Difference in color between PM and Mac OS X Preview

[sigmadp2user]

I am running on a MacBook pro and using Photo Ninja as an external editor.  I developed one raw file in Photo Ninja and saved it as a jpeg. When I view the jpeg in Photo Mechanic, it has a different appearance than when viewed in Preview, the MAC viewer.  The Preview version looked identical to the view in Photo Ninja, but the view in Photo Mechanic had subdued color and overall was darker.

Shouldn't they look the same? I am attaching the jpeg, thinking you might open it in Photo Mechanic and also in some other viewer.

[Hayo Baan]

Looks like you might have gotten PM to not manage colours. Check the top right icon on the PM Window and click it; it should be brightly coloured when colours are managed and dull when not. It should be On.

I think that will solve your problem

PS: your JPG had the ProPhoto RGB colour space. While I recommend using this colour space for >=16bit image editing, it is not what I would recommend for JPG; ProPhoto RGB is a bit too big for just 8 bits of colour data and you run the risk of loosing the smoothness in some of the gradients. Besides, it requires the recipient to have colour management too, or otherwise the colours look dull (like what you saw in PM) as they will get interpreted as sRGB by default.

[sigmadp2user]

Thanks, so much.  Somehow the contact sheet window had color management ON, but the cmd-R review window did not and that's where the image looked dull. And thanks for the information about the color space.  That was a left over from the past that I had overlooked.  I really appreciate the help.

[Hayo Baan]

You're welcome