So many dark entries makes me wonder if we're calibrating our monitors. Most calbrated monitors will look darker than non-calibrated monitors, so perhaps images look fine on non-calibrated, but dark on calibrated.

Just did it as a matter of fact with Adobe Gamma. It's all I've ever used but I must admit to being a procrastinator when it comes to calibrating regularly. Should get into the habit I guess even if all I use is Adobe Gamma, it's still better than not doing anything at all.
DJ

busted! :eek:

every once in a while. how often should you do it?

and, having just sent you a few things, i have to ask, "you talkina me?" (please supply necessary accent)

hafta admit it got a little brighter around here just now when i did it. re my stuff, happy to rescan and resend if it helps.

You're "supposed" to do it weekly, but I do it semi-annually (sloppy, I know).

And I'm not talking to anyone in-particular. Just a generalized concern. No one need rescan anything they don't feel like rescanning :)

oops I didn't know you had to do it more than once.

Adobe gamma used here. But like others, not very often.

Ed

Hi,
I use Adobe Gamma about every 2 months...
However, I haven't been able to produce prints on my Epson Photo EX that accurately depict what I see. I presume the difficulty is in the printer end of the process.

There's a thread or two here somewhere about printer profiles. Epson's use ICC, which is pretty good. Try using the 'search' for "profile" or "ICC".

We'll have to do a poll on printer calibration next :)

Yep. Adobe Gamma, but not very often, either. One more thing to add to my "do this every week" list.:)

I find it's best to do it at night and then turn off the lights so only your monitor light is illuminating the room. You don't get any exterior influences affecting what you see on your monitor that way.
DJ

Debbie,

Why don't you do all of us a favor and make up an action for it? :D

Ed

Oh wouldn't that be nice. I know you can save your settings when you do the gamma thing so I am hoping that all I have to do is load the settings I saved the last time and be done with it. Haven't tried that part yet. Not even sure if this save settings is part of the version 6 or if 5.5 had it also and I just discovered it because it took me that long to calibrate from the last time.
DJ

Speaking of calibrating monitors, I just got a new Apple G4 Powerbook without thinking about having to clibrate the monitor, and there doesn't seem to be a way to do much in the way of calibration for the LCD. I am thinking I will need to get a second monitor for my Photoshop work. I am very new at this. Any suggestions???

Sylvia
Welcome to Retouch Pro. I can't answer your question, I wish I could, but I would think that there are others on this site who could. What you should do is start a new thread in this Hardware forum that specifically asks about LCD calibration to your Apple Powerbook so more people will notice it. That way it won't get buried in this thread and go unnoticed. Good luck.
DJ

I have an LCD monitor and am able to do some calibration although I believe Doug has explained that CRT monitors offer better calibration options. If your computer allows contrast and brightness adjustments to the LCD screen (I'll bet that it does) then I believe that it can be calibrated using Adobe Gamma. The color cast will be adjusted by Adobe Gamma as you answer questions (which square looks like neutral gray?). I'm sure it would be better for you to get a REALLY good [really expensive] monitor, but I think that you'll be able to eliminate color casts and improve image contrast well enough with your monitor until you are ready to add another monitor. One way to test it, I guess, is to submit some work to a Challenge or to the Gallery and see what Doug thinks about the contrast and color.

Oh, you're new! Two things - 1. Welcome! 2. I have no training in calibration, just opinions.:)

Reflecting on these comments has led me to a deeper understanding of the subject. I'd never considered that the pictures I was submitting might be too dark - after all they looked fine on my monitor.

Before getting Photoshop I'd put a background picture on my monitor showing a snow-capped mountain beside a small lake. Dark tree branches, that are great for displaying icons, silhouette the mountain scene.
Anyway, after getting Photoshop I used the Adobe Gamma Wizard to set up my machine. When I was finished, my background picture was way too dark - so guess what - I lightened the screen to make my picture looked great again. This was not the right solution...

After reading these comments I re-applied the Adobe Gamma. The results were the same; my background picture was way too dark...
This time though, I imported the picture into Photoshop and used Levels to lighten it. Consequently all the pictures I do now are a lot lighter.

