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xarnthal
New Participant
February 20, 2017
Answered

Help with JPEG quality

  • February 20, 2017
  • 3 replies
  • 1521 views

Can anyone point me in the right direction, images i export look different from what i see in lightroom/photoshop.

The images open in lightroom & photoshop look smooth no color blotching or tearing. But when it comes to saving the image I'm not getting anything like it.

Photoshop I've tried saving both JPEG and PNG with no good results (always highest quality).

If i take the image that has been exported, and then re-open it in LR or PS it looks awful.

If i use Snipping Tool to take a screenshot and save the screenshot it seems to look much better than the save (but of course nothing like the image displayed in LR/PS -maybe the RGB format).

Example:

Lightroom

: Snipping Tool Capture

:JPEG Export

Photoshop

: Snipping Tool Capture

:JPEG

Additionally I tried to save for internet image but still the same problem.

Any suggestions on how to get a better idea of what its going to look like when it saves, or how to up the quality of the JPEG?

    This topic has been closed for replies.
    Correct answer JeffreyOD

    In case it helps you, I've found the following blog post by Jeffrey Friedl to be a great write-up on jpeg quality settings in Lr:

    Jeffrey Friedl's Blog » An Analysis of Lightroom JPEG Export Quality Settings

    3 replies

    J
    Jao vdL
    Inspiring
    February 21, 2017

    Here is some more info and some guide on how to fix it: Photoshop Actions to fix the banding of Photoshop's gradients.

    This is a very common problem in subtle gradients and a limitation of 8-bit images. At some point Lightroom was going to add dithering on conversion to 8 bits but it looks like that hasn't happened yet. What version of Lightroom are you using?

    X
    xarnthalAuthor
    New Participant
    February 21, 2017

    Thank you all for the responses I'll try them out!

    I'm using Adobe Photoshop CC + Lightroom package, I assume it's the latest version..?

    J
    Jao vdL
    Inspiring
    February 21, 2017

    Check the info screen. It should be 2015.8

    J
    Jao vdL
    Inspiring
    February 21, 2017

    You mean the banding in the sky? Those look like they are single bit steps in sRGB space. I opened the jpegs in Photoshop and you can see the steps are exactly that. They are probably unavoidable in a 8-bit sRGB jpeg. Sometimes they can be made less obvious by dithering. The screenshots are in the colorspace of your monitor and are rendered directly from a 16-bit representation of your image whether you are in Lightroom or in Photoshop and so that will avoid the banding as you are not doing two successive color space conversions (first to 8-bit sRGB and then to the 8-bit monitor profile) but only one (from 16-bit prophoto to 8-bit monitor profile) which avoids the banding.

    In Lightroom you cannot control whether it will dither upon color space conversions but in Photoshop you can. In Color Settings, make sure "Use dither (8-bit/channel images)" is turned on.

    X
    xarnthalAuthor
    New Participant
    February 21, 2017

    I just checked and 8-bit color setting is already on, thanks for the help.

    Is there anything else i can try to reduce the banding on JPEGs?

    JeffreyOD
    JeffreyODCorrect answer
    Participating Frequently
    February 21, 2017

    In case it helps you, I've found the following blog post by Jeffrey Friedl to be a great write-up on jpeg quality settings in Lr:

    Jeffrey Friedl's Blog » An Analysis of Lightroom JPEG Export Quality Settings

      Just Shoot Me
      Just Shoot Me
      Braniac
      February 21, 2017

      Please post the images directly to this thread.

      It is all about the settings you have selected in the Export dialog window. Post a screen shot of that window too.

      X
      xarnthalAuthor
      New Participant
      February 21, 2017

      These windows?

      Everything is on default settings. I did try mess with the "Additional External Editor" to match the Adobe Photoshop CC presets but that left me with a very small even worse quality export... So i reset it back to default.

      Lightroom Screenshot

      Lightroom Export JPEG

      Photoshop Screenshot

      Photoshop Saved JPEG

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