The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
Please vote in the Forum Structure Poll. Polling will close at 2PM EST on January 21, 2025.
Ive been doing a lot of digital art in photoshop recently and have come across a problem. When i paint using my PC at home, the colours look fine, but as soon as i view it on my bros PC or the Macs at Uni it looks really dull and the colours are washed out. The colour values are consistant but it doesn't look the way i saw it as i was painting it at home. Im afraid that my monitor may be giving me a false representation of what it looks like. Has anyone else encountered this problem and what have you done to solve it.
I calibrated my monitor. There's a few tools around. Generally, a Mac with a Mac monitor (like an iMac) will be "accurate." But I've got a pair of monitors here that, while calibrated very, very closely, are different from each other. One's older and both are run on analog connectors, which leaves more up to interpretation.
It's also in how the program saves the files. Like, saving an Illustrator image as a PDF can fuck all sorts of shit up colour-wise. I've been taught how to remedy this, but I've completely forgotten. Try saving in more lossless formats maybe?
You're probably working in aRGB colour space at home and sRGB everywhere else. sRGB is the standard for anything not-to-print, so it's usually best to work in it unless you're going to print and know the printer you'll be using supports aRGB.
Not much of an artist, but familiar with the problem. Generally this is one of two things:
1) the monitors are different, therefore you get different results. You can calibrate your monitor, but even then you'll get minor differences. You can't change that. Usually this isn't as big an issue nowadays, but it's still around.
2) Your brother's computer is somehow loading a different color profile. Does it bring up that annoying error about the embedded profile not matching that on the computer?
also, watch your file formats. jpgs, quality 50+, for photo and "painting"s, gifs for line art, toon shaded work, etc.
secondly, monitor gamma and profiles can vary wildly. if some one doesn't give a crap about color, they will usually leave their monitor in the default config. if you have calibrated your monitor, or use an "odd" color temp (9300k, for example), what you see and what everyone else sees can differ... alot. plus, macs' use a different gamma white point. also, most lcd monitors, espcially cheap ones, use 6bit color and interpolate the missing color. some do it better than others. so be careful.
thirdly, use view -> proof setup -> monitor RGB in photoshop. This should ensure more accurate colors when using "save for web". this is typically the culprit. drop a levels layer on top, and increase the black level slightly and it can make everything "pop" and stay more consistant when save for web is used.
thirdly, use view -> proof setup -> monitor RGB in photoshop. This should ensure more accurate colors when using "save for web". this is typically the culprit. drop a levels layer on top, and increase the black level slightly and it can make everything "pop" and stay more consistant when save for web is used.
This is what I found to be the case when working with photos. I'd edit it in photoshop then upload it to flickr only to find that things were horribly wrong.
Posts
1) the monitors are different, therefore you get different results. You can calibrate your monitor, but even then you'll get minor differences. You can't change that. Usually this isn't as big an issue nowadays, but it's still around.
2) Your brother's computer is somehow loading a different color profile. Does it bring up that annoying error about the embedded profile not matching that on the computer?
secondly, monitor gamma and profiles can vary wildly. if some one doesn't give a crap about color, they will usually leave their monitor in the default config. if you have calibrated your monitor, or use an "odd" color temp (9300k, for example), what you see and what everyone else sees can differ... alot. plus, macs' use a different gamma white point. also, most lcd monitors, espcially cheap ones, use 6bit color and interpolate the missing color. some do it better than others. so be careful.
thirdly, use view -> proof setup -> monitor RGB in photoshop. This should ensure more accurate colors when using "save for web". this is typically the culprit. drop a levels layer on top, and increase the black level slightly and it can make everything "pop" and stay more consistant when save for web is used.
This is what I found to be the case when working with photos. I'd edit it in photoshop then upload it to flickr only to find that things were horribly wrong.