How do these photos compare colorwise on your monitor?

[RagingInMiami]

I bought a much-needed desktop because my laptop was just too slow, so now I'm in the process of calibrating the monitor, which is proving more difficult than I anticipated. I've posted three sets of photos that I took in Cuba. Three were processed on my laptop and three on my desktop.

I did the same procedures on each one, basically just using the automatic functions. Please tell me if you see a difference in colors and which photo -- if any -- looks more natural.


Sunset at the Malegon (laptop)


Sunset at the Malegon (desktop)


Cuban cab drivers (laptop)



Cuban cab drivers (desktop)

Cuban kids (desktop)


Cuban kids (laptop)

[Blue_In_AK]

1. I don't see much difference

except your desktop seems to be just a tiny bit smoother, which has nothing at all to do with color, I guess. I love that bottom photo, especially.

[RagingInMiami]

7. Thanks Blue

Yes, now I see how the laptop version appears oversharpened. In fact, right now, after several beers and a puff of weed, the desktop version looks a little oversharpened. Not as smooth as it could be.

I think I can make the photo look better if I do it my way on PS instead of PS's automatic way. I know I can make the top photo better by lightening the dark shadows and reducing the sun's highlights.

Those kids were very cute. It started off with the two of the younger kids, who curiously walked up to me when they saw me walking down the street with a camera around my neck. I snapped a couple of pictures and an older lady, who was sitting near by, suggested that I at least give them each piece of gum.

Luckily, I had gum. And luckily, I had seven pieces because immediately, the four older kids stepped into the picture.

Here is the first picture.


Here is one a few seconds later. My only regret is that I didn't capture the Cuban flag in its entirety. I didn't notice it at the time.

This is one of my favorite pictures because of the natural expressions and the car in the background. Imagine if the kid in the middle turns out to be a world-class boxer. That photo would be worth thousands.

[Blue_In_AK]

11. That bottom photo is priceless...

These look better to me than the ones above. As for "automatic" on your PS program, I hardly ever like what PaintShop does to my pictures on the auto setting. It puts in too much blue (or more than I want) and brightens them too much. It takes longer to go through the individual little "fixes" but I like the final result much better.

[priller]

2. They look basically identical to me

If there's any difference at all, I would say the desktop pictures seem to have ever so slightly more contrast.

I have similar issues myself. I have two Dell monitors (1600x1200, 1280x1024) attached to my Mac and, even though they're the same brand, I can't get them to show colors similarly. And then neither looks exactly the same as my photo printer. I suppose I should figure out what's wrong.

[F.Gordon]

3. Well, first I interpolated them

Cause' there are times when size does matter. After I interpolated I had a cigarette.
:smoke:

Ahh... much better. Now I can see em'. Definitely a difference, but me thinks it's something you did in pp. I grabbed a syringe and sucked up the same speck of pixie dust from both the desktop and the laptop versions. On the desktop version the rgb was 138,85,95 and on the laptop it was 152,99,118. Two different colors. It was the same anywhere I sucked and it looks like (as mentioned up thread) a difference in contrast.

The laptop versions are also over-sharpened. If I could figure out how to post a jpg mouse-over on DU I'd show you.

My official technical analysis? The Photo Journalist working with the Laptop was shit-faced on Cuban Rum and the Photo Journalist working on the Desktop was not. ;-)

These are all great photos. Especially like the cabbie photo. I was going to ask you to email me the original RAW file to see if I could screw them up but I don't think you were shooting in RAW. Also, did you get a Sigma Wide Angle Lens? For your monitor you might try ConsAreLiars favorite software.... the monitor calibration thing is pricey but it might be worth getting: (I got the scanner one and was very pleased)

http://www.dl-c.com/Temp/

Glad you made it back safely. Anxiously waiting to see more photos.
:hi:

[Blue_In_AK]

5. Over-sharpened ... that's what I meant to say

when I said the desktop ones looked smoother.

[RagingInMiami]

8. What do you mean by interpolated?

The thing is, I think my new monitor appears sharper than my laptop, even before I do any processing. Even pictures and letters on websites appear much sharper in my new monitor, which makes it harder for me to gauge if the color is calibrated correctly.

