optimizing photos for the gallery

[gatafrancesca]

Hi everybody,
I decided to be brave enough to post a few of the very first photos I took since I got the Canon 400mm f5.6 in the gallery. I feel a little bit embarassed as there are so many great photos out there and I am just a newby |:$| You are welcome to visit my gallery, there are only three photos now, but I will post more as I come back from a birding trip starting on wendsday. Anyway, the reason I am writing this is that I noticed that my images on the website gallery look much clearer (less dark than the originals) and the colors look faded, they are much stronger on my computer screen. What do you suggest me to do to improve this? I can't calibrate my screen, it's a laptop and I wouldn't like to see my photos all dark and over-saturated on my computer. Maybe I should just create a darker and more colourful version before uploading it and leaving the original as it is?
Any suggestions are welcome ;)
Thanks
Francesca

[Macswede]

I think your pictures look pretty good, Francesca. I never alter original images. I just create different versions for different purposes. I usually discard the versions I upload to Bird Forum as they are just web versions of pictures for printing and can be made very quickly in Photoshop.
In other words create darker and more colourful versions for Bird Forum if you think they look better.
Graham

[JohnZ]

Nice shots Francesca. Looks like you have got the hang of the lens pretty quickly. Unlike myself who still manages to b~~~s things up at most available opportunities.