This has led to another benefit as well. I could never get my printer to print my pictures light enough. They looked good on the monitor but were printing much too dark. Now they print fine. Who would have thought that a darker monitor would make my printer print lighter....

. . . talk about seeing the light! ;)

Hallelujah! Say amen, somebody...

Okay -- amen! :) (But you knew that was coming, didn't you?)

Ed

Ron
Where can you go for free these days and get this much good information? Happy we all could share in your epiphany. :D
DJ

I think it would be really cool if the 3 that indicated they put a lot of effort/money into calibration would start a thread describing their various efforts, with specific details concernings the how-to's and what-for's. Pluses, minuses, pitfalls, surprises, hidden (and not so hidden) costs, etc.

Adobe Gamma..but guilty! I use it maybe monthly--unless something (like this thread) reminds me to do it more often. I never realized weekly was the recommended.:eek:

And remember to have your monitor on for at least a half-hour before calibrating.

I thought it might be interesting, and useful, if we all checked our gamma to see if we're working with the same numbers. I found this web page that has a chart so you can see what number you're at.
I find that 1.8 is good for me.
The chart is at the bottom of the page.
http://www.nativeamericantraders.com/monitor.htm

I'm 1.75, but I wonder if you're supposed to have the gamma controller off or on to view that chart?

(p.s.: it helps to squint and/or look out of the corner of your eye)

Maybe I should add "Is your monitor calibrated yes/no" as a requirement to registration here :) (just kidding, but things would be alot easier)

BTW, if your mouse has one of those navigator wheels, you'll find you can adjust the gamma control controls to a much finer degree. Just click once on the slider bar, then use the mousewheel to move it.

I'm a 1.8
AND I've added a gamma check to my weekly maintenance list.:)

1.8

but looking @ that chart i thought i detected a trace of color in the 0% column; i'm really not sure how to correct that - in the adobe gamma control panel, under phosphors, (and is that the one that controls that aspect?) custom was checked, but i know i didn't put those settings in there so am loath to change that. i guess i'll experiment and see if any of the standard ones makes it go away.

thanks for the link vicki, interesting.

1.85 - that's the one where I can't see a distinct line at the edges of the square. Thanks for the link, Vikki. I'll have to keep that one in my favorites list and return often.
Jeanie

Nice site Vikki. Don't know how you came across it but I definately bookmarked it for later use. I think I am around 1.8 to 1.9 but I think it would give an easier reading at night when my window isn't so distracting.
DJ

Prior to this instructive thread, the source for info on monitor calibration I've referred to is here:
ATS system calibration (http://www.aim-dtp.net/aim/calibration/index.htm)
LOADS of info:eek:

That guys is waaaaaay over my head. I've been there before, tried to calibrat to his instructions, but ended up with an outrageous gamma setting. I think it was information overload.

Doug,
I think it would be a good idea, as you suggested, to have the site recommend a standard gamma setting. Do you think it would be possible to get a legal copy of that gamma chart, or just link to it?

Well, I've seen that before, so I suspect they got it somewhere else. I did a quick Google search and couldn't find an originator to ask. I do think it would be a good idea to have it available with some recommendations (btw, 1.8 is typical for Windows, but Mac users will be like 2.x).

Anyone know where that chart originated?

I did a search as well. Not much out there, but I did find this link.
http://www.micrografx.com/mgxftp/download/moncal.gif
It's the exact same file, but also no info on ownership.

I even searched for that Thomas Price, no luck there either.

calibrate-gamma (http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1A.html)

just another possibility

Another very good source for calibration. Thanks Pat. I like the part about calibrating your printer especially since I have an Epson printer.
DJ

Those sites all look good. Now if I could just get one of them to work for me. :D My monitor came in at about 65 - 70. But my printer and monitor are very close. Think I'll just leave it where it is.

Debbie,
I'm not sure just what I did, but I have the Epson 900, and I tried to calibrate it after I had a printer problem. Long story short -- I had the color unbelieveably bad! It took me forever to get it right, and I had to download a new driver for it. Now, if I disconnect my printer for any reason, I'm almost gauranteed that I'll have to reinstall the driver again. Arrrrrrrrgh! If it ain't broke, keep fixin it till it is!

