Improve your online pictures.

[zardoz]

I mentioned this is another thread, but didnt go any further, as it was not fair to hijack someone elses thread. So here is a very short guide to improving your pics.

Often we see pics on the interweb, that are way too dark, to see what they are supposed to be showing. Even when the poster tells us what we are supposed to be seeing. It is often just way too contrasty. A very quick fix in your fave image editor can fix this, so that everyone can see your picture.
First of all here is a pic of something ? And below it the altered image. Look at the difference! It may not be techinically good, but thats not what were after is it ? Were just after clarity.

now a quick fix in Irfanview, which is very good AND free (how often does that hapen ?)
http://www.irfanview.com/
All we do in the case of Irfanview is go to Image/Enhance colours and move the brightness slider a little to the right, then if needed alter the contast slider too. Then dont forget to Save it, as something different, so that if you mess it up, you have the original to go back too. Then thats it. Ready to post, your now clear pic, and we can all see what you are on a bout

NB: No that is NOT my car!

 

[rtbcomp]

Instead of using brightness, try adjusting the gamma setting. I use Irfanview a lot, it's great but I prefer Xnview it too is very good and free!

 

[zardoz]

Instead of using brightness, try adjusting the gamma setting. I use Irfanview a lot, it's great but I prefer Xnview it too is very good and free!

Indeed you are right, if there is a gamma setting, it often works wonders. However there sometimes isn't one on some of the basic free image editors, whereas brightness and contrast are almost universal.

 

[malcolm]

I use a contrast tool in paintshop pro quite a lot (effects>enhance photos). Not a lot of info left in that dark image though.

Focus seems more of an issue with a lot of photos here. Mobile phones generally don't seem to be a good way of passing on visual information.

 

[MrFluffy]

Its sometimes down to a bug in internet explorer and the way it renders jpgs etc. I make pics up and they look perfectly fine to me in firefox on linux, and i send them people and they all moan about how dark they are. I took timeout to check them myself, and lo and behold they do come out too dark when viewed in IE.
Dont expect microsoft to fix it any time soon mind. Theyre too busy trying to make vista even work properly while it silently tanks.

Oh and the first pic in this thread looks the clearest and most defined under my setup

 

[zardoz]

Its sometimes down to a bug in internet explorer and the way it renders jpgs etc. I make pics up and they look perfectly fine to me in firefox on linux, and i send them people and they all moan about how dark they are. I took timeout to check them myself, and lo and behold they do come out too dark when viewed in IE.
Dont expect microsoft to fix it any time soon mind. Theyre too busy trying to make vista even work properly while it silently tanks.

Oh and the first pic in this thread looks the clearest and most defined under my setup

Thats interesting i never thought of that affecting it. I tried it in Internet explorer and all pics looked the same (I use Firefox all the time usually) Maybe its your strange French internet provider (Wannadoo ?)

 

[MrFluffy]

Interesting, maybe its also my Pix or local director doing content inspection and modifying the images on my network connection...

You might want to read about colour management and IE's lack of it, I dont know if they still do this, because I no longer work directly in the internet design field

http://regex.info/blog/photo-tech/color-spaces-page1/