Color is Wrong in Preview / Quick Look when viewing photographs

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Level 1

19 points

Color is Wrong in Preview / Quick Look when viewing photographs

Hi All,

I have a problem in that all my photos and image files look a lot more saturated in Leopard Preview / Quick Look, with much warmer hue, tint and color temp, then they do in either iPhoto, Aperture, Photoshop Elements, Safari (or Firefox) when uploaded to the Web and even in my Windows XP VM using the normal Explorer application. The difference is very visibly and is unacceptable when viewing / editing photos.

To summarize, it seems the only place images look different, much more saturated with more warmer tint and hue, is in OS X Leopard Preview and Quick Look.

- I have tried viewing and comparing on another Macbook Laptop and do not notice this problem, which leads me to believe that there is a problem with my system.
- I have also tried creating another user account on my Mac and logging in to preview the images, but it makes no difference.

Can someone please advise as to what I can do to fix the problem?

Thanks,

P

MacBook Pro, Core 2 Duo, 17" Glossy Screen, 3GB RAM, 160GB HDD, Mac OS X (10.5.6)

Posted on Jan 4, 2009 1:31 PM

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Answer 1

gnol

Level 1

5 points

Jan 5, 2009 10:49 AM in response to Peter Loew

I have noticed the same. Seems like a genuine bug in preview.

Try this for laughs: Open up a picture in Preview and note its too warm colors. Make a screenshot, and view in preview next to the original image. The now magically warmer colors prove this is indeed a bug in preview.

Lightroom, PS, Safari, Opera all show the images in question (JPG, embedded profile: sRGB IEC61966-2.1) consistently correctly, with preview being the only exception a lazy comparison could find.

EDIT: This happens only on my external TFT. If I move both the Photoshop and the preview windows to the built-in screen, the Photoshop colors "snap" to look the same on both screens (and the same as preview on the built-in TFT).

There seems to be a problem with preview always applying (correct) color correction for the built-in TFT regardless of whether the image is actually displayed there or on another display. This is probably also only noticeable if built-in TFT and external display have noticeably different color responses (and thus corrections), and only when their colors are corrected.

This really is an annoying bug for photographers or other creative people (which Apple prides itself to cater to).

Message was edited by: gnol

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Answer 2

Peter Loew Author

Level 1

19 points

Jan 5, 2009 1:41 AM in response to Peter Loew

Does anybody have any suggestions?

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Answer 3

Peter Loew Author

Level 1

19 points

Jan 5, 2009 4:04 PM in response to gnol

Gnol,

I am also using an external display (I'm using an LG L227WT in mirrored mode) and although I don't get quite the same results as you, it makes a difference when I unplug the external display and reload iPhoto & Preview:

When I unplug the display and reload both iPhoto, PS, etc. and Preview, the images *look the same* on the individual Laptop TFT display. However they retain the saturated colors (from what I can tell) but they do look the same.

When I plug the external display back in and reload the respective applications, all the 3rd party apps (iPhoto, PS etc.) display a cooler image and the Preview image is over saturated.

Definitely something going on here.

Now I have a problem in that I have no idea what the images really look like; do they look like they do in the 3rd party apps when my display is plugged in, or do they look like they do when I am using the individual Laptop TFT screen?

Hmmm not good and it seems like a genuine bug.

Any further comments / suggestions on the above?

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Answer 4

gnol

Level 1

5 points

Jan 5, 2009 4:27 PM in response to Peter Loew

We are very probably getting different results because you are using your external display in mirrored mode while I'm using mine as a second (or, as in my case, primary) display.

Your images probably look correct in your third party apps, or when viewed with only the built-in screen connected. If they look very different on those two screens (in third party apps), one or both aren't properly calibrated (which will most likely be the case, if you haven't done so manually).

Also note that the built-in panels in notebooks are of quite poor quality when it comes to color reproduction (never mind the challenge of knowing when your head is positioned correctly to achieve the right viewing angle).

Message was edited by: gnol

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Answer 5

Peter Loew Author

Level 1

19 points

Jan 5, 2009 4:52 PM in response to gnol

I have calibrated my external display using the built in OS X Calibration tool, but I have left the Laptop using the default color profile as I assumed this would be already set up just fine. The external display looks as close to the laptop display as I can get it, except in rare color situations.

1) The thing is, when both displays are connected the images in the 3rd party apps look very similar (on both the displays), and in both displays the Preview app is always over saturated.

2) But when using just the Laptop TFT, the 3rd party apps and Preview (although they look the same) seem over saturated.

As a result I am not sure which is correct; it seems like the former (point 1 above) should be correct as the color on the images look more 'normalized' whereas in point 2 the colors seem unusually over-saturated. I am not sure which display / configuration to trust.

Out of curiosity, what display monitor are you using?

Message was edited by: Peter Loew

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Answer 6

gnol

Level 1

5 points

Jan 5, 2009 4:54 PM in response to Peter Loew

I am using a cheap Samsung 226bw which is unsuitable for color-critical work, but can still pretty well demonstrate Preview's behavior. I've calibrated both displays in expert mode, which gives much better results than simple calibration.

I am pretty sure my third party apps display images correctly - on the built-in screen, Preview displays images exactly as any other app (and as close as it gets to how they are displayed in third party apps on the external display).

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Answer 7

Peter Loew Author

Level 1

19 points

Jan 5, 2009 5:05 PM in response to gnol

I think my LG is nearly as cheap as your Samsung, but like you I can demonstrate Preview's behavior.

I have calibrated my LG display in expert mode also, and now thinking about doing my Laptop display in expert mode or buying a hardware calibrator to do both the displays.

The thing is, how can you (or I) prove that our built-in displays are displaying the images correctly on themselves, let alone on the external displays?

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Answer 8

gnol

Level 1

5 points

Jan 5, 2009 6:17 PM in response to Peter Loew

I have found a workaround:

Quit Preview (and all other apps you suspect are displaying wrong colors - Aperture 2 and Photoshop CS 3 get it right, though, no need to quit them).

Do http://support.apple.com/kb/TA24201?viewlocale=en_US

Restart Preview (and all other Apps you closed). Now Preview should display correctly on your external monitor. It could look washed out on your built-in display, however.

This is because apparently apps stay in the color space they were launched in, except for the Adobe apps which actually do check what screen they're on, and apply the necessary correction.

The setting of the primary display as per the link above will probably be necessary every time you reconnect your notebook to the external display, if you had it running without an external display in the meantime.

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Answer 9

Peter Loew Author

Level 1

19 points

Jan 6, 2009 2:45 AM in response to gnol

That is indeed a workaround and it seems to 'sync' everything up on both displays.

Whilst that is all well and good, when I disconnect my external display I still have the problem of seemingly over saturated colors just on my laptop display. So I tried the link even though the external display is not connected, and lo and behold Preview looks like it does when both are connected ('normalised colors') but the 3rd party apps now look over saturated!

My point is I am not sure how to tell which display / configuration is 'telling the truth'. I can live with the workaround, but then why does my built-in display tell me the colors are over saturated when using it independently?

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