 1. plus a 20 in Colors panel.

So I get 3 different values for 1 channel of a color swatch: 14, 20, 33 – How can I detect, with what value the swatch was saved?
 

Can one of you confirm such contradictory values?

Can one of you explain the differences within each of A., B. C.? Are they possibly related to different rendering intents (perceptual, relative, absolute, saturation) ?

 

[radek108]

Hello

"subsequent sessions will use the HSL color wheel as default"
hmm ... did anyone from the DTP industry prepare anything in InDesign, QuarkXPress in HSL color space? 🙂
why HSL is in the program preparing things for print or presentation and why HSL is the default mode?

when creating a document, the color space should be set.
when I create a document, I know why. if I do something for printing I need CMYK, if I click on an object in the color palette it should automatically switch e.g. to RGB if the object is RGB.
I do not understand this solution. after all, in all programs of this type it is simple ...

[rvsf]

On 6/28/2019 at 6:36 PM, Friksel said:

Gracias por encontrar esto. Debo haber pasado por alto esto.

Tuve que ree leer este texto de ayuda algunas veces, pero ahora lo entiendo.

Estaba confundido debido al texto de información sobre herramientas (incorrecto) en la interfaz, diciendo 'bloquear espacio de color'...

En realidad lo que hace según el helptext y lo que veo que sucede ahora, es que, cuando está bloqueado, el panel de color se comporta de alguna manera como cabría esperar: después de cambiar a un modo de vista diferente para seleccionar colores, permanece así mientras trabaja con todos los elementos dentro del documento hasta que terminamos la sesión (así que cierre el archivo o salga del software).

Pero si lo desbloqueamos, de repente cada objeto tiene su modo de vista de panel de colorrecordado de cómo era durante la creación del elemento. Entonces, si creamos un elemento cuando el panel de color estaba en el modo de vista RGB (por lo que vimos 3 controles deslizantes r, g, b) recuerda el modo de vista RGB. Entonces, al cambiar entre selecciones de objetos, también cambia el panel de color al modo 'estado' / panel de color, estaba en el momento de crear. Entonces, si estábamos seleccionando el objeto B que una vez fue coloreado usando el modo de visualización 'HSL', cambia el panel de cualquier modo de visualización en el que estuviéramos a HSL.

Para ser sincero, no sé cuándo encontraría útil esta característica, pero tal vez podría ayudar a alguien a quien le gusta trabajar de esa manera.

Lo que no creo que esté bien, es el nombre en la información sobre herramientas; eso es confuso y engañoso. Está diciendo 'Bloquearespaciode color' y si obtengo el texto de ayuda correcto y basado en lo que ahora veo lo que está sucediendo, es que eso no es en absoluto lo que está haciendo (¡y no debería hacer!) ahora. El documento tiene un colorSPACE, como s RGB, definido y estoy bastante seguro deque no podríamos establecer elementos dentro de ese documento a un colorSPACE diferente (como AdobeRGB o Wide Gamut RGB), porque si eso fuera posible, sería una locura por todas partes, conduce a muchas conversiones confusas y poco deseadas y sería muy erróneo y conduciría a resultados no deseados o inesperados durante la exportación. Así que esto no tiene nada que ver conlos ESPACIOS decolor, ni siquiera con losMODELOS de color en los que se encuentra el documento.

Yes, I agree, in Spanish it is also confusing

[Friksel]

On 11/3/2021 at 11:00 AM, rvsf said:

Yes, I agree, in Spanish it is also confusing

Fine if you'd like to post translations here, but I don't like people changing my words in quotes as if it was me writing them

[rvsf]

Quoting your translated message was a mistake, what I wanted to say is that in Spanish the lock is not understood either.

@Friksel

[Friksel]

Muchas gracias 😉