[Littleshmee]

I recently printed out a few random photos to go on my wall (before my 20 free prints expired!), and I noticed something odd. I had a mix of pictures ranging from a year ago to last week, all shot with the same camera and printed in the same batch. The pictures from last year came out great, but all my recent pictures are really... blah. Flat, kind of cloudy... I didn't take all of them, either, and the one that my friend took came out the same.

The only thing that I can think of that's different is the computer I used to make adjustments to the RAW images, but even on my computer screen the new ones don't look as good. Is it possible I've got moisture buildup in the lens that's clouding things, or anything like that? This is somewhat frustrating.

[Littleshmee]

I recently printed out a few random photos to go on my wall (before my 20 free prints expired!), and I noticed something odd. I had a mix of pictures ranging from a year ago to last week, all shot with the same camera and printed in the same batch. The pictures from last year came out great, but all my recent pictures are really... blah. Flat, kind of cloudy... I didn't take all of them, either, and the one that my friend took came out the same.

The only thing that I can think of that's different is the computer I used to make adjustments to the RAW images, but even on my computer screen the new ones don't look as good. Is it possible I've got moisture buildup in the lens that's clouding things, or anything like that? This is somewhat frustrating.

[Lee Yuan Sheng]

Originally Posted by Littleshmee

The only thing that I can think of that's different is the computer I used to make adjustments to the RAW images

I think that's the key. Care to post one photo from the old batch, and one from the new batch, in JPEG format for us all to see?

[Littleshmee]

Here's the picture I took a year ago, it looked fine printed:


And here's one of the recent ones that came out funky:


I didn't notice anything looking strange on my monitor, just when I had them printed, so you might not be able to notice anything. I wish there was some standard in monitor/printer calibration...

[James Fee]

I assume if the computer is different, so is the printer. You sure the printer is good?

[Jason Kravitz]

The bottom picture looks slightly overexposed on my monitor which may explain why it is not coming out as rich and saturated as the top picture which looks like a better exposure.

Although if this happening with all new pictures your camera is taking I would guess there is something else going on.