Sky Banding

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ACW

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I took this image earlier this year, and upon uploading it to Flickr tonight, the sky seems very banded.

I never noticed this when originally editing the image on Lightroom 4, but now it seems massively obvious.

Is it anything to do with the image being compressed?

Or can anyone not see it? It seems to be worse the smaller the image is displayed.


Westminster Park Plaza Hotel by ACW#, on Flickr

edit- Original image has no banding at all. Why would PP cause this?
 
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If you still have the original file, try saving the edit at a lower compression rate (higher number in PSE, unsure of other PP software). Save another copy at the highest compression rate and compare them...
 
If it's not like that when looking at the RAW in Lightroom, then it's the result of JPEG compression. Save at maximum quality and see if it's still there.
 
Hi ACW. It could also be something as simple as adjusting brightness and contrast on the whole image while post processing that has created the banding. It's easy to concentrate on processing the main detail of any image and not notice something like banding until afterwards.

Did you save a TIF or PNG at all of the finished image after PP?
 
Original raw file has 14 bits per channel. JPEG file only has 8 bits per channel and can not represent fine tonal gradients with equivalent finesse. JPEG compression may compound problems on top of the loss of bit depth.

If you have been been making adjustments to the shadows, to lighten them, or the tone curve in the shadows then you might have stretched the tonal gradient further and made the challenge for JPEG even more difficult.

Finally, I don't know what Flickr does with your uploaded images, but anything resized or "enhanced" (cough!) by Flickr will suffer from a double JPEG edit/compression. So anything which is not at the size you originally uploaded is going to be further flawed. Did you output from Lightroom and upload at 2048x1365 or has Flickr created that file size for you?
 
I usually finding banding is down to too much compression when saving the exported Jpg. Using a higher quality usually cleans most/all of it up. Seems to start appearing at 80% or lower.
 
tdodd said:
Original raw file has 14 bits per channel. JPEG file only has 8 bits per channel and can not represent fine tonal gradients with equivalent finesse. JPEG compression may compound problems on top of the loss of bit depth.

If you have been been making adjustments to the shadows, to lighten them, or the tone curve in the shadows then you might have stretched the tonal gradient further and made the challenge for JPEG even more difficult.

Finally, I don't know what Flickr does with your uploaded images, but anything resized or "enhanced" (cough!) by Flickr will suffer from a double JPEG edit/compression. So anything which is not at the size you originally uploaded is going to be further flawed. Did you output from Lightroom and upload at 2048x1365 or has Flickr created that file size for you?
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As tdodd has said above.

Is the banding only visible on flickr, or also viewable in your local version?

If also visible in the local version, what processing has been done, and do you have the original?
 
Thanks for the replies, this is the first time I've ever had noticeable banding in one of my images.

Nod said:
If you still have the original file, try saving the edit at a lower compression rate (higher number in PSE, unsure of other PP software). Save another copy at the highest compression rate and compare them...
Click to expand...

Pookeyhead said:
If it's not like that when looking at the RAW in Lightroom, then it's the result of JPEG compression. Save at maximum quality and see if it's still there.
Click to expand...

I used adobe Lightroom for this and had resized it down to 2/3mb max size. The full size edit save seems to be much better, but does still have slight banding, but nowhere near as severe. The original has no banding whatsoever.

Unijak said:
Hi ACW. It could also be something as simple as adjusting brightness and contrast on the whole image while post processing that has created the banding. It's easy to concentrate on processing the main detail of any image and not notice something like banding until afterwards.

Did you save a TIF or PNG at all of the finished image after PP?
Click to expand...

I agree about it being easy to miss while in PP. In this instance I don't think it was there when editing. I only saved jpegs. Lightroom is non-destructive in its editing so I should be able to go back and save a TIF to compare?

tdodd said:
Original raw file has 14 bits per channel. JPEG file only has 8 bits per channel and can not represent fine tonal gradients with equivalent finesse. JPEG compression may compound problems on top of the loss of bit depth.

If you have been been making adjustments to the shadows, to lighten them, or the tone curve in the shadows then you might have stretched the tonal gradient further and made the challenge for JPEG even more difficult.

Finally, I don't know what Flickr does with your uploaded images, but anything resized or "enhanced" (cough!) by Flickr will suffer from a double JPEG edit/compression. So anything which is not at the size you originally uploaded is going to be further flawed. Did you output from Lightroom and upload at 2048x1365 or has Flickr created that file size for you?
Click to expand...

I did darken the highlights, I don't think I really bought up many shadows. I outputted them with a restriction on maximum file size rather than pixel height/width. I'm not sure if this may automatically reduce the physical dimensions of the image? I didn't push the image anywhere more than 25% of a slider value.
 
Im not sure if this thread has sensitised me to sky banding in flickr, but i'm starting to notice it a lot more the last few days....


365 #13 by /Cud, on Flickr


365 #12 by /Cud, on Flickr
 
Rapscallion said:
Im not sure if this thread has sensitised me to sky banding in flickr, but i'm starting to notice it a lot more the last few days....
Click to expand...

You might want to keep your eyes open for dust bunnies too - lots of them.
 
I've noticed banding in some of my shots when saving as JPEG after applying noise reduction on long exposure night shots, even when saved at high quality export.

I concluded that the very slight dither that noise represents can be a better perceptual gradation in colours/shades than a PP smoothing technique, when compression algorithms are applied.
 
tdodd said:
I also wonder if low quality display panels don't help. Cheap panels are only 6 bits per channel, with dithering to try to try to emulate 8 bit quality.
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Something to consider. Some people spend a fortune on camera gear, then baulk at spending more than £300 on a monitor.

tdodd said:
My panel is 10 bit and driven at 10 bit quality throughout the signal chain.
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Really? What monitor are you using? true 10 bit panels are very rare. NEC Spectraview Reference are only 8bit + AFRC, and so is my Eizo ColorEdge.

Same with GPU.. very few are 10 bit.


Rapscallion said:
Im not sure if this thread has sensitised me to sky banding in flickr, but i'm starting to notice it a lot more the last few days....
Click to expand...

Could be your screen if you're seeing banding, as I can see nothing here on mine. Some whopping dust spots though!! :)
 
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Dell Precision M6700 mobile workstation (laptop to you and me) with RGB backlit IPS FHD display, driven by nVidia Quadro K3000M GFX.
 
tdodd said:
Dell Precision M6700 mobile workstation (laptop to you and me) with RGB backlit IPS FHD display, driven by nVidia Quadro K3000M GFX.
Click to expand...



Ahh yes... we've had this conversation before :) Great laptop that.

I'd be very surprised if it's a true 10 panel. Panels are often referred to as 10 bit when in fact they are 8bit +AFRC, as both will be listed as 10bit supporting 1.07 billion colours. No reference to this in more detail in the technical manual. Not that it matters much to be honest, but I'm in the market for a new laptop, and a true 10bit display may have swung my choice. Must find out more.
 
I don't think this has been mentioned so far, did you use a lot of noise reduction on this image? Pushing some NR software a little too far can give compression in the sky like this. Actually pushing a lot of things too far can, but you can have visible compression when using NR sometimes even if you think you're being fairly subtle with it!
 
The shots below were taken to demonstrate the uneven effect a polariser has on skies shot with a wide angle lens (in this case, a 12-24 zoom at 16mm in Dx mode) and saved as a quality 0 JPEG from PSE to highlight the effect. Illustrate the high compression JPEG issue rather nicely too!

SkyBandPol1.jpg


SkyBandPol2.jpg


The corner vignetting is down to using a filter on the bucket type lens cap at 16mm.
 
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