Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have come to the end of my rope. I want my red back! I take pictures. I have spent innumerable hours practicing taking good accurate images. I have taken thousands upon thousands of pictures only to be frustrated beyond belief. I have been trying to get my white balance just perfect to show the true color of the kids and this is what I get. I get photos that look almost perfect only to have them diminished once I upload them. Why is this happening?

Here is the image that I just uploaded showing a really red Hypo Boa:

Looks red right? NOT! Not as red as it really is. Not as red as the image is on my computer. The instant I upload it, it looses red. It actually looses green too. The vibrancy of the colors is diminished and I don't know why. Let me illustrate. Here is a screen shot showing the difference:

Neither shot shows the true color of the snake, or the true color of the moss the snake is resting on. The one lower shot shows more vibrant color than the upper image within the screen shot. This illustrates the color loss I get when I upload the image.

Why does this happen and what can I do to correct it?
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Boaphile Home
All Original/Boaphile Plastics
The Boa Network

Hey Jeff.

I think Rich Ihle (Salmon Boa) now uses a white picture box.

Whatever.....you call them.

I think his pictures are more True to the color now that he uses it.

Check out his site and ask him.
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Ashley Lopez's Black Forest Constrictors.

blackforestconstrictors@gmail.com

WWW.BLACKFORESTCONSTRICTORS.COM

Any idea where to buy a picture box or instructions on how to build them?
I tried to google it and came up w/ nadda.
jb
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Jonathan Brady
"Sarcasm is angers ugly cousin" -Dr. Buddy Rydell (Jack Nicholson) in "Anger Management".

http://www.obuynow.com/Standard_kits.html

It is possible some color lense filter may work.
jsc
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"As hard as I've tried, just can't NOT do this"
John Crickmer

Hey Jeff,
I have no idea why it happens but I've had it happen before. Apparently some websites will automatically alter the quality of an image that is uploaded in order to save space. I've experienced not only loss of color, but also loss of clarity as well making them fuzzy. It also seems to get worse over time. Like something (program??) or someone (not as likely as a program) at the site goes through and just "dumbs down" the image every 6 months or so.
I've heard that some people have found photohosting sites that don't do this. It's rumored that photobucket does not but I don't know.
I hope this bit of hearsay is helpful???
jb
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Jonathan Brady
"Sarcasm is angers ugly cousin" -Dr. Buddy Rydell (Jack Nicholson) in "Anger Management".

So you save an image on your computer. It looks good, it looks how it's supposed to. Then after uploading it to the web, it looks different? If so, it may only have something to do with the host that you're loading your pictures to (boaconstrictor.net/gallery). This is common even with Photobucket and Webshots hosting. Most galleries and photo hosts automatically decrease the image's file size which in turn messes with the image quality. This can mean a change in the image's "color profile" (in other words, a crummier range of colors).

I upload all of my images to my own website (in an "album" or seperate "images" folder). Makes it easy to type out the url (for example, http://truetails.net/images/boa1.jpg) and insures that the original quality of the saved image stays in tact. If you can do that through your Boaphile site, I'm sure you'll be much happier with how the pictures look.

But also.. how are you saving the images? I see you have Photoshop. So upon saving do you select "Save/Save As" or "Save for Web"?

If you use the "Save/Save As" option, you're prompted with a JPEG Options window after clicking "Save". Be sure you are selecting "Maximum" for qaulity, and change the number shown from 10 to 12. How it should look:

If you use the "Save for Web" option, again be sure to select Maximum Qaulity, set it to 100, and uncheck the "Optimized" option. This is how it should be set up:

While the file sizes will be larger, saving your images at the highest qaulity will preserve their original color and overall appearance.