It has a 32-bit video graphic card, so I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

I was shooting in RAW, something I've been doing quite consistently since the beginning of this year.

[F.Gordon]

10. interpolated = make bigger

On the smugmug site, when you do a full screen slideshow, it does a form of interpolation. Most interpolation is not real accurate. Smoke and mirrors stuff. Scanners do it. Like I think my scanner does true resolution up to 600 and interpolated resolution up to 1200. I could scratch up some links if you want to know more. I can also dig up some software links if this sounds like something you'd like to use.

I use it because I'm trying to understand all this new fangled printing that is going on in the digital photog world, and it is one of the typical software things used. I'm taking a class on it this summer and it was one of the reasons for my little sprint up to Ft. Collins, CO recently.

I bought this and another print by the same photographer. Firstly because I liked his work but mainly because he is one of the new “printing gurus” and his prints were done using his “technique”.



Assumed you weren’t using RAW because you didn’t shoot in priority or manual but I forgot that you can use normal mode and still get RAW with a Canon. My bad. Also, it says your color presentation is not calibrated. Not sure what that means. Does Photoshop require color calibration during setup?

I’ve gotten in the habit of getting un-cropped 8x10 prints of most of the snaps I want to keep and do whatever with. Don’t trust my monitor. On a couple the prints showed some really bad problems that I never picked up on with my cheap 17” LCD monitor so I’m at least slightly aware of when my monitor is messin’ with me.
:dunce:

I’d imagine that in your field a very fast “workflow” is used. Why don’t you ask some other Photo Journalists in your area. They might tell you to piss off or they might help you out. And I have no idea if the video card would “alter” sharpness. Every time I get a new system, and my first was an Atari 800 with a monochrome monitor, I’m “amazed” at the quality difference. Maybe you’re just seeing things much much better than you did previously.
:shrug:

Whatever. Just do what you do dude. You’re incredible at it and all this techno-poop stuff can be a burden sometimes. IMHO.
:hi:

[TahitiNut]

12. interpolation = calculate intermediate value

The term is loosely used to describe an optical resolution which is derived, NOT directly from the optics, but from a calculated/algorithmic approach. Consider a matrix of pixels, the digital color values for which were all captured directly by a direct optical sensing mechanism.

Simply stated, using the simplest of algorithms, we can interpolate an intermediate value between 238 and 156 (238 ??? 156) by averaging (merely one algorithm of many) the two values and getting (238+156)/2=394/2=197 or (238 197 156). The middle 'pixel'/value is, thus, interpolated.

Now let's say we're interested in calculating a higher density matrix, inserting 'new' (interpolated) pixels between the optically-measured pixels. For the sake of simplicity, let's use an example of a 3x3 array of pixels that we want to increase to a 6x6 array.

Let's start with a very simplified representation of a 3x3 array ...

235 097 167
157 197 227
185 189 022

As we all should know by now, colors are often digitally (numerically) represented by some set of three numbers, each of which is usually in the range of 0 to 255. (Larger ranges ARE used in some implementations.) Conventionally, we're describing the color in terms of the relative amount of each of three 'primary' colors, either red, green, and blue (RGB) or cyan, yellow, and magenta (CYM). Thus, there'd be three seperate numbers in each of the array positions and the interpolation algorithm would typically be something more complex than mere averaging, but for the purposes of this pedanticism, we'll merely keep it artificially simple and use averaging.

The 6x6 array would look something like

235 aaa 097 bbb 167 ccc
jjj kkk lll mmm nnn ooo
157 ddd 197 eee 227 fff
ppp qqq rrr sss ttt uuu
185 ggg 189 hhh 022 iii
vvv www xxx yyy zzz ...

where all the pixels indicated with letters (and "...") would be interpolated

We can calculate/interpolate a value for 'aaa' by averaging the adjacent values (235 and 097) and getting 166. The value of 'bbb' would likewise be 132. Working vertically, we'd interpolate a value for 'jjj' as (235+157)/2=392/2=196.

