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Cableaddict
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p.1 #1 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

I'm very, VERY new to the concept of file manipulation & transfer. I just discovered this problem and it's pretty nasty. I'm hoping someone can at least point me to a website or book that will explain how to deal with it:

I never had a problem with my old P&S camera, but with my current system I'm seeing a MASSIVE change in picture quality (exposure, contrast, saturation) when viewing my Mac-made files on a pc. Here's the details:
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I shoot a Canon 5D, always in raw. I convert the raw files to TIFF with Optics Pro.

I tweak my images in the Mac, using Leopard-Preview, or CS2, then eventually save dthem as jpegs. (set to highest quality)

I want to send large bunches of them to friends, on cd's or dvd's. Very few of the people I will send them to are into photography, so they will likely just double-click the pics to view them. Most will have pc's, not Macs, and so (I assume) will use the stock "Windows Picture Viewer" application.

I just made a data DVD for a friend, and when I opened the files on my pc, all the pics look massively over-exposed, oversaturated, and heavily contrasted. This is WAY more than what could be attributed to a non-calibrated monitor.

Is this normal? (As I said, I never had a problem before with my old P&S camera)
--------------------------------------------------

One possibility:

Could it be due to my just having installed Leopard on my Mac? Not coincidentally, ever since Leopard, my pics also print badly, and in "sort of" the same way: Not over-exposed, but over-saturated to an absurd degree. - But that's some kind of print-driver issue. I'm only mentioning it in case Leopard might be causing OTHER issues. -but what?

I'm rather desperate here !!!!!!! I also need to send pics as promotional material for my (non-photog) business so this is costing me serious money.

HEEEELP !!!!!!!!!

Edited on Sep 28, 2008 at 06:43 AM · View previous versions

Sep 28, 2008 at 06:31 AM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #2 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

More info: (in case it helps)

In the pc, the files are all marked: _MG_ plus a number.

This is how the Mac tags the jpegs.

I burn them using Toast, and always have the "Mac & PC" selector checked.

Is it possible I have to click some OTHER setting for PC-compatibility?

Sep 28, 2008 at 06:40 AM

Sunny Sra
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p.1 #3 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

how did you save the JPEG files? did you embed profiles or is it using sRGB? MS photo viewer is not a color managed application so if you have profiles embedded you may want to remove them and just leave sRGB attached.

Sep 28, 2008 at 06:48 AM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #4 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Thanks, Sunny.

I don't even know what that means. I have no idea where to even start learning about this stuff.
I've got the camera-lens-lighting thing down really well, taking great shots & in full control. -but then it all turns to some sort of techno nightmare.

Right now I just need to get through this one, serious hurdle.

I never even THOUGHT about profiles. That's something I equate with printing, and probably has something to do with my problems printing under Leopard. (even though I have the lastest Epson profiles, not that I know what that means...)

I tried re-burning the jpegs using the Mac's built-in burn feature, instead of Toast, and they look exactly the same. I tried two PC's and a windows laptop, and all look pretty much the same. On the two new machines, the saturation is a little better, but the exposure is even MORE blown out.
It's really, REALLY bad.

I'm just lost here.

Assuming you are correct:

What would cause a profile to be embedded with the jpegs, and how do I remove it?

Sep 28, 2008 at 07:27 AM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #5 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Here's the (possibly pertinent) data I see, on one of these jpegs, if I do a "get info" in my Mac:

Dimensions: 4368 X 2912

Color Space: RGB - is this the problem

I shot raw, so is this set in the converter?

Profile Name: Adobe RGB (1998)

Alpha channel: 0
---------------------------

I created these jpegs, from edited TIFF's, using Optics Pro. It gives the following options for ICC profiles:

As Shot.
sRGB
Adobe RGB
Custom - I assume this lets me pick any profile on my hard drive. (if only I knew why I might do that)

So, which is best, for both Mac & PC, if I don't intend to print them?

If I change them now, will I lose quality?
---------------------------------------------------

Related questions, if someone can stand to deal with such basics:

1: If the best profile for printing is different, am I actually supposed to make a DIFFERENT (separate) jpeg for that?

