photo colour and detail drops/changes when editing or sharing... why???

[Members_TFug4HN]

Hiya. I was wondering if anyone else is suffering the same camera/file problem as me and if anyone knows of a solution. 3 weeks ago I bought a standard Galaxy S25 128GB and so far the camera is causing me nothing but problems. I use my phone camera to take pictures of trains when I go to visit heritage railways, I photo my dogs doing funny things and share with friends and family, I transfer the photos to my computer for editing, storage/archiving and sharing over apps/posting online. I usually crop and/or magic erase things in the photo but this is were the problem is, every time I click edit on Microsoft Photos the quality of the image changes dramatically! Viewing the photo is fine, the full colour and detail is there, its only when I click edit does it all go wrong. When I save the edit, it doesn't add back the missing colour and detail, it stays the same dull photo. I don't understand why this is happening, why I can view the photo and its totally fine but as soon as I try and edit it colour and detail wash out/disappear.

It is only happening with photos taken by the phones camera. I receive photos from people on my phone and the images stay exactly how I receive them when I go to edit them so its not an issue with my screen, like the phone display might be showing things differently to my computer display but this is not the problem because its only photos created by my camera that are changing colour and quality. Also my computer does show the photos properly, in full colour and detail when I open them to view, its only when I edit them does the colour and detail change.

I have found a work around but I cant keep doing this as it is not a viable long term solution: I have found resizing the image in Microsoft Photos, increasing the quality slider from 80% to 100% usually doubles the file size but it keeps all the colour and detail. I don't change the actual size of the picture or any other settings, just the quality slider. Once its at 100% I save the image, click edit again and the picture is exactly how it should be with full colour and detail. I'm then able to edit it, save it and the photo is perfect with no loss of colour or detail. The problem is I cant do this to EVERY single photos I pull off my phone. Also, I cant do this work around on my phone, there is no option for it. When I send photos in emails, messaging apps and post online the same problem, all the colour and quality is lost. I have no choice but to put all my photos on my computer and do the resize quality increase to keep and the detail and colour.

Editing in Microsoft Photo is not the problem because colour and detail also change when I send photos or post them online through different apps so its not Microsoft Photo changing the images because other apps do it as well. This happens both when I do it straight from my phone (when the file has never been on my computer) and also after I transfer them to my computer. From any device, sending them lowers the colour and detail unless I first do the resize quality increase. I have tested, if I send a resize quality increased photo on apps, email or post online it remains in the full colour and detail so this shows it is not apps causing problems because they will handle the photo in full colour and detail. So far this is my only way to fix things; resize quality increase photos so they stay how they should.

I have played around with my camera settings and also downloaded Camera Assistant. I have taken pictures with different AI enhancement levels, at max and min, I have turned auto HDR on and off, I have tried different zooms, nothing has made any difference, whatever setting I change it doesn't help. Every single photo, no matter what my camera settings are set to loose the colour and detail when I edit/share the file unless I first do the resize/quality increase.

I am not a professional, I just like trains and take pictures for memories and topical discussion about the train itself, not to discuss the photo quality or pit it against other images. I have no editing skills, I rely on magic eraser and crop along with some of the sliders for brightness, contrast and saturation for my photos. I don't want to learn anything new and complex to edit photos because that's not why I am taking them. I rely on the basic Microsoft Photos for everything.

In the picture below I hope you can see the difference, its not a great photo sorry, I tried to make a comparison of how it looks after its been edited and how the photo should look. On the left hand side is the edited photo with a lose to colour and detail. on the right is how the photo should look with no edits, just opened to view. Once I do the resize quality increase to the file it will remain the same as it is on the right no matter what I then choose to do with the file, I can open it in edit and it wont loose the colour and quality.

Does anyone have any idea how I can solve this? How can I get the file to be in full colour and detail when I edit and send/post them? I don't want to be doing resize quality increase for the next 5 years.

[Tourbillon De La Vie]

Maybe MS photos introduces issues. Did you try some other software? Check IrfanView

[phil981]

This is likely due to the wider range of colours and luminosity that the S25 can capture - S25 native output will be embedding a colour profile to the jpeg file that captures the extended colours and dynamic range which the S25 can capture.

