Color Shift when importing PNG into After Effects

[Zajcek Skokovski]

Maybe when you were cutting them out, you also erased some of the bottle and made them half transperent?

[Eric Ewing]

Then why would the main files look fine?

I know it has something to do with them being imported into AE, and maybe it’s changing the color profiles or something?

[Zajcek Skokovski]

Have you tried toggling transparency grid on/of or putting a color solid behind it if it changes anything?

[Eric Ewing]

Yea, still nothing :/

[Zajcek Skokovski]

Hmm, this never occurred to me. I would try some other format like TARGA(which also supports transparency and is uncompressed) or just color correct it. I have no other idea, sry 🙁

[Walter Soyka]

What color profile are you using in Photoshop?

Do you have color management enabled in After Effects?

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Eric Ewing]

How do I go about finding out which color profile i’m using?

And how do I change color management in AE?

As far as I know i’m using RGB in Photoshop.

[Walter Soyka]

The same set of RGB numbers may translate to different colors when displayed on different devices. The point of color management is to provide a translation layer that alters the RGB numbers however necessary to provide the desired color on a given display.

[Eric Ewing] “How do I go about finding out which color profile i’m using?”

In Ps, Edit > Convert to Profile, then note the “Source Space.” You can then cancel out of the window without changing anything.

[Eric Ewing] “And how do I change color management in AE?”

You enable color management in your project settings by setting a working space. (sRGB IEC91966-2.1 or Rec. 709 are good defaults.) Now Ae will convert your sources from their embedded profiles to the working space, and by default, will output in the working space. Choosing sRGB or Rec. 709 as your working space means your output will be one of the common monitoring spaces for computer or HD displays, respectively (although you should expect some deviation from display to display from these ideals).

If your source was already sRGB, you should not expect any change in output from Ae, though you may see a change within Ae, since it is now using a color managed pipeline through to your display.

Lots more information here:
https://helpx.adobe.com/after-effects/using/color-management.html

You can also search this forum for “color management.” It’s a topic I’ve written about extensively in the past. I’d be happy to try to answer any other questions you may have.

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Eric Ewing]

Walter, you’re the best! Not sure if this was just a work-around method but in Photoshop I just changed the color profile to Rec. 709, re-saved another PNG and imported into AE and it seems to work great!

Thanks for the help!

[Walter Soyka]

[Eric Ewing] “Walter, you’re the best! Not sure if this was just a work-around method but in Photoshop I just changed the color profile to Rec. 709, re-saved another PNG and imported into AE and it seems to work great!”

You’ve done some manual color management here. Applications often assume Rec. 709 for HD video, so by converting the original image to Rec. 709, you’ve ensured that Ae, with color management off, will simply pass pixels through.

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]