2: Can I just save the TIFFS, and print directly from THEM, choosing the best profile for any given printer at that time?

3: Where the heck can I learn all this? I literally don't know where to turn.

I'M SO DESPERATE, I MAY ACTUALLY GO TO KEN ROCKWELL'S SITE!
(The Kenster recommends just staying with sRGB for everything.)

MASSIVE Thanks to anyone willing to spend the time getting me jump-started on this.

Sep 28, 2008 at 07:33 AM

jerryrock
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p.1 #6 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

The first step to color management is to calibrate your monitor with a colorimeter.

The Mac defaults to a gamma setting of 1.8, you should change it to 2.2 as it is now accepted as the standard for both platforms.

Adobe RGB provides a wider color space than sRGB and unless viewed from a color aware application such as Photoshop, Safari or Firefox3, will appear washed out in applications that assume an sRGB color space.

This article will help to understand color management with a Mac:

http://images.apple.com/pro/pdf/Color_Mgmt_inTiger.pdf

Jerry

Sep 28, 2008 at 04:33 PM

CTYankee
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p.1 #7 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

It is likely a combination of using Adobe RGB and non calibrated monitors. The differences you see are entirely possibly due to the different screen profiles. The ONLY way to evaluate color, saturation, and contrast is on a quality monitor that has been profiled with a hardware deveice (colorimeter).

Sep 28, 2008 at 08:10 PM

fizzy
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p.1 #8 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Read the "Workflow Guidelines" link at the top of this page. It's a good intro to color spaces.

You basically are having the problem that you seem to have ColorSync set to a low gamma setting, as Jerry noted, and your images are being saved in "Adobe RGB" color space. For editing, that's fine (better really) but for viewing on Windows Viewer and other non-pro-photo programs, sRGB is what you want. Your old P&S camera only shot in sRGB, so you never had this problem.

Go into System Preferences, Displays, Color tab, Claibrate... and do that, it'll get you closer than nothing. Make sure the gamma is set to 2.2. Choosing the "sRGB" option in your program and working in that from the beginning is easiest and will keep your pics looking correct anywhere until you get a handle on color management. There are a number of good books, or just hang here for a while.

Sep 28, 2008 at 08:34 PM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #9 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Thanks, all. This is a GREAT help.

I appreciate all the time you took.

Sep 29, 2008 at 01:32 AM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #10 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

OK, I'm losing my mind over this.

Using the several wokflows available, I have made what SHOULD be sRGB-tagged jpegs with CS2. Some were done with the "save srgb embedded" and some were not. Some were also done with the "save for web - jpeg" command. It has been mentioned in several threads (pluFizzy, above) that embedding is not necessary, and makes the file larger.

ALL were shot with srgb set in my camera (well, I shot raw, but I set this just in case.)
All were converted from RAW to TIFF, with Optics Pro, set for sRGB.
I have CS2 set for sRGB as its color space.
I always select "convert to working color space" when importing a non-embedded pic.

AND YET, the two jpegs I just made, one embedded and one not (but theoretically using the sRGB profile) look COMPLETELY different - even on my MAC'S monitor. One is so much lighter, it's scary. The darker one has sRGB embedded, and looks just like the original TIFF.

I thought, from what was written above, that it was NOT critical to embed the profile, so what's going on here?

Take a look: (just test shots)

1: Embedded Looks like the TIFF. (the shot itself was underexposed, but this jpeg is accurate)

2: Not embedded, but converted to working sRGB and saved for web (looks way too bright, compared to the TIFF)

2008 © Cableaddict

2008 © Cableaddict

2008 © Cableaddict

Edited on Oct 07, 2008 at 03:41 PM · View previous versions

Oct 07, 2008 at 01:58 PM

tomm101
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p.1 #11 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Last week one of the docs I work for said she needed a portrait for a program she was teaching in. The organizers wanted TIF files, so that is what I sent, the doc wanted to see the files, I was busy so I just shrunk the and jpeged the images and sent them to her, for getting sRGB. I was walking by her work area later and asked her how she liked the pic. She said they were fine, one was on her scene and yuck the skin color was awful. Did a dope slap but was just happy about folks that weren't color aware.