A value for 'kkk' could be interpolated as the average of two (diagonal) averages. First, (235+197)/2=432/2=216. Second, (157+097)/2=254/2=127. Lastly, (216+127)/2=343/2=172.

So far, we've got ...

235 166 097 132 167 ccc
196 172 lll mmm nnn ooo
157 ddd 197 eee 227 fff
ppp qqq rrr sss ttt uuu
185 ggg 189 hhh 022 iii
vvv www xxx yyy zzz ...

Now, the reader can continue this process for themselves. But what about those 'new' pixels that are on the 'edge'? They don't have two adjacent pixels to 'average'. Well, let's remember that averaging is just the simple interpolation algorithm we've chosen for the purposes of this example. The number of possible algorithms is only limited by our imaginations ... and the 'feel' of the result. For "pixels on the edge," we could use a gradation/projection algorithm, presuming that if the digital values are increasing, then the interpolated value would be an increase as well. After all, we can all guess the value of '?' in the series 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ?. Right?

So, that's it in the abstract. In reality, things get more complicated - because reality is that way, I guess. Some interpolation algorithms might accommodate 'edge detection' and not blindly calculate some average - which has the effect of smoothing or fuzzing the result.

Did any of this make sense?

I may have screwed up royally since I haven't bothered to google/research the subject, relying solely on my math and computer science degrees and parading my pedanticism. Who knows?

:silly:

[F.Gordon]

13. Or that. But I like "Make Bigger" better

That I understand.
:dunce:

Which you can do to a certain extent with almost any photo editing program. I did this just using Paint Shop Pro. (I didn't mess with your photo Ragin'. All I did was make it "bigger". I'll delete this in a couple days or if you want it gone NOW just PM me)



I hope the class I'm taking doesn't get really heavy into the computer science part of it or I'll be sooooo screwed. :( I knew it had something to do with "averaging" but I had no idea how the actual science of it worked. Hey, I'm just a stupid old Iowa farm boy who barely graduated from High School.

My interest in understanding it has more to do with selective interpolation when you need to bring out the lost detail of a certain part of a photograph or when you're doing a tight crop and still want the detail to be good enough to make a decent print from the cropped version.

The math part of your post makes sense. It's the science part where I get lost and I'm the one who complained once that Photography has become less of an art form and more of a computer science. I'm still workin' on this Zen thing. I'll need a little more time for all this science stuff.
:crazy:

Thanks for taking the time to post this. Really appreciate it.
:hi:

Edit? It's always helpful to include all the words in a sentence that your brain told you to type.
:dunce:

[RagingInMiami]

15. Wow, the quality is not bad at all for making it so much bigger

I don't mind that you post that photo. And to answer a previous question, I did not buy a Sigma wide-angle. I must have been using my Canon 20mm, which is really a 32mm.

I can't wait to get that Canon 5D with the full frame.

[RagingInMiami]

17. I was just thinking

With this method, you would be able to add to the empty space in a photo. For example, when you straighten out a crooked photo, you are forced to crop it because it leaves empty spaces. But with this method, you might be able to fill in the empty space.

Or am I way off here?

[F.Gordon]

18. Do you have 16,000 Yen?

If so, then get SILKYPIX Pro Developer Studio. It uses a very intricate Rotation/Digital Shift Tool (interpolation) that can be used for straightening out crooked photos. You will still lose some detail depending upon how much of a rotation you are doing but you won't have to crop it. And when you do want to chop up your photo this sucker doesn't "crop" like Photoshop (and others)... it "trims" using a 9 section grid system. Very sophisticated.

I gave the 30 day demo of CS2 a try. Not impressed. IMO for 1/2 the cost of CS2 you can get Silkpix and Paint Shop ProX and have a photo development/editing system that will blow away Photoshop.

Shouldn't be saying this since I see you already have CS. No biggee... I realize that Photoshop is the "industry" gizmo of choice.

Damn. I can't shut up today. Somebody send F' a carton of cigarettes and shut him up.
:smoke:

[RagingInMiami]

19. I use PS CS2

But I can assure you that I did not pay $800 for it. Far from it. But as you said, it is industry standard and I have to be ready in case I need to edit my photo on a newsroom computer.