Ed

:lol: Ed, don't touch it don't even breath on it, just quietly accept that it is doing good and knock on wood for your good luck.
DJ

Ed, which test are you using? I don't know what you mean by 65 to 70. What is that on the 1.8, 2.2 type of chart?

Deb, regarding those Epson printers. I've always had a problem with light prints. No matter what I did, my prints would come out too light. I finally figured out, if I changed my Photoshop gamma to 1.4, I could see how my prints would look printed. I could make pre-print adjustments (but never save those changes). Then switch back.
I recently bought a new HP system that came with a free HP printer. It isn't a top of the line photo printer, but I'm actually very impressed with it! The first print I made was perfect, no calibration necessary!! Amazing, after spending so much time messing around with Epson. My point to that little story, if I do decide to get a photo printer, I will seriously look into HP - something I never would have considered before.
BTW-I send all my "work" out to online printing services

Sorry Vikki. It should have read 1.65 - 1.70.

Ed

Yes. I got instructions from the company who prints my work on Lambda

Vikki
Photoshop has a color management setting for my specific Epson printer and when I print I use the Epson color profile as well and I seem to get very good results.
DJ

I kinda use adobe gamma, at least I did calibrate my monitor and then save it as a profile (ICC).
I get to check my calibration everyday for when I get pictures back from my lab I get to compare them to what I see on the monitor.. which I might say is very very close.

I send my stuff to 2 different labs, one uses ICC profiles the other doesn't. I have just got into the habit of adding +4G to lab 1 and +5B to the other.

Where I get into trouble is when I try and tone down a print. seems to be a larger amount at the labs as verses on my monitor, so I have got use to a little is usually best.

I have always set me gamma to 2.2, running windows 98SE.
In the Real World Adobe Photoshop by David Blatner and Bruce Fraser on page 135 they advise:

"If your running Windows, you're probably better off shooting for a target gamma of 2.2 than one of 1.8. PC-based systems generally aim for a gamma of 2.2 and you'll lose fewer levels in the video card's lookup table the closer to the native monitor gamma you aim. Mac users should continue to aim for gamma 1.8 for the same reasdon - the native gamma of most Mac display systems is close to 1.8"

Looked up the specs for my windows monitor and they advise it is set to use a gamma of 2.2.

George

George,
Sounds like you're trying to get Macs and PCs to meet somewhere in the middle. :D Not a bad idea if it can happen.
DJ

As I stated I am running on a PC (Windows 98SE)and have set the gamma to 2.2 which is the specs for the monitor I am using.

I was pointing out that monitors used for windows OS on PC's, normally have a gamma of 2.2 and MAC's have a gamma of 1.8. If you setup for the native monitor gamma then you'll lose fewer levels in the video card's lookup table.

Best to look at the specifications for your monitor and set the gamma to the specs to get the most from it.

George

Something is weird. I use NO color management and don't set my gamma---when I did, my photos printed dark and oversaturated. Now it's back at 1.0, and PSP7 and my Epson 870 completely agree with each other (on Epson paper, anyway).

I was reading

http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1A.html

and thought I would look to see what my monitor temp is set at, and I'm at 9300K! He recommends 6500K, which makes all my whites look orange-yellow.

What gives? Should I set the color temp and then futz with everything else to get things back to normal, or should I just accept that something is cancelling out something else and be happy?

(Note: I'm not retouching professionally)

Kaulike
"If it ain't broke don't fix it" :D A very good saying and one I try to follow. With all the trouble we all go to match our devices to the same color profiles only to be disappointed, I would say if you had agreement between your devices then don't mess with it. (Or in your case, put it back) Somehow you achieved what we are trying to do by all the settings and fidgeting to get that perfect setting.
DJ

I have used the Adobe Gamma and feel that I have that correct or at least close.

I feel like a complete idiot on all of this color calibration stuff. I have tried to read up on it and the more I read, the more my head hurts.

I just want to pay someone to come to my house, load the proper profiles for my microtek scanner, my epson 870 , and sony DSC-F707, Dell trinitron monitor, and make it work when using either photoshop or paint shop pro so that the colors match what I view on my monitor.

I would then need that kind person to show this confused person step by step what I need to do when I want to print to make it all come together.