Tom

Oct 07, 2008 at 02:07 PM

Alistair Watson
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p.1 #12 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

I primarily shoot RAW. My camera is set to Adobe RGB. My Adobe Photoshop CS3 working colour space is set to Adobe RGB. I decided on the Adobe RGB colour space because it larger than sRGB. When preparing images for my website, I have a CS3 action which resizes the image to 700 pixels on the long side and converts the colour to sRGB.

As Jerry wrote, you really do need to calibrate both your systems to Gamma 2.2 to ensure consistency in the images across platforms.

Oct 07, 2008 at 02:20 PM

paulhodson
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p.1 #13 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Bear in mind that sRGB even on a calibrated monitor and not in a color managed application will look bad on a wide gamut monitor. If you have a wide gamut monitor and your friends do not they will actually get a better version than you see yourself. Wide gamut monitors NEED color managed application at all times.

Oct 07, 2008 at 03:46 PM

jerryrock
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p.1 #14 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Both images look identical on my calibrated monitor with FireFox 3 and Safari on my Mac.
Color aware browsers like Safari will assume sRGB for an image without an embedded color space.

I don't know how you processed these files, but the file without the colorspace embedded is actually larger than the one you posted with the color space embedded.

Personally, I always embed the sRGB colorspace in all of my web images.

2008 © jerryrock

2008 © jerryrock

Oct 07, 2008 at 07:43 PM

paulhodson
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p.1 #15 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

jerryrock wrote:
Color aware browsers like Safari will assume sRGB for an image without an embedded color space.

With a monitor like my Dell 2408 though, even Safari does not show images without an embedded profile accurately. sRGB is OK.

Firefox 3 seems OK with or without an embedded profile

Oct 07, 2008 at 08:44 PM

Greg Lutke
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p.1 #16 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

For what its worth:
Both images look identical on my calibrated monitor (Eye One Display 2) with Internet Explore on my PC.

You will, in time, fully understand color management - on either a Mac or PC. Picking a platform will not make anyone mysteriously understand color on computers.

You may find reading Andrew Rodney's color management book, "Color Management for Photographers" a great start. Although not simple at first, it really does make perfect sense afterwards.

Best of luck - its a great journey!

Oct 08, 2008 at 12:23 AM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #17 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

jerryrock wrote:
Both images look identical on my calibrated monitor with FireFox 3 and Safari on my Mac.
Color aware browsers like Safari will assume sRGB for an image without an embedded color space.

How the heck can this be? I am ALSO looking at them, in this thread, on a Mac via Safari, and they look glaringly different!

This is starting to make me insane....

BTW - the reason for the size difference: In CS2, when you choose "embed the profile" you get much smaller choice of sizes. The next notch up put it over the FM Forums 350K limit, so I had to male it around 250K. When you use the "save for web" command, the dliniations a much finer, and I was able to choose just-under 350K.
-----------------

Anyway-

I guess the answer to my "problem" is simply to always embed the profile.

-But I thought I was, when I did the conversion from RAW to TIFF. If my TIFF file has sRGB embedded, shouldn't the jpegs made in CS2 also be embedded, unless I specifically tell CS2 to strip it out?

Edited on Oct 08, 2008 at 04:18 PM · View previous versions

Oct 08, 2008 at 01:36 AM

paulhodson
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p.1 #18 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

OK - compared images on two tabs so I could switch from one other to the other to check any differences. Did this in each of three browsers.

For me on a wide gamut calibrated monitor:

Firefox 3 they look identical
IE they look identical

Safari bottom image is brighter and over saturated

Take of that what you will. You would I believe get different results on a different monitor. As I have said before in many posts wide gamut monitors bring problems relating to this unless you use fully color aware browsers and other programs (and that does not include Safari)

They would also have looked similar on my monitor and in Firefox 3 if one had (incorrectly) been aRGB. This would not though apply in Internet Explorer.

Oct 08, 2008 at 06:14 AM

Steverock01
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p.1 #19 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

They look identical on my monitor as well (Eye-1 Calibrated and IE 64-bit Explorer).

Oct 08, 2008 at 08:23 AM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #20 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

paulhodson wrote:

Firefox 3 they look identical
IE they look identical

Safari bottom image is brighter and over saturated
.

