new member first post.

After a long time of just browsing on this site i thought it was time i joined and got the benefit of other peoples comments.
This is my very first post so i dont know how it will go.
I am using two puters . One is used for my workflow and the other is used for web use only and i am sharing one monitor. I calibrate my workflow pc with spyder and everything looks good and i get good prints. But i have burnt this image to a cd so i can post it via the web pc.It looks fine on the workflow pc but very dark on the one used for web work. So as this is my first post i dont know what will happen.
1dmk 11
500mm
f/8 1/800
iso 500

Hi
Great image. The reflection makes it for me
Where was it taken

Thanks jack,
it was taken a couple of summers back and if i remember right it was in the lake district. Cant understand why its so dark though. Im missing something here.

Hi Matt,

Welcome to the forum

I like he composition of the image and the colour of the water. I don't know if you have applied USM but the head looks very soft to me, and the whites look a tad hot.

Regards

Rob

Hi Matt

Welcome to the forum

A very nice first post, super water colours and reflections. I would be tempted to clone out the small black specks on the waters surface to the right of the grebe. I agree with Rob the eye looks a little soft so maybe some extra USM around the head would help. Also a more panoramic composition (removing some of the top of the frame) could also work effectively I feel.

Nice shot though

cheers

Sean

Hi Matt and welcome to UKNP/NPN.

The image looks fine - not too dark.

When you 'calibrate' your monitor you do two things - you set the monitor controls to use a particular brightness/contrast and colour temperature, and the colorimiter sets the computer's graphic card to adjust it's colours. ie. calibration is always a combination of both the computer and the monitor - not just the monitor. So to see the same on both computers you need to run the calibration again on the 2nd computer. Don't adjust the monitor settings, just let the Spyder do it's colour patch bit. The colours should then more or less be the same on both computers.

Hope that helps

Hello Matt
Welcome to the forum. Useful advice from the guys above and the image doesn't look too dark on my set up either. Nice first post.
Best wishes
Phil

Hi Matt,
I agree with above comments, I always have to resharpen when I resize for the web.



Tim

Hi,

Nice first post, love that water, as said head does look a tad soft....

Nick is right about the calibration/profiling, an image will only look the same on two computers if they are profiled correctly.. (think I said that right)

You don't say what type of monitor you are using so a touch difficult to give advice, firstly it is important to calibrate the monitor correctly before profiling, I believe the Spyder software refers to this as Pre-Cal, if you are using an LCD the recommended luminance is often too high at around 140 (cd/m2), I would recommend a more conservative 100 to 110 (cd/m2), a gamma of 2.2 (Mac and PC these days) and a white point of 6500K. (CRT a luminace of 100 (cd/m2))

Once this is done you should be able to produce an accurate profile curve for the graphics card in each computer.....

HTH

Phil

Hi Matt
a brilliant first post. Exposure is great on my screen nice comp. and lovely water.
John
Aberdeen

Hi Matt,

Nice first post - looks pretty good to me and I love the reflections,

Niall

Welcome to the forum Matt.

The colours and shapes of the ripples on the water are beautiful and i love the reflection. The head does look a little soft but a bit of USM may well fix that.

Graham

Thanks guys for all your comments on my first posting. I know the whites are blown and did also think of cloning out the specks on the water ,but this was really just a sort of test shot. I didnt use any usm at all and just a bit of sharpening in p/s. I was dissapointed in the results as the image was very dark to me. But i understand what you mean by calibrating the two computers and i am in the process of doing that tonight.I am using an llyama prolite lcd monitor .Its a couple of years old now but its all i have so itl have to do .I normally weed out what i think looks ok in rawshooter and then play about with the images in p/s 7. I know ive a lot to learn and i apreciate all you help. Thanks again.
Matt

Nice to see you posting on here now matt - expect to see some good stuff from your scotland week too

Hope to be making up your way in the next couple of weeks (just back from a week in Norway) so may be in touch if there's anything about!!

ATB

Mark

Should have said nice shot in previous post by the way!! Like the reflections.

Mark

Thanks mark,
Still getting the feel of this yet. If your up this way give me a call and maybee we can sort something out.
Matt