This is getting to be a real conundrum, and I appreciate any suggestions:
When creating JPGs or GIFs for the internet, obviously my greatest concern is not how they'll look on my own monitor, but rather how they will look on thousands of other monitors. My question is what are the best general colour management settings for either CorelDraw or PhotoPaint when exporting to JPGs or GIFs -- without creating files of enormous proportions?
First off - set your working units to pixels so that you can scale your vectored image down to the correct size - in pixels - that you require. Also be cognizant of page size - set your page size to the pixel dimensions you require and then fit your artwork on the page so that nothing hangs beyond the boundary of your page.
When exporting make sure you export only the current page.
That should be a good starting point to get your file sizes down.
Use sRGB as your working colour space because that's what your browser - and everybody's browser for that matter - wants. Don't use AdobeRGB or ProPhoto or CMYK colour space. Be prepared for unpredictable results if you do.
Terremoto, I forgot to mention that I didn't know that about using sRGB, and I will do that immediately.
Gus, let me ask - which option are you using to export? Export, or export for web?
It almost sounds like you're using straight export.
I've tried both -- and others to boot. For example I have a 24-bit RGB item that's 10 by 460 pixels. If I export it under the web settings, the resulting JPG is a whopping 170kb. If I export it as a straight export, same result. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's gigantic for such a small file and can drastically add to web-page loading time.
I usually export my files through the Web Image Optimizer and try to get as much compression and smoothing as possible without overly distorting the image. But I don't understand why the files are sometimes small and sometimes enormous, notwithstanding that I'm perpetually playing with colour management and have never been consistent.
gus1 said: For example I have a 24-bit RGB item that's 10 by 460 pixels. If I export it under the web settings, the resulting JPG is a whopping 170kb.
For example I have a 24-bit RGB item that's 10 by 460 pixels. If I export it under the web settings, the resulting JPG is a whopping 170kb.
Using what compression %?
In general, the ultimate file size depends on what's in the picture. If you use one color (say a transparent png for use on a web site) the file will be small even if it's a lot of pixels. If you use a photograph of something detailed - trees, buildings, gradients, what have you, the file size will be larger, because you have more colors in a more complicated order.
In the bad old days of the early web when we had to work with gifs and only 256 colors, there was a noticeable file size difference between gradients that ran horizontally and those that ran vertically. Thankfully those are behind us, but my point is content matters.
Not that I'm saying 170kb for a 10 x 460 pixel file is normal. Can you post a copy of the file you're working with?
I just checked it, and yes, the internal colour profile is being embedded. The option, of course, is to "Always embed using ... " or "Do not embed ICC profiles". Which do you suggest I use?
Thanks!
Do not embedd.
The internet works on sRGB and does not require an embedded profile.
With that said, you must not use anything other than sRGB for your internet files.
The discussion of color management for the internet is complicated but the reality is that it is simple, sRGB works even with systems that handle color managed files and is a great deal smaller and therefore faster on the web.
Also with that said you have a reduced gamut with sRGB but the increased gamut has a price and that is file size and site load speeds.