Convert an image RGB->Lab with python

Question

What is the preferred way of doing the conversion using PIL/Numpy/SciPy today?

Answer 1

At the moment I haven't found a good package to do that. You have to bear in mind that RGB is a device-dependent colour space so you can't convert accurately to XYZ or CIE Lab if you don't have a profile.

So be aware that many solutions where you see converting from RGB to CIE Lab without specifying the colour space or importing a colour profile must be carefully evaluated. Take a look at the code under the hood most of the time they assume that you are dealing with sRGB colour space.