Windows Color System: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 08:19, 13 August 2008

Revision as of 15:43, 1 November 2008

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[[Image:Windows Vista Color Management.png|thumb|Screenshot of the Color Management [[Control Panel (Windows)|control panel]] which is used to configure Windows Color System settings.]]

'''Windows Color System''' (WCS{{Fact|date=May 2008}})''' is a platform for [[color management]] exclusive to [[Windows Vista]] that strives to achieve color consistency across various software and hardware, including cameras, monitors, printers and scanners.<ref>[http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/display/color/WCS.mspx Windows Color System]</ref> Different devices interpret the same colors differently, according to their software and hardware configurations. As a result, they must be properly calibrated to reproduce colors consistently across different devices. WCS aims to make this process of [[color calibration]] automatic and transparent, as an evolution of [[ICC profile]]s.

Windows Color System features a completely redesigned ''Color Infrastructure and Translation Engine'' (CITE) at its core. It is backed up by an enhanced color processing pipeline that supports bit-depths more than 32 bits per pixel, multiple color channels (more than three), alternative [[color space]]s and [[high dynamic range]] coloring, using a technology named ''Kyuanos''<ref>[http://www.digitalcamerainfo.com/content/Windows-Vista-to-use-Canon-Color-Management-.htm Windows Vista to use Canon software]</ref> developed by [[Canon Inc.|Canon]]. The color processing pipeline allows device developers to add their own [[Color management#Gamut mapping|gamut mapping]] algorithm into the pipeline to customize the color response of the device. The new pipeline also supports floating point calculations to minimize [[round-off error]]s, which are inherent in integer processing. Once the color pipeline finishes processing the colors, the CITE engine applies a [[color translation]] according to a color profile, specific to a device to ensure the output color matches to what is expected.