Realistically, does anybody even do this kind of service, and would I have to take a home equity loan to get it done?

I live in the metro Chicago area so I think that would give me better odds of finding someone. Any advice or recommendations would be appreciated.

Signed

Carl, the head hurting, frustrated one who just wants his colors looking right.

I never thought about it but I would imagine if there is something to be done there are people out there to do it for a price. The Adobe gamma is fairly easy and there is a Wizard that leads you by the nose through it. As for the rest of the profiling, you're not the only one who feels bogged down in confusion. Photoshop color settings has my Epson printer listed and I still have trouble getting colors to match perfectly. It's really next to impossible to do and they make very expensive equipment to do just that because of the difficulties involved. Wish I could give you a magic number to type in but then my problems would be solved too if I could do that. Good luck finding someone.
DJ

I found the articles on the Epson printers and Photoshop at this site to be very helpful.

http://www.computer-darkroom.co.uk/

I am using the Epson printer paper profiles that you can download from here and have setup my computer to print from photoshop 6.0 as explained in the article. Printed a test image and found the colors on the monitor match the print, just a slight difference in brightness on some colors. Have been using these settings for a few months, happy with the results. I mainly print on the heavyweight matte paper.

George

There is an excellent explaination on the adobe site.. under tutors I beleive?? that deals with how images are displayed. PC verses Mac. And most mac photo will display dark because of the difference in gamma between the 2 platforms. If I remember right you go to leveles on the mac then set the mid range to a gamma of .8 to see how your photo will display on a pc.
For pc users you set that to 1.2 to see how your photos will display on a MAC. Not exact but close enough

Phil

I calibrate with the adobe gamma. I try once a day(it's weekly more like it) But I don't totaly rely on it for highlight,shadow,neutrals. I check them with the eyedropper tool ALL THE TIME for output to devices. I know some that use Barcos' don't check the numbers. But then again for $5,000., I would want the thing to drive me to work too.

Up until last week, I hadn't actually calibrated my monitor :eek: :eek: !!! when I was reloading some software, I noticed that something called Kodak "Colorific" came on a cd with my monitor so I loaded it and finally got my monitor calibrated (and adjusted the "color temperature" in my monitor which I never knew I could do until now) I'm liking the results I'm getting on my monitor much better now! I'm going to have to add that to my weekly/monthly "to do" list (although I'll probably only end up doing it bi-monthly anyway..)

- David :)

I agree with George. The correct gamma setting for those that are using windows (Xp through 95) is 2.2, setting it to 1.8 (as suggested for a Mac)will be lighter than a typical PC screen should be. My print output very closely matches my screen.

This information can be verified on page 842 of the Photoshop 7 bible. Or if you wish you can check the specs in the operating system.

The chart that Vikki referred to seems to be quite accurate. Thanks :)

I seem to be the odd one out. I use Colorvision's Optical software with their Spyder hardware. My A90f Viewsonic displays what I want to see in photoshop and Qimage. I have tried the Colorific software that came with the monitor and Adobe Gamma with some problems with both. Now color calibration is a non-issue and I can worry about all the other things.

How important is calibration? It may be more important than you realize and what you see might not be what you get.

I suspect that, even though a number of us have worked and played on the net for many years, we are each operating in a virtual vacuum. Although I'm a relative new comer to photo work I have over 30 years of computing experience under my belt, so I like to think I know a thing or two. I've always built and maintained my own computer systems and until recently this included dual 15" monitors. These monitors were the sharpest and brightest monitors I could find, and I loved working on them. I believed the results, I saw on my screen, would impress other viewers.

When my primary monitor began to fail I started looking for a replacement, but over the last few years 15" monitors have virtually disappeared, so I began looking at the new 17" flat screen units. Using the buy and try (money back if your not satisfied) option available at Office Depot etc. I quickly returned the first monitor I tried because it was way to dark. The whites were a dim egg shell color not the super snow white bright I was used to. On further investigation I found most monitors appeared much darker and dimmer than the ones I was using (on the new super bright monitors you can not set the black point properly).

