Quick Preview and Viewer Test... Do you have this problem?

VirtualRain

• February 18, 2015 00:02

I've found something interesting that may help them get at the problem that is affecting previews on my 4K display.

I was playing around on my laptop screen and I'm wondering if this problem is easily recreated by anyone...

- Find a RAW image with fine details... ideally something with a sign or text that's in sharp focus
- Make an adjustment - anything like adjust the exposure a notch or two or something
- In Preferences, Set your preview size to something much less than your viewer window (e.g. if you're running on a 2560x1440 display, choose a preview size of something like 1280).
- Right-click your thumbnail in the browser and select "Regenerate Preview"
- Note the sharpness of the sign or text - take a screen shot if you want
- Now go back to Preferences, and set your preview size larger than your viewer window (e.g. 2880)
- Right-click the thumbnail and "Regenerate Preview"
- Note what happens to the sharpness of the sign or text - take a screen shot again and compare to the previous

Here's what it does on my MacBook Pro with an Apple 2560x1440 monitor with the viewer about 1950px wide... (click to see the full image)

https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7431/16565240605_9c8db93a8f_b.jpgScreen Shot 2015-02-17 at 3.59.06 PM by Virtual.Rain, on Flickr

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  Grant Hodgeon

  • February 18, 2015 00:11

  Are you zooming in when taking these screenshots? At 100% maybe?
  
  Just trying to replicate your steps.
  
  Also, what exactly is the issue you're highlighting? That the lower-res preview is sharper, or something else?

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  VirtualRain

  • February 18, 2015 00:14

  [quote="photoGrant" wrote:
  Are you zooming in when taking these screenshots? At 100% maybe?
  
  Just trying to replicate your steps.
  
  Also, what exactly is the issue you're highlighting? That the lower-res preview is sharper, or something else?

  
  
  Not zooming. I keep the image at "fit" throughout this process. For the image above, I just screen grabbed a small portion to illustrate the differences.
  
  The thing you'll notice is that a preview image smaller than your viewer is rendered much sharper than a preview image that's larger than your viewer.
  
  EDIT: If I trusted the viewer, I would have thrown out the first image due to OOF... but it's fine... its the preview that's soft. WTF?!

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  Grant Hodgeon

  • February 18, 2015 00:22

  [quote="VirtualRain" wrote:
  

  [quote="photoGrant" wrote:
  Are you zooming in when taking these screenshots? At 100% maybe?
  
  Just trying to replicate your steps.
  
  Also, what exactly is the issue you're highlighting? That the lower-res preview is sharper, or something else?

  
  
  Not zooming. I keep the image at "fit" throughout this process. For the image above, I just screen grabbed a small portion to illustrate the differences.
  
  The thing you'll notice is that a preview image smaller than your viewer is rendered much sharper than a preview image that's larger than your viewer.

  
  
  Honestly that doesn't surprise me too much. Shrinking a large preview into a smaller window will likely result in a soft image vs blowing up a smaller (perceived sharper) image. The true technical reason this is happening and whether it can be improved isn't something I can't comment on. But hey, TFAT.

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  VirtualRain

  • February 18, 2015 01:25

  I'm really interested if anyone can reproduce this... it would preserve my sanity. 😊

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