How to properly save TIFF format so that Windows Photos can view it properly?

[Vicky12]

I shoot RAW, ARW & CR2. Used to have RAW files edited in ACR and then transferred to PS via Open Image and added more editing here, then saved the edited files in TIFF format from PS to PC.
The saved TIFF files:
1. The file size was about 60MB～70MB each, or 80MB~90MB if photo frames were added in PS.
2. There was an xmp file with each TIFF file in a folder, the xmp was a Notepad, I could read it.
3. The TIFF files could be viewed in Photos, all images with bright colours as edited.

A few weeks ago about the time Windows updated to 20H2:
1. The same saved TIFF file size was doubled 125MB～140MB each, or 180MB~190MB if photo frames were added in PS.
2. The xmp file with each TIFF file became a Windows Player file, still an xmp by name, Windows could not open it.
3. The TIFF files could be opened in Photos, but all colours were in dull tone, not as edited. ( Note: This happens only in Photos. The same TIFF files viewed in many other freeware viewers do not have this problem. Everything is normal.)

Please help. How to get rid of this trouble, please:

Thanks.
Vicky

 

[hooferinsane]

Hi Vicky, re the XMP file, have you tried to right click on one of the files, choose ‘open with’ option, choose notepad as the application to open it with, and hopefully there is a box to tick ‘always use this program to open this type of file’ and hopefully this would allow you to open them.
I am not sure why the file size would double at all though.
20H2 has caused one or two minor quirks on my system, but I haven’t noticed anything re colour change in photos,. It may be rectified with the next update on Windows possibly.

 

[MikeB]

I've had Win 10 version 20h2 loaded since last November. My file sizes are unaffected. The XMP files require you to associate an application to it as mentioned by @hooferinsane, but their use by ACR is unaffected. The application "Photo Viewer" opens and displays my TIFFs properly.

XMP files - When editing a TIFF in ACR, an XMP file is created containing the instructions for the edits. Upon transferring the image to Photoshop, the .xmp's instructions are applied to the image. Once you flatten the final edited image in Photoshop and save it as TIFF, the .xmp file's instructions are redundant for the TIFF and are only useful with the associated raw file - they no longer need to be saved with the TIFF.

Size - Just the conversion from raw to TIFF will produce a file typically 3-5x the size of the associated raw file - without editing. You are converting from a non-RGB (no color) image where 16-bits of data define each pixel to an RGB image where 16-bits of data define each of the three colors for a given pixel. Editing will increase the file size and sharpening will increase the file size significantly. If you are choosing to save the file as a TIFF with lossless compression, the file may be smaller. My raw files are about 38mb, an unedited TIFF (just a conversion) is about 172mb.

Colors are off - Let's try this first. Before saving the image out to a TIFF, EDIT-->CONVERT TO PROFILE (alt-E, v). Set Profile to sRGB IEC61966-2.1 and hit OK. Save the file as a TIFF (.tif). How does the image look? If the image looks good, then the problem may be that you are not saving the TIFFs out with the appropriate color management tag. This tag tells the viewing application what color gamut to use for display.