I was trying to figure out how I was going to produce adequate work on these much darker machines, when I came to the realization that for years I'd been doing everything wrong. On my old "super bright" monitors I'd always had to reduce the Contrast and Levels to get the pictures to appear "normal".

It was a shock to understand that most viewers didn't have the same bright monitors that I had, so they wouldn't see my images the same way I did. For most viewers my images would appear much darker and dimmer than I expected.

Therefore, if we only consider our own preferences for brightness, gamma, and color saturation - we might be surprised to find that other people, looking at our work on the web, see something very different than we expect. If our monitors are set brighter than normal, others will see our work as too dark. If our monitors are set darker than normal, our work will appear brighter than we expect.

These considerations only apply to putting our work on the web. If we are pre-processing or printing our work then we must ensure our settings match our output devices.

Ron

At my employment, we recently purchased an Epson 9600 and an Eye One calibration unit was bundled. I swear by it!!!!

If you need truly accurate output, consider a monitor calibration unit which profiles an ICC. It's simple to set up and very precise. It's more far more accurate than Adobe Gamma and well worth the investment vs. wasted prints.

VidKid

Doug, the biggest problem come indeed from the different gammas that PC and MAC's are using.

Most experts (Bruce Fraser, writer of Real World Color Management, Ian Lyons, form Computerdarkroom) recommend using 2.2 on Mac, as on Pc...

NJPatRN (and others), BE VERY CAREFUL about AimDtp... the theories from that site (gamma at 1.0) are not shared by the majority of the Color Management experts (Schewe, Fraser, Lyons, Koren, and Chris Cox -an Adobe Software Engineer-, etc... the list is very long!)

Make your own tests, but don't tell that you weren't warned...

You can also make a google search about "linear gamma", "aim dtp", or "Timo Autiocari" and see what the majority of persons think about it...

I see a lot of info here about calibrating a CRT monitor, but how would I calibrate a LCD monitor? I try to rely on the numbers when I'm color correcting, but I'd also like my visual to be close to correct, also.

Thanks...

I'm not certain you CAN adjust the colors on an LCD monitor. Their color fidelity is more or less fixed.

Is that a good thing? Does that it mean they are generally more accurate?

LCD screen brightness and color depends on the angle of view, so calibration is impossible.

The reason that an LCD monitor is never going to be 100% capable of being calibrated is because an LCD is backlit. That means that black will never,ever be true black. Until OEL (organic electro-luminescant) Monitors come out the best bet for color calibration is a Trinitron tube monitor.

This might be a silly question - but do you get a gamma shift when viewing an image in a web page vs direct viewing - e.g. as wallpaper?

I must have slept through the "you have to do it more than once" part.. <sheepish look>

Lynn

I'm (with tired eyes) a 1.9
I've only posted one photo, but now I'm wondering if it looks too dark, or too light to anyone?

Hey, I use pantone Colorvision, SyyderPRO Suit works really good

LCDs can be calibrated, but to do a good job, you'll need a colorimeter or spectrophotometer (e.g. ColorVision's Spyder, Monaco's Optix, Gretag-Macbeth's eyeOne). Usually CRTs can be eyeballed--risky, but at least practical--while LCDs don't offer user controls sufficent to do much tuning.

A good calibration will generate a specific description of the device's behavior, and change how colors are displayed. The most common technique is to create a custom color look up table for the video card to get it to a 'known state' Then the profile describes the differences, and is used by color management aware stuff, like Photoshop.

I calibrate every other week, or every 2 weeks and 1-2 days if I was busy or forgot. New monitors and old monitors drift more than middle-aged ones, too, so it's something to keep in mind.

If you're eyeballing via Adobe Gamma or ColorSync, do NOT do it when you're tired; your color perception is much weaker.

My LCD monitor is always calibrated with colorimeter .
I used to get better results with a CRT monitor using the manual adobe gamma, however.........

I had read somewhere, if you go into Photoshop's "color settings"....and turn color management to "off" you get more accurate color for web use. When management is on...you are using color management for how the image appears in print.

I have tried it and it gave me better results when I submit color corrected products for an online store. Maybe this was only useful to me as I am on a mac. It has improved color as well as gamma.

