danmitchell wrote:
There could be several things going on relative to your "different on the web" and "different on different computers" issues.
1. If both of your monitors are not properly profiled the image will, indeed, not look the same on the two of them. Even profiling won't totally solve this if one of the monitors is a lot darker than the other.
2. Some browsers are "color managed" (Safari and, if you set it up right, Firefox) while others are not (IE). If you use a non-generic color space on your uploaded files they will look correct in color managed browsers but not look correct on the non-color managed browsers.
3. Safest thing is to save in the generic sRGB color space when you create your jpgs.
There are several ways to do the conversion. My approach goes more or less like this:
1. Finalize the full 16-bit PS image including sharpening in smart layers and save.
2. Make a duplicate of the entire photo in PS and then close the original.
3. Flatten the duplicate image.
4. Resize the duplicate image for the web.
5. Do an unsharp mask or (rough default) 25,1,1 settings.
6. Add any branding to the image (e.g. - border, copyright info, other text) and flatten again.
7. Use Edit --> Convert to Profile... to convert to the generic sRGB color space.
8. Convert to 8-bit.
9. Save as... to save a jpg on my disk. (I typically go for a quality setting of about 8 in PS here.)
10. Upload.
In the end, you cannot completely control the appearance of your photographs on the web. You can use good practice (use profiled monitors as you do your work, convert to sRGB, etc.) but you still cannot control the setup on users' computers.
By the way, on my profiled monitors the shadow areas look quite bright - and are part of my reaction to the photo as seeming perhaps somewhat unnaturally bright, especially in the foreground forest area. (I'm a California photographer who has been going to the Sierra for decades, so I'm pretty familiar with this view and the issues of photographing it.)
I follow pretty much the same routine you outlined above when saving a jpeg I'm going to put on the web. Except on the duplicate file I change to 8bit first, then resize, then convert to sRGB. It just seemed odd that with the same picture from the web as compared to it opened in PS on the same monitor viewed at the same time should look different.
I love this. At first it was confusing but then all the wonderful details revealed themselves and they really hit me. Exceptional image that needs to be seen biiiiig!
Ute
This is a wonderful image. When I first opened it I thought "abstract with elements" - and then things in the picture began to happen and I felt the dynamism of the whole thing. It was like a slowly moving, slowly revealing picture, wonderfully dynamic! The last thing that I saw was the waterfall and then the whole thing stopped and everything clicked into place - a wonderful and artistic experience. Well done indeed in capturing and realising such a dramatic, dynamic and powerful image. Very nice to see a new and artistic take on such an icon!
