Photoshop - Gradient "stepping"

grudas · 26 Apr 2011 at 13:50

hey

some how my photoshop started to save the files wrong.. never had this odd problem before but now no mater what mode i run 8bit or 16bit i can clearly see gradient stepping in my files saved and in photoshop while working.. of course i went and did all the normal steps to find the problem

display setup - 32bit

driver setup - 32bit

since wallpapers downloaded with gradients in them don't have the "stepping" but the ones i save do.. any ideas? i have tried .png .jpg formats..

example of what stepping looks like

remember - i have never seen this happen before so it can't be normal?! and i have been using photoshop for over 5 years now

Dj_Jestar · 26 Apr 2011 at 14:33

all I'm seeing is a black box.

Anyway, check your colour palette. Maybe you've set it to a reduced number of colours? (such as "for web" palette)

uv · 26 Apr 2011 at 14:49

Dj_Jestar said:
all I'm seeing is a black box.

I've no idea why it's doing it, but I can see the "stepping" quite clearly

FabienO · 26 Apr 2011 at 14:50

I see it too.

Dj_Jestar · 26 Apr 2011 at 14:54

TFT fail. I can see it when the pic is right at the bottom of my screen, but not at the top.

seabiscuit · 26 Apr 2011 at 16:29

Add a higly transparent layer of noise to break up the banding in the gradient giving it jitter.

Limenote · 26 Apr 2011 at 17:31

Ive had this in the past at very high resolutions, what version are you using?

grudas · 26 Apr 2011 at 18:38

seabiscuit said:
Add a higly transparent layer of noise to break up the banding in the gradient giving it jitter.

yes that would be a way out.. but it still a problem and i mean shouldn't do that since it worked before so i need to find a way to "fix" it

ill check the colour palette

Xink said:
Ive had this in the past at very high resolutions, what version are you using?

CS5

resolution doesn't matter i have tried it on low/high res nothing changes the steeping is still there..

Sherbs · 27 Apr 2011 at 21:57

That look better?

Just used the standard gradient tool and output using save for web. How are you creating the gradients?

JPGs are better for Gradients too.

Rozzy85 · 27 Apr 2011 at 22:55

That PNG you posted is 8-bit so banding is going to be present. Make sure Phtoshop is set to RGB mode or another 24-bit colour depth mode. The 8-bit/16-bit you're on about seems to be per channel.

pieplough · 27 Apr 2011 at 23:32

Is the dither option checked?

grudas · 28 Apr 2011 at 02:36

Sherbs said:
That look better?

Just used the standard gradient tool and output using save for web. How are you creating the gradients?

JPGs are better for Gradients too.

can't see any stepping in your image.. :/ editing the black/white gradient or using the downloaded ones from deviantart and other sources

Rozzy85 said:
That PNG you posted is 8-bit so banding is going to be present. Make sure Phtoshop is set to RGB mode or another 24-bit colour depth mode. The 8-bit/16-bit you're on about seems to be per channel.

image/mode/16bit - thats what i have mine set as.. tried both 32bit and 8bit seems to be the same.. even tried to reset photoshop settings to the default ones.. same problem :confused:

pieplough said:
Is the dither option checked?

yes, cant see any difference between it being checked/unchecked

Eagle-Eye · 1 May 2011 at 21:22

This is quite a common problem it seems, I get it a bit with high res images with a large dynamic range of colours. The highly transparent layer of high suggested by seabiscuit is your best bet if you can't figure the problem out.

grudas · 3 May 2011 at 14:10

Eagle-Eye said:
This is quite a common problem it seems, I get it a bit with high res images with a large dynamic range of colours. The highly transparent layer of high suggested by seabiscuit is your best bet if you can't figure the problem out.

ye the problem is still there.. i guess thats the only way doh