tom rumland
(K=14874) - Comment Date 6/6/2004
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patrick, i empathise with you. i use G4's as well and have the very same issue. however, i only noticed it when i was at a friend's house and used his PC to show him some of my photos. they looked terrible! all i could think was, " this is NOT my photo!". again, i can't tell if the problem was his screen or not.
i think the issue is the color temp difference between PCs and Macs. i wanted to compare your photos to mine color-wise but i see you haven't uploaded any yet. take a look at mine on both machines. is there a difference? i'm very, very curious about this issue.
hopefully someone else here can help us out.
take care,
tom
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Betsy Hern
(K=12872) - Comment Date 6/7/2004
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Three things come to mind when you are talking about Mac vs PC display - gamma, brightness/contrast and the video card in the computer. Is the gamma on your Mac set to 1.8 (previous standard)? Reset it to 2.2 (PC and modern day graphics standard for both platforms) and then adjust the brightness and contrast and you will see less difference when viewing your Mac-created photos on a PC.
Macs have better video cards and show more clarity and color depth. So when you view your image on a monitor hooked up to a Mac it almost always looks better than when you view it on the same monitor hooked up to a PC (generally speaking). The Mac has better electronic conventions when it comes to displaying accurate color on the screen. You can do some adjusting to compensate.
The factory adjustment for your computer monitor is nearly always wrong because the brightness is turned up too high. What's more, the contrast is nearly always turned down too low. Try turning the brightness way down and the contrast way up and you'll have a much better picture. This should restore the proper balance.
All PC monitors have low gamma - that is, the 50% gray is in fact displayed darker than it should be. This can be a problem if you edit images on a PC. If your PC-created image looks dark, you naturally brighten it. Now the new image would look fine on your monitor, but viewed on systems with gamma correction such as a Mac this would give you a washed-out image.
Sounds like your problem might stem from when you are editing your image on your Mac. Do some experimenting with gamma, and your brightness/contrast until your posted images "pop" like you want them to. Monitor color calibration is no easy thing. Graphic professionals spend a lot of time getting their monitors calibrated properly so the color is true from monitor working space to print. Throw in the world of the web and you have even more color issues. Different browsers even display colors differently.
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(K=907) - Comment Date 6/7/2004
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Tom and Betsy,
Thanks to both of you for taking the time to reply.
Unfortunately within an hour of posting my forum message I had all my camera equipment and laptop stolen!! It has broken my heart!
So for the next few weeks or so I will dedicate my time to this site and see if I can pick up some more tips. Hopefully within short I should be able to post some of my own images on this site (once I have travelled up to the states to purchase replacement equipment)!
Thank you both and I look forward to keeping in touch.
Best wishes.
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Sebastian Fainbraun
(K=542) - Comment Date 8/16/2004
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Sorry to hear about your equipment. I had the same problem between two PCs. I used the Adobe monitor callibration tool and the problem went away. It is amazing what a difference callibration makes. Before callibration my pictures were completely pixelated (meaning that colors were not blending well); I assumed it was a bad video card or something because the pictues looked just awefull. With the calibration it went away completely.
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(K=907) - Comment Date 8/16/2004
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Sebastian, Thanks for taking the time to reply. I have since replaced my equipment and I am pleased to say tat I finally sorted out the problem. I am now preparing my photos for the web through the use of ImageReady (Photoshop CS). This immediately seems to give me a true rendition of what the photo will look like on the web. I now edit same in photoshop and then colour calibrate in ImageReady. Finally I am getting the colours I saw through the view finder!
PS I also calibrated the monitor.
Thanks again!
Patrick
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Sebastian Fainbraun
(K=542) - Comment Date 8/16/2004
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Patrick,
I have no problems with print and screen but I do with the web. I've never used ImageReady on my PS. Could you tell me a bit more about it and what it is that you are doing on it?
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(K=907) - Comment Date 8/16/2004
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Sebastian,
I am just leaving Sao Paulo office for the airport. Have a flight to RIO this afternoon. Will definitely come back to you on this tomorrow and Let you have all the info regarding Image Ready! Be good! speak to you tomorrow!
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(K=907) - Comment Date 8/17/2004
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Hi Sebastian,
OK in follow up to our conversation of yesterday, let me explain what I have managed to do with Image Ready. Image Ready comes as standard in the PHOTOSHOP CS PACKAGE. Basically it allows the user to prepare his photos for publication (in this case for the web) which includes compression (jpeg), resizing etc. I use photoshop for the editing of my photos but if I then upload them "as is" onto UF the final photo comes out very pale, washed out with no vibrant colours. T4 what I do now is the following:
In Photoshop under FILE there is an option "Edit in Image Ready". I accept this option and Image ready opens with my photo which now looks pale, washed out etc!!! I simply edit the photo (basically increase saturation, balance out the contrast etc) in order to get the photo back to the same colouring as I had in photoshop. Once done I save the optimized photo for the web.
When I finally upload the Image Ready version to UF it is an exact replica of the final result I got in Image Ready. There is no change in colours, saturation etc.
You can see an example, if you look at my portfolio the first 4 photos were edited in photoshop only and then uploaded to UF. The colours are quite pale and certainly nothing like the what I hoped for. However if you look at the last photo I published (FLOWER - http://www.usefilm.com/image/519570.html) I used IMAGE READY for the first time and the colours and saturation is exatly what I hoped for.
There may be other ways of doing this however so far this is the best method I have found. Maybe someone else has some suggestions!
Let me know your comments and how you get on!
Good luck,
Patrick
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Sebastian Fainbraun
(K=542) - Comment Date 8/17/2004
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I will try it. I still dont understand why a file edited in PS CS and ImageReady would be different? Does IR have a different algorithim for saving sRGB images for the web?
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(K=907) - Comment Date 8/17/2004
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I don?t know Sebastian. I wish I could give you an answer. Possibly you could ask the forum again for comments in a separate message. This is the only way I have found to get my photos to where I want them! Let me know, there must be others out there with the same problem.
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Sebastian Fainbraun
(K=542) - Comment Date 8/17/2004
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Thanks, Patrick. I will definitely use your trick. Hopefully my pictures will look less muted. I also wonder if there is an optimal size and resolution for web publishing. I usually use the BetterPhoto format which is 750x500 pixels at 300DPI.
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