- Samsungs gallery app, and likely your computers photo viewer and even web browsers support this extended colour profile and display the image correctly

- The issue likely lies with your editing software (Ms Photos) - if it doesn't support the embedded colour profile, it'll convert it to a (lower, sub standard) colour profile which it can support and you'll experience a "loss" of colour, known as "colour shift"

- When you resize the image in Microsoft Photos, increasing the quality slider from 80% to 100%, you are essentially forcing Microsoft Photos to re-process and re-save the image. During this re-saving process, it's likely converting the image into a more standard and universally compatible format - effectively "baking in" the correct colours and detail so that subsequent edits or shares don't cause a colour shift. This also explains why the file size increases, as it's being re-encoded.

Potential fixes - 

- go to your samsung camera settings - your goal is to change image settings to more 'standard' ones. For example, turning off auto HDR settings, not choosing HEIF/HEIC etc

- use actual photo editing software - not Ms Photos!

- use Samsungs native photo editing software on the phone 

[Reylob]

Hi @Members_TFug4HN 

Welcome to the community forum.

When posting images or sending via messaging apps; they are usually reduced in quality to save space. Check if the app in question has a setting for sending original picture or a reduced quality one.

Editing JPG images will result in reduced quality. It is a lossy format (It loses information when editing, hence losing quality). You might like to use the High Efficiency Format (HEIF) in the camera. It has a better compression rate than JPG. It is also a lossy format, but it will allow you to do undo some changes and keeps more information than JPG.

If using Windows, you might like to try XnView MP (https://www.xnview.com/en/xnview/). It is free, and will allow to manipulate images, convert them, etc. You could do the changes and the convert them to JPG, to share. I do not know if it can handle Samsung’s Raw format but might well do it.

Another great free image editor is GIMP (https://www.gimp.org/), of course there will be a learning curve with both software if you are not familiar with them.

[Members_TFug4HN]

Thankyou for the comments Reylob, phil981 and Tourbillon De La Vie.

It makes sense in what you are saying about my S25 "embedding a colour profile" for the more dynamic range the S25 can capture. I just wish there was an option to force the phone to create the file in its full colour rather than me having to "bake in" the correct colour. ultimately this is what I am trying to find a solution for, to get the image to automatically be in its full colour so I don't have to "bake in" every single photo.

I have tried turning off and on auto HDR settings along with choosing and not choosing HEIF/HEIC files. the colour drift happens no matter what settings I have active/not active. As it stands, no matter what combination I put my camera settings in, any photo looses its dynamic colour when I click edit, it all must be because MS Photos docent support any embedded colour profile when editing. like I said, when I view a photo in in MS Photo the colour is all there, it is just when I edit the colour drifts unless I first "bake it in"

I am willing to give another editing program a try but the reason for using MS Photo is its fantastic magic eraser. My S25 object eraser is no were near as good/accurate as MS Photo. For some reason my previous phone, S20FE, had a way better magic eraser than my S25. When I erase anything on my S25 it seems to blur the object noticeably leaving a square of blur wherever I try to erase something, its not actually removing the object and filling in the area behind it. this didn't happen on my S20 and doesn't happen on MS Photos. For whatever reason my computer does a perfect job of actually removing and filling in areas/objects. I used to do all my editing on my phone, I only started using MS Photos more because of the poor quality of S25 object eraser. I mostly remove lampposts, bins, plants and sometimes people obstructing the views and faces in the train windows, I don't want to be posting peoples faces without there permission but I cant ask a moving trains occupants for permission to post when I'm standing in a field and its zooming by. I know there are fair use laws in regards to people who just happen to get in the way of photos but these train events are family event with sometimes young kids who's parents may never want them posted online.

The programs you have suggested: IrfanView, XnView MP and GIMP, do they have object erasing options built in and if so how good/accurate is it? do you have experience in these programs and how they act when editing photos? I am open to learning and using a new program but only if its a benefit. As you say, MS Photos is causing colour shift unless I "bake in" the correct colour, however, If IrfanView, XnView MP and GIMP don't have a magic eraser then the only purpose of using them is to "bake in" the correct colour before opening the file in MS Photos for magic erasing any object I need to. It would be less confusing for me to stick to using MS Photos because I can do the colour correcting and magic erasing in the same program but if another program can handle the embedded colour profile and has a great object eraser then I would start using it immediately as it would solve my problems.

I just want my phone to play ball and do what I want it to do. iv never encountered these problems on any phone iv had before and its annoyed me my brand new £800 phone is messing around with my lovely train photos. why cant it just create a full colour file right from the start and why is its object eraser so poor.