This link was intended for Photoshop 5 (but still applies to photoshop CS which I use now.) You'll also find the suggestions on other websites as well. Hope this helps.

http://www.mccannas.com/pshop4/tip37.htm

Wideangle

Until about 9 months ago, we only ever calibrated using Adobe Gamma. We eventually got around to buying a Gretag Macbeth Eye-One, and it is by far the best £100 or so that we have ever spent. It paid for itself within a couple of months, simply by us not having to reprint or reorder from the lab because things hadn't matched the screen. Everything now comes back from our lab in EXACTLY the way I'm expecting it to. I can't recommend it highly enough!!!!

"There has to be a better way than this."

That was the conclusion I came to after a frustrating, paper and ink wasting time 'guesstimating' how much too dark, flat and blue I had to get my photos 'on screen' before they would print with pleasing saturation, contrast and colour.

So I did my homework reading up on colour management, which enlightened and discouraged me in roughly equal measure. It seemed that even with mega-money expenditure on calibration hardware and software, perfect matching of screen to print was nigh impossible.

On the premise that I couldn't make my situation a lot worse, I tracked down generic profiles for my monitor and printer (I already had those for my cameras and scanners) turned on the colour management options in my software and spent a little while tweaking my monitor's controls and settings with the WYSIWYG monitor calibration software (kind of like Adobe Gamma as I understand it - but Adobe Gamma 'crashes' on my PC so I had to find an alternative).

O.K. the monitor-print match isn't perfect, but it is a MASSIVE improvement :pleased: I'm sure that proper custom profiling of the devices would get me even closer to the theoretical 'perfect match', but for an amateur making his prints on an InkJet printer the important thing is that I now consistently get pleasing prints that look pretty damn close to how they did on the screen if not exactly the same. That last small percentage of accuracy isn't important enough to me to want to throw more of my limited photo-hobby budget at attaining it.

So, in my personal experience the free monitor calibration tools (and a bit of time spent tracking down profiles) has worked wonders for outlay of nothing but some of my time - time I would have wasted (not to mention money) making bad prints in the past anyway.

Alan

I just got a new LCD monitor and it has more calibration settings than I have ever seen. This is my 5th monitor and, as far as I can tell, will be my last. I have it using the adobeRGB1998 ICC and my Photoshop working space is set at the same. It's working fine so far. By the way, I finally gave up on Epson printers, never could get the result to match, I'm using a Canon now and am more than happy.

Does it count as calibration if I simply did several test prints and then played with the colour until it matched my output? :devious:

That would be more along the lines of "profiling" than calibration. Calibration is just making a device output the same everytime in a "bubble" if you will. Profiling is adjusting the colors to match one or many different output devices....IE) A different profile for each printer...and each printer would be calibrated before you profile. Many printers calibrate when you turn them on. But monitors need to be calibrated by the user either with a colorimeter or something like adobe gamma. After that it's about playing with the colors of the monitor. But really the ideas cross over eachother.
But, like you're doing, playing with the color till it matches counts indeed. That's what its all about no matter how it is acheived.

What a blab that was. I hope that at least helped someone...
Wideangle

I don't usually calibrate my monitor. I do try to find the drivers for my monitor if available. I just bought a 21" Sun Microsystems/Sony GDM5410PT, but can't find a driver. I decided to run Adobe Gamma and I always get confused on what to do. Pick the most neutral gray square.. what is neutral?! I just clicked on the square I thought was most gray.. the others were kind of purple/blue.

In the end after I've done calibration I always go and adjust the monitor myself because it's always a little dark for my tastes.

I just ran Adobe Gamma for the first time. The wizard told me to set my contrast to maximum. Am I supposed to permanently leave my monitor contrast at maximum?

I had some trouble setting the individual colors. Standing 10 feet back seemed to help me ascertain whether the center square was brighter or darker than the border.

The before/after comparison shows me that I have added some green to my monitor. It looks fine either way, but I want to know that my monitor is correctly calibrated.

Ken

It helps me to take off my glasses and squint. Yes, to the contrast question.

Both Spyder and i1 have hardware calibration units for around $100 nowadays, I'd strongly recommend that method over Gamma (but Gamma is infinitely better than nothing at all).

Thanks for the suggestions. But am I supposed to leave my monitor's contrast setting at 100% after the calibration exercise?

