A Little Help?

[Jamian]

I've already posted this on Flickr, but I wanted to ask here as well...

Alright, here's the situation. I have kind of a convoluted method of posting photos on Flickr. Usually I process and edit them at home but post them from my computer at work in the morning.

I've begun to notice that when I view the photos on my work monitor, they look washed out and dull. A simple increase in blacks can usually correct this but when I view the adjusted image at home again it looks too black and saturated.

Can I get some opinions on which of these two photos looks better? The one I just posted above is before the black increase and the one below is after. I really appreciate any opinions on this so I can sort out this monitor issue once and for all. Thanks everyone.

 

[disneyboy2003]

I, personally, like the 1st one. I think the 2nd one is too black.

However, the underlying issue seems to be that you need to have both your computer monitors calibrated. You can go to your local computer store and buy a device that calibrates your monitor. You can find one for less than $100.

Calibration is a topic that is commonly covered in many Intro to Digital Photography books. For years, I thought my monitor was okay and thought I didn't need calibration. But once I bought the Spyder 3 monitor calibration thingy (pretty technical, huh?), I found out that this whole time my monitor was a bit light blue! So the whites on my screen were never truly white...they were displaying a subtle light blue. That meant that all my post-processing work on my photos were probably off by a little bit.

If you have a printer, you might also have to look into calibrating your printer, too.

The goal of all this calibration is to have the "correct" colors from the camera to the computer to the printer and ultimately to the print.


...which reminds me, I need to re-calibrate my monitor. I'm WAY overdue...

 

[VVFF]

The previous poster is correct. It all has to do with monitor calibration. I also agree that the first picture is much much better.

 

[RBennett]

I personally like the second one, but I could see where it might be a LITTLE too black. Is there a version 1.5 that is between the two of them? But in all seriousness, I think it comes down to personal preference. I like the blacks in the sky of the second one, but in the first one the majority of the picture is nice.

 

[photo_chick]

Monitor calibration is a huge factor. But things like ambient light, browser colorspace, any optimizations the hosting site runs, is the monitor LCD or CRT... they also play a part.

I wouldn't stress too much about what it looks like online because you can't control these factors for your viewers. Focus on what it looks like when you print.

 

[Evad]

I'll vote for the 2nd one as well!! I love deep rich looking colours.

 

[dioxide45]

I would agree that the first is the better photo. We have run the Spider on our PC. In fact we have run it on all of our computers. It is definitely worth the money.

 

[SrisonS]

I personally like the second one, but I could see where it might be a LITTLE too black. Is there a version 1.5 that is between the two of them? But in all seriousness, I think it comes down to personal preference. I like the blacks in the sky of the second one, but in the first one the majority of the picture is nice.

Ditto.

Would you happen to have access to a "third opinion" source, like an iPhone or something??? I recently discovered that my monitor was definitely uncalibrated recently. I've had the monitor for a few years now; and even then, someone just gave it to us used. But it never occurred to me that I even neded to calibrate it. But as I was viewing one of my pictures on my iPhone, I could see red spots in the clouds of it (i was an HDR shot); but they were totally white on my home pc. Initially, I could see the reds at home, but thought I got rid of them. So I did a quick little calibration, and lo and behold, I could see the reds. Even websites like Flickr looked different. You know how there are light blue boxes around things on the site??? Well, everything was completely white before (I sort of noticed the differences in when viewing Flickr on my laptop; but I just thought it was different browsers acting differently).

But again, picture one doesn't look dull at all. And yes, I'm viewing this on my phone right now.

 

[jeffb]

Hi Jamian,

When you upload the photos are the jpgs using the SRGB colorspace? If you upload an Adobe RBG colorspace jpg, many browsers will display them with colors that looked washed out.

 

[Jamian]

Hi Jamian,

When you upload the photos are the jpgs using the SRGB colorspace? If you upload an Adobe RBG colorspace jpg, many browsers will display them with colors that looked washed out.

Hey Jeff, I'm pretty sure I use SRGB but I should check that out thanks.

 

[Jamian]

I guess I had better just suck it up and get my monitor calibrated, thanks everyone for your help.

Cheers,

 

[RBennett]

The funny thing is that when I read this post last night, I was at home on my laptop and saw a pretty significant difference between the two photos. Now that I am at work and looking at the two of them though, I see very LITTLE difference. Amazing what a difference it makes!

 

[MICKEY88]

The funny thing is that when I read this post last night, I was at home on my laptop and saw a pretty significant difference between the two photos. Now that I am at work and looking at the two of them though, I see very LITTLE difference. Amazing what a difference it makes!

I noticed the same thing this morning

 

[Daisy14'sDH]

It would be helpful if there was an online calibrator that used everyday objects to compare with.

Red could be adjusted with a bottle of Heinz Ketchup, White could be done with a glass of milk.

I did a search online but its all dependant on your eyes looking for differences instead of a colour comparism.

Now that I've typed all that, is there an online resource like that?

 

[PhotographyDR]

As far as the picture, I think both have good qualities that add to the shot. The second one really has that nice deep black sky. The first has a lot of hidden details in it that really are lost when the black levels are raised in the second shot. Don't know what editing software you use but in Photoshop or Lightroom you could selectively darken key areas in the shot. I would leave the sky dark. Increase saturation or vibrance on the rest. Maybe a little sharpening and I think you would get the best of both worlds.

 

[disneyboy2003]

It would be helpful if there was an online calibrator that used everyday objects to compare with.

Red could be adjusted with a bottle of Heinz Ketchup, White could be done with a glass of milk.

I did a search online but its all dependant on your eyes looking for differences instead of a colour comparism.

Now that I've typed all that, is there an online resource like that?

The closest I've seen to something like that is a calibration kit from Mpix.com. Here's the link to Mpix & its calibration kit: http://www.mpix.com/Kits.aspx/calibrationkit

Basically, they send you both a digital version of an image and the same image as a printed photo. Your job is to match colors of the digital image on your monitor to the ones in the printed photo. The entire calibration kit is only $3, so you really can't go wrong!