Dark Pics on xp

Shereej · 13th December 2002

I need someones help, i have been searching for the answer to this problem for 6 months!! I have been through all my settings, help files and I cant find the problem. All the pics i view on XP are dark..i mean really dark and its not just pics it's also my webcam. Seems to me anything directly viewed from my computer is dark. I can browse through the net and everything is fine, so i doubt its my monitor.. its just mainly my pics and webcam. I think when I first installed XP I made a adjustment to fonts , an adjustment so it was suited to my eyes or something like that and have a gut feeling that this maybe my problem.I cant find the setting to change it back either. I am just about pulling my hair out here ...CAN SOMEONE HELP!!!

Newt · 13th December 2002

That's gotta be frustrating. Oh, and welcome to the bbs.

To see if it is a particular application or some system setting, download and install Irfanview - a great and free picture viewer. Then view some pics using it.

Post back your results.

Shereej · 16th December 2002

I downloaded the viewer hun and its still the same , anymore ideas?? pretty please??

**Dennis L** · 16th December 2002

Hi Sheree

Sorry to hear of such an annoying problem. Do you remember when the "Dark Picture" problem started. Was it after a hardware or software installation?
With pictures managed correctly on Web, but incorrectly on all other views is somewhat confusing. It seems to imply that its not hardware related... per video card, driver and monitor. A setting in XP that allows correct views in web, but no where else seems like a stretch. I'm still suspicious of the webcam. Just out of curiosty try this. Find a pic on the web that is displaying correctly. Do a "Save Image as" and send to your image file. Use Irfanview to view the same pic.. is it NOW dark? If yes, email that image to a friend. Does your friend view the picture correct or dark? Check all image type files for file association. Also check to see what programs are being loaded during startup. All of the above are just ways to narrow down the search field. Post back with your findings.
Dennis

taki · 16th December 2002

maybe it's the overlay feature that comes with the ati drivers for your vid card, that's if you have an ati video card. and i'm not sure if it's the same for all ati cards.

i have an ati radeon 64ddr (although it shows up as a 7200 in display options), and there's a section under display options where it changes the brightness, gamma, contrast etc etc for things that support "overlay".