It does have its limits. For example, it did not have a an automatic download function that for when you put in your memory card into the memory reader. PS Elements 3 had it, so it's not like they haven't done it before.

So I had to buy Breeze Browser Pro, which turned out to be a solid investment.

http://www.breezesys.com/BreezeBrowser/

How much is 16,000 Yen?

[ConsAreLiars]

20. Software is not very good at guessing what is outside the frame, but

Picture Windows Pro has a Transformation/Geometry/Warp function that lets you crop and expand/warp the data to give a lot of control over what ends up in the final version. I'm sure other software has similar functions. For example, the following photo was a bit tilted because I wanted to include certain flowers but forgot about the horizon and gravity, so the second (warped) was made. Won't work real well with portraits, unless there is some real uniqueness about the subject, or with buildings, other than the Experience Music Project structure, but it can be very helpful in many cases.

Before


After

[RagingInMiami]

21. Nice pictures

[RagingInMiami]

16. I've read all that three times and it is just beginning to make sense now

Maybe another three times and I will suddenly see the light. Or at least the true colors.

[TahitiNut]

22. (grin) That's the kind of crap I caarry in my head all the time.

We all have our burdens to bear. :silly:

After a math undergrad and comp sci grad work, and years of 'puter programming, with a fascination for 'numerical methods,' I'm habituated in thinking 'big picture' at the most miniscule algorithmic detail.

Nonetheless, it gets really, really interesting to me when I consider that the science/engineering of such algorithms are an essential part of what makes satellite (or Hubble) photos sharper than their optical resolution might otherwise depict directly. It gives me a 'feel' for things that're too classified for public dissemination. When I try to consider what they might accomplish using two (virtually) simultaneous photos of the same distant objects and some massive computer power for crunching the numbers, I'm verklempt.

[RagingInMiami]

23. One day if I ever make it big

I want to hire someone like you because every company needs a math/numbers guru on their staff. I've always been a words man myself.

[peacebuzzard]

4. the laptop versions have better exposure IMO

more shadow definition
by the way, great shots....keep them coming!!!

[ConsAreLiars]

6. They look the same to me, and they should, if the same original

was moved through the same processing steps. Like F. Gordon, I used a RGB readout tool, without expanding the photo sizes, and got "very close" results from the same areas. Both (#3) look equally over-sharpened (halos), and I'm pretty sure the differences you are concerned are due to differences in the displays, not the calculations. (Halos in #2 also, less noticeable in #1).

(edit a second time to add) As a definitive test with #3, I simply did a Transformation/Composite/Subtract operation, which takes all the RGB numbers at each point in the two images and subtracts the values at the same points in the second image. The result was a uniform black (0,0,0), meaning that the two images were precisely identical.

"Common knowledge" has it that until very recently laptops and LCDs generally were impossible to calibrate correctly for use in serious photo processing, and there were lots of debates about the "best" monitor. I use two, the better one is a low end NEC made 7 years ago, and the "newer" one a real cheapy. I doubt that either one will display the full range of colors that newer sRGB monitors can, but unless your new desktop monitor is a real piece of junk, the default settings are probably pretty good.

You can do a pragmatic test by loading in a test image like those found here at http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1A.html and printing it out. If everything looks good enough, then you are set up well enough to use your image processing software with reasonable confidence that the changes you make will show up in the print or on other people's monitors, and the results will be reasonably close to what you intended.

You obviously can't predict what other people "will" see, other than using the kind of feedback you are asking for here, since few people will have their monitors set "perfectly" or even close, but by setting up your monitor correctly, you can at least know what they "could" see. If you wish to go beyond the guidelines shown on the Norman Koren site, you will need to read up on color management - for example, ftp://ftp.bmtmicro.com/bmtmicro/DLC_WEB/Picture%20Window%20(BMT%20Micro)/Picture%20Window%20Doc/Color%20Management.pdf , and the next step is use a colorimeter to measure the actual output of your monitor and recalibrate it until it is as close to perfect as you can get. This is especially important if you are doing commercial prints, since unless your monitor is accurate you will never be able to predict how the image will print.

