When I look at the resized images displayed on my Zenfolio and compare it with the same images resized using Photoshop (or even Flickr) the quality just doesn't match up. For some reason the images displayed in Zenfolio appear softer and overall less appealing. It seems to me that Zenfolio either compressed the images too much, or has a poor resizing algorithm, or both.

Here is an example of a detail of a picture. The original was uploaded both on Zenfolio and Flickr. I then screen captured the results on both Zenfolio and Flickr from the same browser, cropped a small interesting area in Photoshop, and put the two side to side.

The two are not exactly the same size because Zenfolio and Flickr provide two different sizes. This is only an example, but the difference in quality is noticeable no matter what you do. Try with any image, and you'll see.

Here is that area resized in Photoshop

Here is the image on my zenfolio:

http://www.pasqualis.com/hdrhumantraces/hccc3d15#hccc3d15

And here in the medium size on Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pasqualis/4029586252/sizes/m/

The zenfolio version looks noticeably worse.

I would like my images to look at their best in Zenfolio.

Do you have any suggestions?

Can you please fix the quality of the resized images?

Thanks.

I looked at your two images and honestly didn't notice any differences, so I used Vista's wonder photo-pirating tool (snipping tool) and grabbed the same section of the photo from your zenfolio image.

FWIW, I'm using Firefox v3.5.3 as the browser.  Snipping tool grabs the image exactly as it was displayed, and I didn't put the image thru photoshop before displaying it here...  interestingly enough, tho the area I grabbed is slightly smaller that the area you grabbed (cropped) my image is larger.

I think you may have something else going on in the process somewhere?  Just my opinion... there are others here much more knowledgeable than I on these kinds of things.

Zenfolio resizes images on the fly, so depending on the size of the browser you'll get different image sizes. I picked a size of the browser that was as close as possible as the Flickr's medium format.

The difference is not only noticable in the side-to-side comparison that I created (which I was very careful to do in a completely non-destructive way), it is also noticeable simply looking at the images in the browser.

If you open the browser on Flickr, and you open another browser on zenfolio, the difference in quality is very clear. Just look at the details of the roof.

This is true for any image that I upload on Zenfolio and on Flickr.

I haven't tried SmugSmug yet.

I also see sharpness differences between resizing done by SmugSmug and the resizing done by Zenfolio. To me the resizing done my SmugSmug looks a bit sharper than the resizing provided by Zenfolio (I am mostly looking at details of the roof in this particular photo). Also, to me resizing done of Flickr looks substantially better than both Zenfolio and Smugsmug.

Here are the links to compare.

http://www.pasqualis.com/hdrhumantraces/hccc3d15#hccc3d15

http://pasqualis.smugmug.com/Hdr/Human-Traces/10062316_BognM#690140518_uFaBx

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pasqualis/4029586252/sizes/m/

Is that just me?

I looked at your Zenfolio and Smug image side by side like Kevin did. I couldn't open the Flickr one because it said it was private. I use IE7 and Vista Home Premium. I noticed that the Zen image was much darker and because of that lost some detail in the darker areas. It seemed to be much more saturated than the Smug one. Although you could see more detail in the Smug one because it wasn't as dark, it also appeared a little soft. Details, yes, but a little soft.

Ops, sorry for the "private" flickr image. I changed it so now you should be able to open it.

Let me know what you think.

The roof resized in photoshop, to a size comparable to the examples in my original message, looks pretty sharp:

BTW, this is a tiny detail of the original roof, at 100% size (1:1).

After some more research I discovered that Smugmug applies sharpening after resizing. In fact you can set the various sharpening options in the configuration.

It seems like a good idea to me. Zenfolio should consider adding such an option too, or should consider improving the resizing algorithm to maintain sharpness (Photoshop resizing gives good results without need for additional sharpening, so it is obviously possible).

Having pictures show at their best is kind of a big deal to me.