Ken

Yep, Gamma adjusts the contrast via altering the video output (same way it adjusts the color).

:surprise: What?! I have to do this regularly?
Now I have an excuse why my prints are bad. "It's not me, it's the monitor!"

I've also calibrated it at the worst time when sunlight is filtering in the room.

Thanks. Great tips from this thread. :)

Just to say that Nvidia now comes with monitor calibration, its as good as Adobe Gamma but I've found it much easier to use. I.e. it takes up the whole screen while using it (unlike Adobe's 1" square).

To get to it see the screen shot

Thol

Just to say that Nvidia now comes with monitor calibration, its as good as Adobe Gamma but I've found it much easier to use. I.e. it takes up the whole screen while using it (unlike Adobe's 1" square).

To get to it see the screen shot

Thol

I tried nvidia's own just a couple of days ago but found it produced a profile that was incredibly dark - went back to Adobe Gamma after that.

I have had good results with the Optix on our crt monitors. When used on our LCD monitor, results where marginal. Our lab was a exhibiting vendor at a seminar co-sponsored by fuji film. The photographer who was the speaker stated that there are level 1 and level 2 LCD monitors. Level 2 where easier to calibrate. His site for those who are interested is www.shootsmarter.com. He has a couple of tutorials on monitor calibration.

Greetings folks! newcomer here..

A new "Graphics artist" I used to just do photo edits / cropping just now started to use photoshop's to "create"

I calibrate the monitor once. I didnt know you have to do it more often. I would understand. Cause calibrating for graphics messes up the gamma for the games (hay! how did those get in there?) and video.

I initially bought a colorvision spyder and ended up selling it on Ebay.

I recently picked up a Gretag McBeth Eye One 2 from B&H Photo and found it quite easy to use.

I run two monitors but only calibrate my main monitor which is where I do all of the colour critical work. The images on my screen are now pretty close to what comes out on the Fuji Fronteir system at my prolab.

We use Gregtag Mcbeth Eye One 3 at our studio and at home. Very easy to use and it reminds you every couple of weeks or how often you want to set it to. Just added the Epson R1800 at home, gave my Epson 1280 to my daughter in law. I have no problem with Epson. We use the 7600 at the studio I work for. Wonderful printers.

Paint Shop Pro 10 comes with a monitor calibration chart and some brief instructions.

Craig

I just bought Spyder2Pro, and supposedly, I should be able to calibrate my LCD notebook monitor.

I have been very frustrated when scanning pictures, since the colors on my screen are way too 'blue'. I plan on scanning hundreds (maybe thousands) of pictures (not all mine) in the future, so I would like to do it right the first time.

When I get my monitor calibrated, I will post the results.

Bernie

I use Apple Colorsync and get pretty good results throughout the workflow.

I've also obtained the ICC profies of my printers to stay in sync with their processes.

Since I've been buying all new digital equipment since the hurricane(s), I'm really into color management all through my workflow. It's tricky, but well worth the effort. I have a LaCie 22" monitor and use a Monaco OPTIX-xr colorimeter to do the calibration.

Mike

WOW, I have never calibrated my monitor. I used the chart and my monitor is 2.10. :surprise: My problem is, my monitor and my printer work well together so I never considered problems. I guess everyone sees my work way different than I do :blush: Do I calibrated and mess up my montior/printer or just leave it? Ahhh................ :confused:

Karyn

I went out and purchased a $199 USD sensitometer calibrator package. What a difference it makes!

I was having a REAL PROBLEM getting my prints to match the way they looked on my monitor. They came out dark or contrasty or the wrong color. Now they consistently come out just right with no hassle.

When I printed, they looked too dark, so I went back to photoshop and took a "perfect picture" as far as the monitor was concerned - and then cranked the curves way up. The second print come out better but not perfect - now the color is wrong too. I spent $5-7 USD on paper and Ink on each picture I wanted to print because I was doing each print multiple times.

Now that I calibrate every month or so - First print is dead on.

Highly recommend calibrating your monitor first. Thats the easiest thing to do. Adobe Gamma is a great beginners step at accuracy - because it requires subjective judgement and does not have the precision electronic photocell of a calibrator. The grayscale chips on this site are a great start too. You should be able to see all the steps of black and white without any crushing.

