Corel PaintShop Pro X8 Workspace Brightness/Contrast

[AnunRhama]

Hey, I downloaded a trial version of X8, and one of the things that caught my eye is... what's with the values of the workspace in the program? If I open up an Image that is somewhat darker in nature, the software darkens it even further. At least while you are working on it. I've tried increasing the color depth to 16-bit, cause it wasn't on automatic, but no change. If I export it as a PNG (for instance), it becomes brighter in values. And that's how it's everywhere. If I open it in Chrome, any other image viewer/editor program. Just in X8, while working on it, it's darker. It's a problem, not being able to see a final product until you export it at the end. Also, you can see the change when you hover with the mouse over the X8 icon on the taskbar. It displays the tabs of the files you are working on. And if you place a cursor over the tab, it shows you the image with it's real values. Here are the examples:

(These are images from the web, and I had to post links cause of the size)

http://s19.postimg.org/5g80d3akx/1_A.png

http://s19.postimg.org/3pozblt1t/1_B.png

http://s19.postimg.org/bjpkx00up/2_A.png

http://s19.postimg.org/liajjhaa9/2_B.png

Comparison:

http://s19.postimg.org/c5ejt3vwz/comparison.png

So, what's going on. I had some previous versions of PaintShop Pro, and this never happened. Can something be done about this... or is this just a new 'feature'.

Thanx in advance.

[AnunRhama]

Found it. Went to File> Color Management> Color Management... And then unchecked 'Enable Color Management'. I've never used this before, but it seems that in previous versions, although enabled, it didn't had that much of an effect... as set on default. If someone has something more to add to this, some kind a tip for these values, you're welcomed...

[flagpole]

I'll be honest. I have no clue what you are talking about

[JoeB]

Found it. Went to File> Color Management> Color Management... And then unchecked 'Enable Color Management'. I've never used this before, but it seems that in previous versions, although enabled, it didn't had that much of an effect... as set on default. If someone has something more to add to this, some kind a tip for these values, you're welcomed...

Color Management is definitely not a strong suit of PSP. Most people find that disabling it (as you did) works best for them also.

[GMack]

Joe's right, color management isn't PSP's strong point and one reason I cannot rely on it for editing-to-print. It's just different from Adobe's PS color management which leaves the default settings alone. Gamma seems to be another PSP issue since my other Eizo monitor tattles on PSP about it changing both gamma and color space when launching it.

You found the issue with the blacks as well. I had some issues between PSP and Photoshop where PS produces a blacker black, and PSP crushes the blacks or perhaps they are more gray than a deep black. I have comparison images of PSP and PS here: http://forum.corel.com/EN/viewtopic.php ... 15#p321196 and a little later on in the same thread.

Also, I know every time nVidia puts out a new driver, I have to set it to the YCbCr444 setting manually or the black detail is gone. Seems nVidia has some preference for TV/movies rather than good screen shadow detail with a RGB=16-235 rather than 0-255 which I have to set manually in their console. Too bad it can't leave those settings alone when it installs a new driver, but that one's for nVidia to fix.

Mack