Vista - Photo Gallery Pictures are Horrible

I just bought my first Vista PC, and I have noticed that pictures (JPEGs)
viewed through Photo Gallery are horrible. When using Photoshop, Adobe
Bridge, or Adobe Lightroom, the pictures look normal and good. However, with
Photo Gallery, pictures tend to be darker, especially for the darks (shadows)
in the pictures. People's hair in particular usually has very poor
rendering. Parts of hair are completely black...there is absolutely no
detail. Pictures with dark backgrounds (e.g., pictures taken of people,
using a flash) render the background almost completely black in many areas.
In most of these cases, dark hair blends completely into the dark
background.....both the hair and background are completely black.
This is very annoying. While I use Adobe products to edit my pictures, I
like to use "quick" programs like Windows Pictures and Fax Viewer to run
through my pictures to view. It also raises the concern that what if people
I send pictures to use Photo Gallery?
I'm sure it's some sort of color management issue, but users shouldn't have
to fiddle with this, especially with a computer right out of the box!
I'd greatly appreciate any suggestions....thanks, Richard

Richard1962 wrote:==================================
Have a look at the following articles:

(939395) When you view an image in Windows
Photo Gallery on a Windows Vista-based computer,
the image is yellow
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/939395/en-us

Microsoft PhotoBlog Frequently Asked Questions:
http://blogs.msdn.com/pix/pages/faq.aspx#q6
Read: "Q: Why do my photos have an odd color
cast in the Photo Gallery (but look fine in the XP
Picture and Fax Viewer and IE)?"

Yellow pictures in Windows Photo Gallery
http://tinyurl.com/33gxum
or...
Yellow pictures in Windows Photo Gallery


--

John Inzer

Thanks, John.

Got to run, now, but I'll look at those articles in more detail tonight. I
will say, however, that I wouldn't characterize my problem as a yellow tinge
or sepia tone. I did quickly check what color profile is being loaded at
startup, and it is the one that came from Dell for my 24" widescreen monitor.


I guess one thing I need to look into is if any of the articles above work,
why do pictures look fine, viewing with Photoshop CS3, Bridge, or Elements,
even after booting up with that Dell color profile? I can bring up pictures
with any of these Adobe products side by side with the same pictures viewed
with Photo Gallery, and there is a marked difference.

Anyway, thanks again....I'll investigate further tonight.

Richard

"John Inzer" wrote:

Richard1962 wrote:===============================
My bet is still on the color profile.

Let us know if you find a fix.

--

John Inzer

John,

Something came up, and I haven't been able to delve into this problem this
past few weeks, but I'll get back to checking it in the coming days.

Richard

"John Inzer" wrote:

Hi, John.

Changing the color profile appears to fix the problem....note that I think I
had to reboot in order for the color profile changes to take place. I also
tried using
Adobe RGB 1998, which is what I usually shoot with, and that seems to work
as well.

Thanks a lot for your help!

Richard

"John Inzer" wrote:

Richard1962 wrote:=================
You're welcome.

Thanks for the update.

--

John Inzer
Digital Media MVP

Notice
This is not tech support
I am a volunteer

Solutions that work for
me may not work for you

Proceed at your own risk

John,

After looking at many pictures this evening, I've noticed something else.
Although I think I have fixed my original problem, it appears as if a similar
problem occurs when I run the slideshow part of Photo Gallery.

Before I get into the slide show part, one thing I started noticing is that
if I convert the color space to Adobe RGB 1998, things look better than using
sRGB. This is especially true in the dark areas. This is understandable
because Adobe RGB 1998, which I usually take pictures in, has a wider color
gamut (can see more colors) than sRGB can. I just never noticed this on my
laptop running XP and Windows Picture and Fax Viewer, but it also could be
because I also bought a nice monitor with my new PC which has a wide color
gamut. To be honest, however, I don't think this is because my new monitor
is better....I would think that even with sRGB, pictures should still be
better than the older machine.

Now, about the slide show. It's a little harder to tell because I can't as
quickly switch back and forth between pictures using different programs
because of the slide show running, but there is some noticeable difference.
Again, the shadows or dark areas don't have as much contrast; they seem to be
oversaturated when the slide show is running, as compared to just looking at
individual pictures. Pictures also do not look as sharp using the slideshow
as compared to individual pictures in Photo Gallery. This is especially
noticeable in people's hair.

My suspicion is that Photo Gallery's slide show does something to the
pictures like perhaps using sRGB, even if my default profile is Adobe RGB
1998; I suspect it might be lowering the resolution or changing the sharpness
somehow.

Have you seen or heard of this particular problem with the slide show
portion of Photo Gallery? Again, I never noticed this on my laptop with XP
and Windows Picture and Fax Viewer. I really do not think the problem exists
on my laptop with XP.

Thanks,

Richard

"John Inzer" wrote:

I would suggest removing all the Color
Profiles and see how things look.

--

John Inzer
Digital Media MVP

Notice
This is not tech support
I am a volunteer

Solutions that work for
me may not work for you

Proceed at your own risk
======================
Richard1962 wrote:

John,

I've removed both color profiles. As default, I had Adobe RGB 1998. The
2nd one was the profile for my Dell 24" monitor.

After removing both and rebooting, I still see that problem with the
slideshow in Photo Gallery. However, the more I have looked at it, the more
I think it is a sharpening or perhaps a much lower resolution issue.

Again, what I see in the slide show is a picture that is without a doubt
less sharp than what I see if I just double click on a single picture. This
is particularly noticeable in a person's hair, but I can also see it in their
faces and other places.

One picture I have is of a friend in the foreground. In the background,
which is dark, there are 2 people sitting in a booth in a restaurant. My
friend's face and particularly his hair is noticeably less sharp in the slide
show. In the slide show, those 2 people in the dark background are harder to
make out than they are when I just double click on that picture.

Another thing I have noticed is that in the slide show, some pictures, not
all, show a very thin and rainbow colored border, typically on the top and
the left edges of the picture, in the slideshow. That border is about the
width of a pencil line. Don't know, and doubt, if this is related.

Richard

"John Inzer" wrote: