I'm at my whits end, I've tried reading every topic about this on here and all across the web and I can't figure out a solution. The problem is very straightforward, when I finish editing a RAW picture in lightroom and click export the photo that is exported looks completely different than the picture does in lightroom. Exported in sRGB, Jpeg 100 percent quality. I am totally perplexed, none of it makes sense to me. I quickly did a random edit to screenshot and share for an example. Right is lightroom, left is the exported jpeg in windows photos. Notice the huge difference in colors. To answer a couple questions that seem to be commonly asked on topics like this: I am comparing the photo side by side in lightroom develop mode vs the picture in the default Windows photos application (windows 10), Firefox, Chrome, and my Samsung Note 9. I.e. how 99.9% of the public will be viewing these photo's. The picture in every single device and application looks basically identical to eachother, it's the lightroom version that looks completely different. My computer's color management settings are as follows. I tried changing them to a bunch of different options and noticed no difference (unless I need to turn off my computer for it to go into effect? The computer was running the second profile (not the HP one), I just changed it to the HP one to test and kept it because there was no difference). I have no issue with this at my work, photo's in lightroom taken with the same camera look perfectly fine in lightroom and export perfectly fine as jpegs in Windows Photo. It's just at home, and I can't figure out why. Now something extra interesting I noticed. I exported the lightroom photo, then tried importing the new jpeg back into lightroom (1:1 preview set) and in the import window the picture's color matched that on Windows Photos (and chrome, firefox, etc). HOWEVER that was only in the import window, once imported the photo's color suddenly changed back to the less saturated greener version as before. Below is a screenshot with the photo in the import window showing the more red version that matched the photo viewers, then the same jpeg in lightrooms library after importing showing more green (re-screenshotted and overlayed to keep it to 1 screenshot to share). I'm totally at a standstill, I can't edit these photo's with such a drastic difference between the two and at this point I simply cannot edit at home anymore which is not an option. Please, anyone, I don't need long explanations about color theory I just need actionable suggestions I can try to get the two to match up or at least be close. If you are able to help me you will be life savers. Thank you!

Participant

Question

Exports Look Drastically Different Everywhere Outside of Lightroom

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
December 3, 2019
6 replies
1157 views

I'm at my whits end, I've tried reading every topic about this on here and all across the web and I can't figure out a solution. The problem is very straightforward, when I finish editing a RAW picture in lightroom and click export the photo that is exported looks completely different than the picture does in lightroom. Exported in sRGB, Jpeg 100 percent quality. I am totally perplexed, none of it makes sense to me. I quickly did a random edit to screenshot and share for an example. Right is lightroom, left is the exported jpeg in windows photos.

Notice the huge difference in colors.

To answer a couple questions that seem to be commonly asked on topics like this:

I am comparing the photo side by side in lightroom develop mode vs the picture in the default Windows photos application (windows 10), Firefox, Chrome, and my Samsung Note 9. I.e. how 99.9% of the public will be viewing these photo's. The picture in every single device and application looks basically identical to eachother, it's the lightroom version that looks completely different.

My computer's color management settings are as follows. I tried changing them to a bunch of different options and noticed no difference (unless I need to turn off my computer for it to go into effect? The computer was running the second profile (not the HP one), I just changed it to the HP one to test and kept it because there was no difference).

I have no issue with this at my work, photo's in lightroom taken with the same camera look perfectly fine in lightroom and export perfectly fine as jpegs in Windows Photo. It's just at home, and I can't figure out why.

Now something extra interesting I noticed. I exported the lightroom photo, then tried importing the new jpeg back into lightroom (1:1 preview set) and in the import window the picture's color matched that on Windows Photos (and chrome, firefox, etc). HOWEVER that was only in the import window, once imported the photo's color suddenly changed back to the less saturated greener version as before. Below is a screenshot with the photo in the import window showing the more red version that matched the photo viewers, then the same jpeg in lightrooms library after importing showing more green (re-screenshotted and overlayed to keep it to 1 screenshot to share).

I'm totally at a standstill, I can't edit these photo's with such a drastic difference between the two and at this point I simply cannot edit at home anymore which is not an option. Please, anyone, I don't need long explanations about color theory I just need actionable suggestions I can try to get the two to match up or at least be close. If you are able to help me you will be life savers. Thank you!

This topic has been closed for replies.

D Fosse

Community Expert

I never worry about how people on the other end see my work. It's not my problem. It's theirs. If they don't have a properly color managed setup they need to deal with that, I can't do it for them.

And it's not my responsibility. I know it's right on my end, so I have delivered my part of the bargain.

Also keep in mind that they see everything that way. It won't stick out.

Per Berntsen

Community Expert

1. If I send a client the picture, and they open it using windows photos (as 99.9% of windows 10 users would) is it going to look totally different like it was for me, or is that a product of my monitor and if they have a decent more modern monitor it'll show close enough?

If your client has a wide gamut monitor, images will display over saturated.

If they have a standard gamut monitor, images will probably display more or less correctly.

You could tell your clients to use color managed viewers like FastStone, XnView or IrfanView.

All these are free for non-commercial use (and cheap to buy for commercial use). They are probably not color manged out of the box, color management has to be turned on.

And as far as I know, Bridge is a free download, and your clients could use that, but they probably have to create an account with Adobe to be able to download it.

