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Color is different when exported from Lightroom to other applications

New Here ,
Nov 03, 2021 Nov 03, 2021

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I am trying to solve an issue I have had with Lightroom for some time - images exported from Lightroom look darker and more contrasty when viewed in other apps or web browsers - i.e Chrome, Edge, Firefox, DaVinci Resolve, One note....  I am exporting as sRGB and embedding profiles. I have also tried export as Adobe RGB with the same results. 

There is something wrong with the way Lighroom and Photoshop are handling colors - if I export from Lightroom to my Photoshelter account, the image looks dark when viewing in Chrome. However, if I download the uploaded image from Photoshelter and open it in Photoshop it looks like it did in Lightroom, normal.   I have two high end calibrated monitors and are running a newish window desktop. I still get the same results previewing on a Macbook Pro.

I am tempted to try Affinity photo to see if I get the same result, and perhaps switch my entire workflow away from Adobe.  But I'm stumped as to why the adobe apps seem to be handling colour differently to other apps and browsers.

I have attached a screenshot that shows the exported image in a browser next to the image as it appears in Lightroom. Any help much appreciated.

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New Here ,
Nov 03, 2021 Nov 03, 2021

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In addition - this appears to be a Windows problem. If I open the Lightroom exported file in Photoshop on my Macbook Pro, I get the incorrect dark, high contrast appearance.  The same file opens up in Photoshop on the windows machine looking as I expected it, with my Lightroom tonal adjustments. Something odd going on here...

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Community Expert ,
Nov 03, 2021 Nov 03, 2021

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One thing needs to be ruled out first, since you say you have two monitors: None of those web browsers have multi-monitor support. They will use the monitor profile for your main display, even if the application is on the secondary display. And that will be wrong and it will display incorrectly.

 

Photoshop and Lightroom, OTOH, will use the appropriate profile for each display. But they have no control over the profiles as such - they just use whatever profiles they get from the operating system.

 

Generally, if a color managed application displays incorrectly, it's usually a monitor profile problem. The profile may be bad or inaccurate, or it may be the wrong profile. If the profile is good, the data are converted from the document profile into the monitor profile, and it will be correctly represented on screen. There is, in fact, nothing Photoshop or Lightroom can do to prevent correct display.

 

Are those monitors BenQ by any chance? BenQ's calibration/profiling software is known to be very buggy and unreliable, and the most common symptom is that the profile simply isn't loading correctly. You wouldn't be the first.

 

If not, what calibrator are you using?

 

The point I'm trying to make is that this is usually down to factors outside the application, i.e. the monitor profile (or the video driver).

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New Here ,
Nov 03, 2021 Nov 03, 2021

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Thanks for your reply. I'm using 2 HP Z27 displays. I suspect it is a display profile issue - though odd that it is only showing up in Adobe software. (not DaVinci Resolve, Windows apps, web browsers etc. ) I have Nvidia  GeForce RTX 2080 graphics card. Unfortunately I haven't been able to get the x-rite monitor profiler device to work with the screens, so are using profiles I generated about a year ago. 

 

I'm still trying things out as I have to solve this or switch software. My image deliverables from Lightroom or Photoshop show up as way too dark/contrasty in other apps/systems/browsers. 

 

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New Here ,
Nov 03, 2021 Nov 03, 2021

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I've found if I switch the monitor profile from HP z27x dci-p3 icc profile.icc to HP Z27 sRGB D65 ICC Profile.icc on one of the monitors I get a color shift when dragging an image opened in adobe photoshop from one monitor to the other. The color approximates what the export output of Lightroom is giving me in other apps/browsers so I will use that as a workaround for now. 

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Community Expert ,
Nov 03, 2021 Nov 03, 2021

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First of all, the native Windows applications aren't color managed at all, and will just ignore all icc profiles. They don't know what an icc profile is.

 

The only exception is Edge - but if all these web browsers display identically to e.g. Windows "Photos" or Explorer, that just shows color management isn't working as it should.

 

Secondly - a monitor profile with "DCI-P3" in the name isn't very reassuring here. Where does that profile come from? This monitor isn't a DCI-P3 monitor. It doesn't have those primaries.

 

You can't experiment with monitor profiles. Only one is the right one. The monitor profile has one single purpose: to accurately describe the actual and current response of the monitor. The profile is a map, and it has to correspond to the actual terrain.

 

This is what a calibrator does. It measures the monitor's output, and writes a profile describing that behavior. If the behavior changes, the profile is no longer valid and you need to make a new one.

 

I don't know where your monitor profiles come from, but I would make an educated guess here that Photoshop and Lightroom are using those profiles, but your other applications aren't. So then it boils down to whether those profiles are accurate or not.

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