(edit to add) Oh, I forgot to say these are a very inviting preview of what we all (I suspect) are looking forward to seeing when you are able to post a fuller set. I expect your images will help us understand the people of Cuba a lot better than a 10000 threads of debate on DU or anywhere. You have an extraordinary talent for showing people as they are and they world they live in.

[RagingInMiami]

9. I can always count on you to provide an in-depth, easy to follow

breakdown on the technological aspects of digital photography.

I think the problem is that my new monitor appears oversharphened even before I do any processing. Perhaps it is because it is a much larger screen than I'm used to or perhaps its because it's using a Radeon X550 video graphics card.

Now I really don't know what that means, but the guy who built it for me raves about it. Perhaps it is a little too powerful for photos. I know it's good for videos.

One of the many reasons I had for going to Cuba was provide an accurate description of what Cuba really is whenever one of the Fidel/Cuba threads pop up in GD. I've only scratched the surface but I promise I will deliver something more substantial than the countless reports and opinions posted in GD in the last two years.

But the main reason I went was much more personal. I've been immersed in Cuban culture since the day I was born because all my mom's friends and the kids in my neighborhood were Cuban. My first kiss was with a Cuban girl. (Coincidentally, so was my last kiss)

Almost all my friends growing up were Cuban. (I was addicted to Cuban espresso by 16)

The first time I was called a communist was by my right-wing Cuban neighbor. (Incidentally, that wasn't the first time I had sent a Cuban to hell)

Although I am of Colombian descent, Cuban culture has been running through my blood for more than 30 years.

Visiting the island last week made me realize it will be running through my blood for the rest of my life. I plan to return soon.

[intheflow]

14. I don't see any difference in the cab driver shots.

But the other two sets of photos have a marked difference on the desktop library computer I'm using right now.

The faces in "Sunset at the Malegon (desktop)" are dark and very hard to see, so the laptop version is mui better.

In the last set of photos, however, the top (desktop) shot looks like much more natural lighting, whereas the bottom version looks about this close to being color-manipulated to death.

Weird! I'm going to check this thread again when I get home and can play with my laptop, just to see if it changes again.

[NV Whino]

24. Laptop seems to be more contrasty.

[RagingInMiami]

25. I think I got my monitor calibrated

At least I hope I do because I've so far processed more than 100 photos this week from my Cuba trip. I need to process a few more before I post them, along with my typical commentary.

It's been a week since I've returned and I've done nothing but listen to Cuban music I purchased over there. Old and new. Socialist music. Santero music. Music that defines Cuba better than Gloria Estafan ever will.

Here are the same shots from this thread, but reprocessed tonight. And this time, I didn't use automatic settings.

[ConsAreLiars]

26. They look better on my monitor.

Especially the first, where the shadow detail was very murky. You might have gone a tiny bit far on that one - after all it was nearly night - but seeing the detail like the bicycle and faces makes it more effective. On the others the detail seems much more clear and the disturbing halos that result from over-sharpening are gone. I've noticed that even slides that look great when projected, once scanned need a fair bit of work to look right, and developing the skill to simply re-present those images in digital media is a challenge. Good work. It seems you are climbing that learning curve much faster than me.

[Blue_In_AK]

27. Much better, Raging.

The top one is really interesting this way - it's nice to see the faces more clearly.

[Schema Thing]

28. Can't trust much viewing on my laptop, but

Malegon: laptop version looks slightly more "natural" per se, but the desktop version works better on my end due to the lightening. It doesn't look like you could get away with any more lightening, but what you did works.

Cabdrivers: laptop looks overly sharpened, desktop looks more natural

Cuban kids: laptop looks overly sharpened, desktop looks more natural



Colors look exactly the same on all pics.

I've gotta get a brightscreen laptop, my old traditional style laptop screen is impossible to judge contrast and density with.

[liontamer]

29. desktop ones look better to me

the contrast in the laptop ones seems a bit too much