I did not test chrome, but i'm guessing there's a similar setting there that's also causing the same issue. I then tested windows photo viewer and that did indeed show a picture much closer to the LR colors, but it's a terrible application so I decided to just use adobe bridge which seems to work fine

Chrome should work out of the box, it behaves like Firefox set to mode 1.

I didn't mention the Windows Photo Viewer because it's hidden on Windows 10, and I definitely agree that it's a terrible application.

D Fosse

Community Expert

This is how you should set up Firefox. It should be set to mode 1:

Mode 1 assigns sRGB if a profile is missing, and this means that the normal color management chain can run. There always has to be two profiles, a source and a destination. The destination in this case is the monitor profile.

The default is mode 2, and the difference between them is that in mode 2, images without an embedded profile aren't color managed at all. The numbers are just sent straight through.

The Viewsonic seems to be a standard gamut monitor, and so the lack of color management won't be so conspicuous. It still won't be entirely right, but it will be close - close enough for most people. A standard gamut monitor has a native color space pretty close to sRGB, so if you feed it sRGB numbers it will be roughly right even without color management.

Per Berntsen

Community Expert

You seem to have a wide gamut monitor, which means that you have to use only color managed applications to view your work. The over saturation you're seeing in Photos is typical (and inevitable) for viewing images in applications without color management on a wide gamut monitor. The import module in Lightroom is not color managed either.

Firefox and Chrome are color managed, and should display the same as Lightroom.

Phones and tablets are not color managed, and can not be expected to display correct colors.

To set things straight, first go to the Advanced tab of the Color management dialog, and set everything back to default.

These settings should never be touched, everything you need to do is done in the Devices tab.

Since you have a wide gamut monitor, add the Adobe RGB profile, and set it as default. The color gamut of your monitor is probably closer to Adobe RGB than to sRGB.

Now you have to restart all color managed applications, so that they can become aware of the new monitor profile. (a computer restart is not required)

If this fixes the issue, it is recommended that you calibrate the monitor with a hardware calibrator, which will also create and install a custom monitor profile that accurately describes your monitor.

Be aware that no native Windows applications are color managed, and they will all inevitably display images over saturated.

This includes Photos, Paint, Edge, Internet Explorer, Desktop, File Explorer.

There are several third party color managed image viewers. I recommend FastStone which is free for personal use.

Make sure color management is enabled, like below. Both boxes must be checked.

Visit OceansideAuthor

Participant

I appreciate the response! I remember reading that Windows Photos is not color managed, but I also read that Chrome and Firefox should be so that was very perplexing to me that all 3 looked identical (and the phone was more of a mix between what those were showing and what lightroom was showing, leaning more towards windows photos/Firefox/Chrome).

I stayed at it last night until quite late, and discovered some settings in the firefox backend were changed so that it wasn't "color managed" anymore, or not properly, or whatever the right termonology is. I changed the color management setting and now the picture dragged into firefox matched LR. I did not test chrome, but i'm guessing there's a similar setting there that's also causing the same issue. I then tested windows photo viewer and that did indeed show a picture much closer to the LR colors, but it's a terrible application so I decided to just use adobe bridge which seems to work fine (though overkill for that purpose I think). I also changed the color settings on my Note 9 and it's much closer now as well (though still more red, but that's fine).

So overall I think it's all ok, but I have two remaining questions.

1. If I send a client the picture, and they open it using windows photos (as 99.9% of windows 10 users would) is it going to look totally different like it was for me, or is that a product of my monitor and if they have a decent more modern monitor it'll show close enough?

2. At work I just tested it and exporting a RAW photo from the same camera in lightroom and viewing it in windows photos (also windows 10) side by side they look close enough:

The monitor at work is a ViewSonic VP2768-4K 27" and it's had no color callibration done to it, just as is out of the box. Does that mean this monitor is not wide gamut and therefore it plays nicer with windows photos and other non-color managed software? I was thinking about grabbing a new monitor for home, the 30" HP is nice I've used it for years but this would tip the scale for me if so.

I appreciate the help you guys have given me, thank you!

D Fosse

Community Expert

First of all: you need to use color managed software, like Lightroom, Photoshop and most current web browsers except Edge. They will use your monitor profile to remap/convert the data into the monitor color space, so that the file is correctly represented on screen. Stop using software that isn't color managed, like Windows "Photos". It ignores all profiles, document and monitor, and will never under any circumstances display correctly.

For web use and all other scenarios where color management is absent or uncertain, safeguard by converting to sRGB and embedding the profile. This will display roughly right in the largest number of different scenarios.

For Lightroom, Photoshop etc to display correctly, you need to have a monitor profile that is accurate. A calibrator would make that for you. If you don't have one, you are probably getting generic manufacturer profiles distributed through Windows Update. These are surprisingly often defective or not written to icc spec. As a result, those color managed applications display incorrectly.

The LP3065 is an old model from 2007 or thereabouts. I can't find any information about the gamut of this unit - or rather, it's conflicting. If it's a wide gamut unit, sRGB without color management will look oversaturated. So that would explain the screenshots. If it's standard gamut, it's more likely to be a defective monitor profile showing up in Lightroom.

Either way, a calibrator and color managed software is the solution to the problem.

ManiacJoe

Inspiring

Normally this is an issue of color management.

Cell phones and the Windows Photos app are not color managed, so the exported JPG may look different depending on the monitor you are using.

Firefox and Chrome should be fully color managed like Lightroom.

What monitor are you using?

How long ago was it calibrated?

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