Fuji Question about color space, photobucket, flickr, LR

[pniev]

Hopefully someone can help me solve a puzzle.

I just created a photobucket account to use this one for forum photos etc. I first tried a plugin for photobucket (using sRGB color space) to upload photos from LR4.4 shot in raw. When I checked the photos, the colors were awful. I needed sunglasses to look at them. It seemed as if saturation levels were set to 100%.

To verify if the problem had to do with the plugin, I exported the files, again in sRGB, to my harddisk. The colors looked good at my screen. After uploading to photobucket (via PB's uploader) it turned out that the colors were still over-saturated. So the problem did not have anything to do with the plugin.

Upload to Flickr, using Adobe's Flickr plugin for LR, works fine. I do not know how my photos look at your screen, but they look fine on mine. Interestingly, I cannot check if the uploaded jpegs are converted in to the sRGB color space or not.

My questions are:

1. Did anyone experience similar problems (photobucket over-saturated, flickr fine)?
2. How do I check which color space is used in the Flickr photos?
3. How can I solve the photobucket saturation issue? I use the Jeffrey Friedl plugin. Does another one work better? Or should I just forget about Photobucket?

Thanks for your help,

Peter

 

[Luke]

Peter, it's not clear to me if your files are starting out as sRGB or if they are being converted to sRGB on export.

If you upload an sRGB JPEG (converted in Lightroom before your export) to photobucket does THAT look screwed up as well? I think there is no conversion going on. But that's just a wild guess.

 

[pniev]

Thanks for your reply and help, Luke. I am sorry for not being clear.

the files are all in RAW. Conversion to sRGB is part of the export function. I tried two different approaches:
1. Conversion to sRGB jpegs and export to Harddisk. Followed by upload to Photobucket. The jpegs on my harddisk look fine. Those in PB do not. This scenario is similar to what you meant, right? I haven't tried
2. Using the LR plugin to upload to PB. This process includes conversion to sRGB Jpeg's. Results do not look good in PB.

I've also just tried the following: import the converted jpegs from my HD and upload them via the preset. Import in LR looks great. Photobucket file looks way too saturated. I do not have these problems with Flickr. I do get the impression that Photobucket does some processing itself. But I could not find any setting or information about that.

Results in Safari and Firefox are similar. Interestingly - as a side-note - I noted that Firefox does not support ICC v4 yet while Safari does! I haven't tried chrome or IE.

 

[Luke]

well if you are sending an already converted JPEG to photobucket, then that rules out the plug-in. I don't see any other explanation other than Photobucket is doing something on their end. Do you have links you can share to the same image on flickr and photobucket (not sure what it would accomplish anyways....just trying to figure it out)

 

[pniev]

I refreshed the photos in Flickr as well as photobucket. The differences are less obvious now but still visible (maybe today's sun may have influenced the look on my monitor when I looked earlier). Nevertheless, Photobucket seems to boost saturation and makes green look somewhat blue-ish. Although it may benefit flat-looking photos, photos of flowers do not.

Herewith some links. I am curious to which extent you see differences in your browser on your monitor! Thanks.

Peter

link to flickr example (alread quite saturated): DSCF0051.jpg | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
link to photobucket: http://i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag154/Peternievaart/Keukenhof-002_zpsa2af5f26.jpg

one other:
flickr: DSCF0053.jpg | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
photobucket: http://i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag154/Peternievaart/Keukenhof-003_zpsf211f837.jpg

Another:
DSCF0146.jpg | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
photobucket: http://i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag154/Peternievaart/Keukenhof-012_zps558c08c7.jpg

Differences in B/W versions are also clearly visibly (in my browser on my monitor):
DSCF0139-Edit.jpg | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
photobucket: http://i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag154/Peternievaart/Keukenhof-011_zpsfa0c77bf.jpg

well if you are sending an already converted JPEG to photobucket, then that rules out the plug-in. I don't see any other explanation other than Photobucket is doing something on their end. Do you have links you can share to the same image on flickr and photobucket (not sure what it would accomplish anyways....just trying to figure it out)

 

[ean10775]

Honestly, I think that it may be the black versus white background that the photos are being displayed on that are making you think they look different. I don't see any difference in the photos. FWIW, I'm using a PC with an LCD monitor and Chrome as the browser.

 

[pniev]

Thanks! That is a relief.
Do the colors look excessively saturated or natural in your browser?
Sorry for keeping asking questions?

Honestly, I think that it may be the black versus white background that the photos are being displayed on that are making you think they look different. I don't see any difference in the photos. FWIW, I'm using a PC with an LCD monitor and Chrome as the browser.

 

[Luke]

they are definitely not the same. And the thing that is odd to me is that they are not consistently different. I don't know what to say....this kind of stuff is well above my paygrade.

viewed in Firefox on a crapola laptop screen.

 

[pniev]

Thanks Luke. In a way that is comforting and that it is not just me!

As I cannot find useful - recent - information on the web, I've send a support request to Photobucket. I'll get back if/when I get an answer. For now I'm afraid I have to assume that photobucket and flickr deal differently with embedded color profiles.

Thanks again for your help!

they are definitely not the same. And the thing that is odd to me is that they are not consistently different. I don't know what to say....this kind of stuff is well above my paygrade.
viewed in Firefox on a crapola laptop screen.

 

[BBW]

Hmm, well after I figured out how to get rid of the black background on Flickr, I really don't see any differences in your photos between the two websites. I'm using a MacBook Pro and Safari.

I love the first tulip image! It's very reminiscent of 1970's psychedelic art. Of course that may be dating myself for some.

 

[pniev]

Interesting! How did you manage to get rid of the black background?

The colors were indeed bright and saturated. As I was not part of the psychedelic scene, I cannot make any comparisons to those days. haha.

Hmm, well after I figured out how to get rid of the black background on Flickr, I really don't see any differences in your photos between the two websites. I'm using a MacBook Pro and Safari.

I love the first tulip image! It's very reminiscent of 1970's psychedelic art. Of course that may be dating myself for some.

 

[BBW]

I clicked on View Sizes or something like that. I've been so busy offline that I hadn't even known that Flickr had updated their site..so I have to figure some ways to configure it to my liking. I don't want to see photos on black unless I choose to. I'm from the old school days of a white mat.:wink_old: Though I do like to see them on black, too.

Those flowers definitely had a lot of "flower power".