Ughhh. So this is some kind of issue with Safari? -But only with SOME monitors?

Or is it a monitor issue?

I need to solve this now, I don't have time to get a doctorate in color management. the differences I'm seeing on my Mac are small, but siginificant. The differences I'm seeing on some pc's is HUGE. I'm sending out promotional materials, and this could actually cost me money.

It's clearly NOT a calibration issue.
----------------------------------------------

Again, if I figure out how to always have sRGB embedded (why CS2 doesn't do that when it does "save for web" is puzzling) then I should be OK?

Oct 08, 2008 at 07:20 PM

fizzy
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p.1 #21 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Cableaddict wrote:
How the heck can this be? I am ALSO looking at them, in this thread, on a Mac via Safari, and they look glaringly different!

That leads me to believe that you do not have your monitor profile set correctly in ColorSync. Safari is showing the "embedded" JPEG correctly, but your monitor is so far off from sRGB (which is more-or-less what monitors end up to be) that the other looks way different. When I look at them, they are exactly the same. (When Paul looks at them on his wide-gamut monitor that is not close to sRGB, they look different. But as he said, that is a different, special case.) I think I suggested before, go to Display, Color, Calibrate control panel, set gamma to 2.2, and go through the calibration. Make sure you have the monitor profile set to the profile you create, and not Adobe RGB or something else which is not a monitor profile.

If my TIFF file has sRGB embedded, shouldn't the jpegs made in CS2 also be embedded, unless I specifically tell CS2 to strip it out?
Not using "Save For Web," which strips everything out of the JPEG.

Again, if I figure out how to always have sRGB embedded (why CS2 doesn't do that when it does "save for web" is puzzling) then I should be OK?

No. That would be fine if everyone saw your pix in Safari or Firefox, but for the rest of the world, you need to get the color right without embedding. Which isn't as hard as it seems to you now, you just need to take a breath and go back over things. read the Mac help about ColorSync, read the Photoshop help about color, which is not too complicated either.

Oct 08, 2008 at 09:47 PM

jerryrock
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p.1 #22 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Cableaddict wrote:
Ughhh. So this is some kind of issue with Safari? -But only with SOME monitors?

Or is it a monitor issue?

I need to solve this now, I don't have time to get a doctorate in color management. the differences I'm seeing on my Mac are small, but siginificant. The differences I'm seeing on some pc's is HUGE. I'm sending out promotional materials, and this could actually cost me money.

It's clearly NOT a calibration issue.
----------------------------------------------

Again, if I figure out how to always have sRGB embedded (why CS2 doesn't do that when it does "save for web" is puzzling) then I should be OK?

Invest in a colorimeter and calibrate your monitor.

Oct 08, 2008 at 10:13 PM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #23 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

fizzy wrote:
Cableaddict wrote:
How the heck can this be? I am ALSO looking at them, in this thread, on a Mac via Safari, and they look glaringly different!

That leads me to believe that you do not have your monitor profile set correctly in ColorSync. Safari is showing the "embedded" JPEG correctly, but your monitor is so far off from sRGB (which is more-or-less what monitors end up to be) that the other looks way different. When I look at them, they are exactly the same. (When Paul looks at them on his wide-gamut monitor that is not close to sRGB, they look different. But as he said, that is a different, special case.) I think I suggested before, go to Display, Color, Calibrate control panel, set gamma to 2.2, and go through the calibration. Make sure you have the monitor profile set to the profile you create, and not Adobe RGB or something else which is not a monitor profile.
r.

I have done all this. Months ago. Contrast brightness & gamma are fine. - But I use the Mac gamma setting of 1.8 I tried 2.2, but I prefer 1.8. First, I'm on a Mac. Second, 2.2 is much darker, and I tend to make my pics too bright in general. Using the PC gamma setting would just make that worse.

The colrsync profile IS set for sRGB.

The only thing I haven't done is buy a calibration kit, which would possibly help with color, but two friends who are pro photographers have looked at their own pics on my monitor, in the past, and think it looks fine.

