..
  SPDX-License-Identifier: CC-BY-4.0
  Copyright Contributors to the OpenColorIO Project.

.. _aces_studio:

OCIO Studio Config for ACES
===========================

The OCIO Studio Config for ACES is the successor to the widely used :ref:`ACES config <aces_1.0.3>`
for OCIO v1.

It contains the complete set of ACES color spaces, displays, and views.  In addition, it
contains some extra color spaces that are not officially part of ACES but that are widely 
used in the VFX, animation, games, and post-production industries.

Users who need a simpler config that contains just the basics needed to use ACES color
management in common DCC tools are encouraged to check out the :ref:`aces_cg`.

The most recent version of the Studio config is based on ACES 2.0.

The latest version of this config may be downloaded from the Releases page of its GitHub
`repo. <https://github.com/AcademySoftwareFoundation/OpenColorIO-Config-ACES/releases>`_

The Studio Config leverages the high quality ACES implementation built into OCIO itself
and so requires no external LUT files.  In fact, even the config file is built into OCIO
and users may access it from any application that uses OCIO 2.2 or higher by using one of the
following strings in place of the config path:

``ocio://studio-config-v4.0.0_aces-v2.0_ocio-v2.5``   (for OCIO 2.5 or higher)

``ocio://studio-config-v2.2.0_aces-v1.3_ocio-v2.4``   (for OCIO 2.4 or higher)

``ocio://studio-config-v2.1.0_aces-v1.3_ocio-v2.3``   (for OCIO 2.3 or higher)

``ocio://studio-config-v1.0.0_aces-v1.3_ocio-v2.1``   (for OCIO 2.2 or higher)

These new configs adopt an advanced naming convention so that they can be uniquely identified:

``studio-config-v1.0.0_aces-v1.3_ocio-v2.1.ocio``

``|-----|-------------|---------|---------|---|``

``|Type | Colorspaces | ACES    | Profile |   |``

Where:

* Type: The type of the config, e.g., CG or Studio
* Colorspaces: The version for the color spaces and other config features
* ACES: The aces-dev version being used (currently supports ACES 1.3 and 2.0)
* Profile: Minimum required OCIO version

In addition, the latest version of the Studio config may be accessed simply using:

``ocio://studio-config-latest``


The OCIO Configs Working Group collected input from the community and simplified the
naming scheme relative to the earlier OCIO v1 ACES configs.  However, aliases have been 
added so that the original color space names continue to work (if there is an equivalent
space in the new config).

Please note that with OCIO v2 we are trying to be more rigorous about what constitutes a 
"color space". For this reason, the new configs do not bake view transforms or looks into 
the display color spaces.  Therefore, it is necessary to use a DisplayViewTransform rather 
than a ColorSpaceTransform if you want to bake in an ACES Output Transform.  This is not 
only more rigorous from a color management point of view, it also helps clarify to end-users 
the important role of a view transform in the process.  Baking in a view transform is a 
fundamentally different process than just converting between color space encodings, and it 
should be perceived as such by users.