Then you should see if you can get a profile for your exact printer and using the exact kind of paper you will be using. When you match your monitor, printer and your papers ink absorbtion factor - then you will get consistent results.

A monitor that is just slightly brighter than it should be - like the standard computer monitors are - will produce pictures that print dark and look dark on the web. If your monitor is just slightly bluish - like most are - then your prints will look muddied and over saturated in the flesh tones. Your prints will come out opposite of the problem you have with your monitors accuracy.

Want a great test - make up your own test chart - using Photoshop gray chips. You want to be able to see all the wihie and black steps and the middle 128 color should be pure gray and not reddish or bluish or green.

Attached are some general ideas how to set up a basic zero to 255 chip chart for yourself. It would be best for the 10-20 chips to fill the whole screen - these were for other purposes.

I'd like to see a poll asking "If you calibrate your monitor, what color temperature do you use?" Reason is, I use 6500 and my prints look great under daylight, but slightly darker in room light. Since most prints will be viewed in room light conditions, should I use 5500 or so to calibrate my monitor, i.e., calibrate for the real-life viewing conditions?

Mike

It's our studio policy that we calibrate on the 1st of the month, every month, and that goes for the retouching department as well as the shooter workstations. (PhaseOne stations).

We have the Gretag-Macbeth EyeOne and it does a great job with all the CRT's, as well as the Wacom Cintiq21 tablet monitors, which have decent color adjustment controls built in.

The EyeOne will calibrate displays, printers and scanners. It won't calibrate our Kodak Approval though. We're seeing WYSIWYG there anyway.

always lots of great stuff covered here, this thread and all the comments are no exception...

seems my monitor is [maybe] set a bit dark... as best as I could tell I might be close to the 2.2 recommended in reading LQQKER's comment...

Doug's original comment, regarding images posted to the web possibly opens an opportunity for wider consideration or further discussion than simply judging images and monitors for print. First, I've recently heard a bit about color shift when saving as JPEG's even at the Camera level this is evident With a 5D (shooting RAW and jpeg simultaneously) the jpegs are much darker than the RAW... not that I know more about it than being able to google a quote and look at my last Canon Raw files and compare the Base RAW display to the JPEG's that are simultainiously created... that point possibly seeming moot, we can surely white balance and adjust the exposure of the RAW file...

but it does appear that between Save for Web settings, Save as JPEG and sRGB... folks are seeing some color shift.

I agree with George. The correct gamma setting for those that are using windows (Xp through 95) is 2.2, setting it to 1.8 (as suggested for a Mac)will be lighter than a typical PC screen should be. [B]My print output very closely matches my screen.


for those of us that work primarily in print... this is the key. is it not?

I've recently moved from one of our offices to another [and back] now someone else has inherited my monitor of two years—who's color and brightness I could trust... several million catalogues printed looking like what I saw on that monitor.

we've now got a ColorBurst SWOP® Certified RIP & Epson 4800 with Proofing paper to verify what I see here is what we can expect in print.


that said, what we see on our own monitors may not be at all what we can expect 'others' will see on their monitors when viewing on the web.

As an unscientific test—just to see how dark images I was posting to thwe web might be on other folk's screens, I posted an image to my home forum last year... viewed by a number of web & design professionals, the range of what was seen ran the whole gamut... this image (http://64.62.139.2/~waltdiet/images/monitorTEST.jpg) has a set of numbers 0-9 on the right, with a gradient mask on the same set on the right.


this monitor seems dark, I was guessing I'm close to the 2.2 LQQKER's qoute suggested... and I can [faintly] make out the numbers at the left and see 0,1,2 and part of 3 on the right. The monitor I said I know I can trust from comparasin to a couple years worth of print output—I can see the 3 completely and have difficulty sating I see any of the 4 at all.

My monitors at home, which I use more for browsing and for creating artwork for display on the web are set quite a bit lighter... and I know I must take this into account.

There's a new (and VERY affordable! - $89) out for calibrating:

http://www.pantone.com/products/products.asp?idArea=2&showNav=121&idProduct=103