LR3 Export vs. Save As in PS

[ElCapitan]

I have been using LR3 for about 2-3 months now. I really love the program fro editing RAW files and viewing and comparing images, but there have been a few things that I am not sure why it it does what it does.

First off, when I edit an image in PS and then save it, when I view the preview in LR3, the image has some differences compared to if I were viewing the image open in PS.

Second, when viewing an image in Library and exporting the image as a jpeg to either view or put online, the exported jpeg looks different than if I were to open the image in PS and save as a jpeg in the exact same size.

I am trying to figure out why it is doing this as I'd like my images I put up online to look exactly like how I see them when editing them. As it is now, I edit an image to my liking, and then when I use LR3 to export the image as a jpeg, it comes out unlike how I had edited. Can anyone explain the reasoning behind this or what I am doing wrong? I will throw up a few images to show the differences between exporting in LR3 and just saving as a jpeg in PS.





The top image was saved in PS, and looks just like my finished edit. The bottom image was exported in LR3 and is brighter that how my finished edit was. For some reason, when viewing the image in LR3, it has a different look, and this same look is being exported along with the images.

[ElCapitan]

Have been messing around with this all night, and still haven't really found a clear answer, but it seams that the problem lies somewhere between saving as jpeg in CS4 or rendering and exporting in LR3l. However, when the image is viewed at 100% in LR3, it looks identical to the image viewed at 100% in CS4. So which method offers the most accurate preview?

Anyone have any ideas or knowledge bombs they can drop? Also, I do have the auto-tone apply box unchecked in preferences, so that is not the problem.

[RLucas]

Check the brightness slider in the Develop module. Does it stay at the default +50 when you bring it back in to LR? That may be part of the problem.

[fire-eyes]

This may be related to an issue that I found when working in LR3 and doing either 1) Edit in photoshop 2) Export to TIFF, open that in photoshop

What I found is that, at the very least, lens corrections such as distortion and vignetting corrections (part of the lens corrections) are NOT done with #1. It's likely certain other settings as well. But they ARE done with #2. This took me a long time to spot.

I found this pretty annoying as at no point did LR3 inform me that it would only do part of the instructed edits, I just noticed one day that the edge of an object was just a touch past the edge of the frame, and looking in LR, it was IN the frame.

This may be something similar to that.

[ravncat]

Sounds like it is a embdedded color profile / color space issue - or possibly the 1.8 vs 2.2 gamma issue. Lightroom works in a native 1.8 gamma space.

I'll look into it, as I don't know for sure off the top of my head.... Have to do my own checking, I'll report back if someone doesn't figure it out first

I ran a quick double export, one via LR , the other via photoshop. I saw only a difference in my sharpening settings - via the export tool. With color management settings selected - I saw no differences. I do think there are some rendering differences going on when viewing in the lightroom library and not the develop module (Library likes to take some shortcuts for display)

I'm leaning towards the settings you have chosen in the save for web and the export dialogues. Possibly color space.

[fire-eyes]

That's possible too. Double check that you're using the same color space in the camera, in lightroom, in photoshop, and that you're saving to .jpg in the same colorspace. It has to be an unbroken chain.

[corvus2606]

looks to me like PS is working in Adobe RGB, and LR is in sRGB. check the colour profiles

[fire-eyes]

By the way the little giveaway I've noticed when the color space chain is broken is that when there is a blue sky, the blue is slightly different but only noticeable when comparing the LR and final version.

[ElCapitan]

Thanks for all the replies. I am pretty sure it is not a color space issue... I think or at least not one that is supposed to be happening. I am using sRGB the entire process. My workflow is this:

1) Copy RAW file from card to external HDD 2) Add RAW to catalog in LR3 3) Edit RAW in LR3 4) Export RAW to PSD on HDD as sRGB and 16bit and add to catalog 5) Edit original in photoshop (still sRGB) 6) Export edited image as jpeg and sRGB (or open original, resize and save as jpeg within PS)

I did a little more testing. I opened an image in PS and zoomed in at 100% and took a screen grab. I then selected the same image in LR3 in the Library module and zoomed in to 100% and took a screen grab. I then opened both screen grabs in PS, aligned both images, and cropped out so only the images in the screen grab were showing. The images at 100% are almost identical, but I did notice that the one opened in LR3 was a just a tad bit brighter/colorful. At 100%, it doesn't appear to be sharper, but when viewed to fit screen, it comes off as a littler sharper. Something is going on behind the scenes of LR3, and I cannot figure it out.

I even tried exporting my image as TIFF to see if that made a difference and the same exact problem occurred. I then tried exporting the RAW as a PSD with prophoto RGB and when exporting the edited PSD, export as sRGB jpeg and prophoto RGB jpeg. Still had the exact same problem.

I tried checking and unchecking the apply auto tone box in preferences, and I went back into the Develop module with the PSD selected, and none of the sliders are out of place.

I will try messing around to see if it has to do with the Lens Correction not being applied when exporting as PSD, but this is driving me mad. I really want to find out what the issue is here, because I do like using the export feature in LR3 rather than the Image Processor under Tools in Bridge.

EDIT: Test after test, I cannot seem to find out what is going on behind the scenes. No matter the image, no matter if I open it in PS before exporting, the exported image from LR3 is brighter than the image opened in PS and saved as a jpeg. the brightness isn't quite as noticeable on smaller images, but when comparing jpegs that are 1800x1200 to fit the monitor, the difference is extremely noticeable.

I also noticed that when I import the PSD that was exported from the RAW, it looks like it should in the preview window, but when it rendered the image, this is where the brightness is added. I am guessing that LR3 then exports based off the rendered image.