I'm just not understanding this. Even if my monitor's color WERE slightly off, (which is possible) why would this cause the non-embedded pic to look bright? - And it looks so both from my Mac's desktop, and via Safari. -And why not for most of you? I can understand a pic looking different on another monitor or computer, but I DO NOT understand THIS.

I realize it's probably been explained, above, but the answer completely eludes me. I assume it's a profile thing, but WTF is the solution? The only thing that makes some sense to me is what Paul wrote, that I might have a wide-gamut monitor, and hence my pics need embedding for ME to see them correctly.

Is that right? -And how would I know? When I set colorsync to sRGB, isn't that telling my monitor to use the smaller gamut, no matter what it's native gamut might be?

Oct 08, 2008 at 11:11 PM

fizzy
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p.1 #24 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

Cableaddict wrote:
fizzy wrote:
Cableaddict wrote:
How the heck can this be? I am ALSO looking at them, in this thread, on a Mac via Safari, and they look glaringly different!

That leads me to believe that you do not have your monitor profile set correctly in ColorSync. Safari is showing the "embedded" JPEG correctly, but your monitor is so far off from sRGB (which is more-or-less what monitors end up to be) that the other looks way different. When I look at them, they are exactly the same. (When Paul looks at them on his wide-gamut monitor that is not close to sRGB, they look different. But as he said, that is a different, special case.) I think I suggested before, go to Display, Color, Calibrate control panel, set gamma to 2.2, and go through the calibration. Make sure you have the monitor profile set to the profile you create, and not Adobe RGB or something else which is not a monitor profile.
r.

I have done all this. Months ago. Contrast brightness & gamma are fine. - But I use the Mac gamma setting of 1.8 I tried 2.2, but I prefer 1.8. First, I'm on a Mac. Second, 2.2 is much darker, and I tend to make my pics too bright in general. Using the PC gamma setting would just make that worse.

Use 2.2. Without getting into a bunch of stuff about the native gamma of different colorspaces, 2.2 is what you need to use for digital photography, especially using sRGB color. If you have the gamma at 2.2, and start editing your pics that way, we wouldn't have this thread. Why Apple continues to set default to 1.8 even on new LCDs is a mystery.

The colrsync profile IS set for sRGB.
Close, but not quite. The ColorSync profile should be your monitor profile.

-And why not for most of you? I can understand a pic looking different on another monitor or computer, but I DO NOT understand THIS.

When I set colorsync to sRGB, isn't that telling my monitor to use the smaller gamut, no matter what it's native gamut might be?

No. It's you telling ColorSync what the profile of your monitor is. It might be close to sRGB, but you really need to set it to your actual monitor profile that you create with the "Calibrate" control panel (or ideally a calibrator device). But you need to set the gamma to 2.2 first, or else your pictures will continue not to work on other systems. We all have our monitors at 2.2 gamma, and see above where we saw the pics as identical. Really, use it, it works.

Oct 08, 2008 at 11:58 PM

Cableaddict
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p.1 #25 · Mac to PC - Horrible change. Why?

fizzy wrote:....you need to set the gamma to 2.2 first, or else your pictures will continue not to work on other systems. We all have our monitors at 2.2 gamma, and see above where we saw the pics as identical. Really, use it, it works.

Fizzy,

I greatly appreciate all your time, but this just doesn't work. (and why would it?)
I tried 2.2, even re-did my calibration afterwards, but this does NOT make the two pics look the same on my monitor. They just look darker, but still different.

In fact, and I kid you not, at 2.2, the two pictures above look VASTLY different in brightness, whereas at 1.8 the difference is only slight. This is absolutely the case, so what can I say?

-Also with 2.2, I make all my pics even brighter, which makes them look even worse on a pc.
--------------------

You wrote: "Make sure you have the monitor profile set to the profile you create, and not Adobe RGB or something else which is not a monitor profile."

I have a feeling this could be part of the problem, since I don't understand it. (g)
If you mean the monitor profile in colorsync, then sure, it's set to my custom-calibrated setting.
The only other option in Colorsync is "set to factory," which of course I didn't select.

Are you talking about something else?

Edited on Oct 11, 2008 at 06:04 PM · View previous versions

Oct 11, 2008 at 05:39 PM


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