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When I upload a video to YouTube, the white areas become grey and the colors seem a bit washed out.

This is how it looks locally:

Local Video

And this is how it looks on YouTube (Screenshot from Firefox):

YouTube Video

This happens when uploading the original screen recording (via OBS), as well as when uploading an edited version (edited with Shotcut).

YouTube is clearly able to show "full white" in screen-recorded videos, as seen in this screenshot:

Other YT video

These are my Shotcut export settings:

Shotcut export settings

When I change the "Color range" option from MPEG to JPEG, there is no difference except for Windows Media Player (WMP) showing the colors too bright. VLC Player and YouTube show the same as before.

Changing the codec to libx264rgb made no difference except now WMP isn't able to play the file. Changing the framerate and quality also made no difference.

I just want the video to look the same on YouTube as it does locally. To look the same as the screen that I recorded. And how Shotcut previews it. Why is that just not working? VLC player always shows the video correctly, and even WMP usually does. So why is YouTube different?

Surely I'm just making some stupid mistake here?

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    Have you got the YouTube link, so it can be double-checked on a colour-managed system?
    – Tetsujin
    Commented Dec 29, 2022 at 15:11
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    Thanks. Checked. YouTube has re-encoded the video you uploaded. It does look exactly the same if I view it or DL it from YT. Your original video is quite washed out in comparison. Nothing I have here will show it in the 'darker' version from your 2nd pic. YT looks similar to your first pic. I suspect 2 things; your workflow isn't calibrated, causing the mismatch on upload & Firefox is doing its usual 'wonderful' job of failing to translate profiles correctly. Pic - i.sstatic.net/8ysBA.png Left YT, centre YT downloaded to Mac, right Your original from DBox.
    – Tetsujin
    Commented Dec 29, 2022 at 15:47
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    See if this will help with FF - photo.stackexchange.com/a/124357/57929 - this is how I have mine set & it looks the same as in Safari, Mac on a fully colour-managed system.
    – Tetsujin
    Commented Dec 29, 2022 at 15:47
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    @Tetsujin I disabled hardware acceleration and now the video looks correct in Firefox. But again, I didn't have this problem for other videos. Strange.
    – AyCe
    Commented Dec 29, 2022 at 16:58
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    You 'old' version looks like it has the correct colour - i.e. they match those in YT. I can't even guess at how/why the hardware setting affects the video output - Mac just don't have those settings at all. Windows is completely weird as to how it allows the user to mess up graphics settings without telling them what things do;) Mac has a single, managed, colour workflow.
    – Tetsujin
    Commented Dec 29, 2022 at 17:24

1 Answer 1

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It seems to be related to NVIDIA Hardware Acceleration, though I don't know why it only affects some videos.

When I disable Hardware Acceleration in the Firefox settings, white areas become white.

(Firefox must be restarted between changes)

When I enable Hardware Acceleration again, they become gray-ish again.

Hardware Acceleration can be enabled but then this option needs to be explicitly set as well in the NVIDIA Control Panel:

Also, the NVIDIA Display Service must be running at all times.

NVIDIA Control Panel

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