How can I reduce banding in photos exported for the web?
Asked 7/29/2018
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2 answers
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I sometimes add a little noise before posting photos online to help avoid visible banding in smooth gradients. However, I occasionally still see banding after uploading to sites like 500px, even when it is not visible in Lightroom. What causes this, and what export or editing steps can help reduce banding in images prepared for the internet? Would exporting at a lower resolution help?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
7y ago
2 Answers
2
Banding and blotchiness in images is often caused by excessive post processing. There are a few ways to avoid causing such effects:
- Capture in RAW and post process with high bit-depth color. Make sure "dithering" is enabled when exporting to 8-bit color.
- Use the sRGB colorspace. (Avoid ProPhoto, AdobeRGB, and other wide-gamut colorspaces.)
- Limit the amount of post processing.
- Make sure editing tools have "dithering" enabled.
- Avoid or limit noise reduction.
- Add additional noise.
Originally by user75526. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user75526
7y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
Banding in web images usually comes from heavy tonal edits combined with 8-bit output and web compression, especially in smooth gradients like skies.
To reduce it:
- Shoot and edit from RAW in a high bit-depth workflow.
- Enable dithering when exporting to 8-bit files, if your software supports it.
- Export in sRGB for web use rather than wide-gamut spaces like Adobe RGB or ProPhoto.
- Go easy on strong post-processing, especially large gradient or contrast adjustments.
- Avoid excessive noise reduction, which can smooth away natural texture and make banding more visible.
- Adding a small amount of noise can help mask banding.
Lowering resolution is not a reliable fix by itself. In some cases, resizing may change how compression behaves, but it won’t address the root causes as well as proper color space, bit-depth handling, restrained editing, and dithering.
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