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the colors of my renderings look off (brighter / less saturated) outside of blender. – compare the image in the finder (left), and in blender (right):

screenshot

how can I make sure the results look just like in blender?

edit: more info

this is on late 2016 macbook pro. and I'm talking about the built-in display: display settings

the rendering looks the same in finder and photoshop. also using exr as output format does not seem to make a difference.

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    $\begingroup$ Need more context. What platform are you developing on? What type of display? What file format are you encoding to? What software are you viewing in? If you are on an Apple product post late 2015, Blender's default view transforms are completely wrong. $\endgroup$
    – troy_s
    Sep 9, 2018 at 13:27
  • $\begingroup$ @troy_s I edited my question, adding more information. $\endgroup$
    – kindoflike
    Sep 9, 2018 at 14:17

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Update September 20, 2018 - Filmic now Supports Apple DCI-P3!

You can download the branch for testing here. It will get merged into the main branch after a little time for testing.

Original Answer

The issue is that Blender isn't designed for your MacBook Pro 2016 nor any model beyond it. I have brought up this point many times, but no one cares.

The reason is that the RGB coloured lights in your MacBook Pro are different to the sRGB standard coloured lights. Blender's camera rendering transforms (displays and views) are designed solely for REC.709 based displays. Blender simply sends values that are encoded assuming REC.709 flashlights at the display, and when those lights aren't REC.709 colours, the results are completely broken.

macOS assumes imagery without an ICC profile attached are sRGB. This is close to how the imagery is designed to look, when viewed through Preview, as Preview will properly transform the imagery to the DCI-P3 based lights in your display.

So what is the problem, exactly? Blender is showing you incorrect colours while working within it. In order to properly get a 1:1 WYSIWYG within Blender, the developers would need to integrate a series of camera rendering transforms designed for your display, as well as fix Blender's areas where it isn't properly colour managed.

With a little effort, you could test the values in the development branch Filmic Blender. Sadly, I haven't had time to update the entire configuration to support Apple P3 displays, but the basic values are in there for testing.

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  • $\begingroup$ by assigning the output file the icc profile of the macbook display, I got it to like in blender (the background color being identical). – however, if I then convert it to sRGB, it goes back to being paler / less saturated. should that conversion step not try to keep the overall look of the image, or am I assuming s.th. wrong? $\endgroup$
    – kindoflike
    Sep 11, 2018 at 9:29
  • $\begingroup$ Again, you are not supposed to be looking at the colours as they are in Blender. That is wrong. You are looking at sRGB coloured light ratios projected out P3 lights. The proper method is to render using a proper view designed for the P3 display, which converts from the sRGB coloured light ratios to match the intended colours under P3 light ratios. Then tag with an ICC as desired. That transform line is in the development version of Filmic, but untested and not applied to all views. $\endgroup$
    – troy_s
    Sep 11, 2018 at 16:23
  • $\begingroup$ with filmic blender, renderings in the blender viewport look a lot more like my previous renderings. new renderings (outside of blender) look very pale now, but assigning the display profile, and converting to sRGB does it! $\endgroup$
    – kindoflike
    Sep 29, 2018 at 12:12
  • $\begingroup$ macOS should assume an image without an ICC tag is sRGB by default. There shouldn't be any conversion required, simply assign or tag via ImageMagick. Conversion would be incorrect. Use the new configuration, render, and optionally tag / assign an sRGB profile. $\endgroup$
    – troy_s
    Sep 29, 2018 at 12:38

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