Defining Photoshop’s Color Settings

Free Photoshop Tutorial

Master the art of color management in Photoshop with this detailed guide, providing step-by-step instructions to customize settings for optimized image display and printing.

This exercise is excerpted from Noble Desktop’s past Photoshop color managment training materials and is compatible with Photoshop updates through 2018. To learn current skills in Photoshop, check out our Photoshop Bootcamp and graphic design classes in NYC and live online.

Exercise Overview

Color Management affects how Photoshop displays images on-screen, as well as how they print out. You will customize these settings for your own needs, but for now we must ensure that your color settings are set properly so the following exercises will look and work correctly.

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  1. Launch Photoshop.

  2. Go to Edit > Color Settings.

  3. If you can’t see all the options shown below, click More Options on the right.

  4. From the Settings menu at the top, choose North America Prepress 2.

  5. All the settings shown should already be set, but double-check them anyway.

    default color settings

  6. Click OK and you are done.

    NOTE: The above settings are what we’re using for this class. Everyone’s workflow is different. While these settings may be correct for your work, we don’t want to say everyone must use them. You’ll soon learn more about how you can customize them to your needs.

photo of Dan Rodney

Dan Rodney

Dan Rodney has been a designer and web developer for over 20 years. He creates coursework for Noble Desktop and teaches classes. In his spare time Dan also writes scripts for InDesign (Make Book JacketProper Fraction Pro, and more). Dan teaches just about anything web, video, or print related: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Figma, Adobe XD, After Effects, Premiere Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and more.

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