Calibrate monitor?

[James Hogarth]

Hi all,

I think I may have to calibrate my monitor but not sure exactly how or why.

I'm using an iMac 2013 27" and i've noticed lately some of the skin tones and other parts seem quite green. I've checked the monitor the EPIC is feeding out to and it looks great on that so not sure how to fix it.

Do I need to calibrate the monitor and if so what's the best way to do this on my machine.

As always any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks guys

 

[Terry VerHaar]

I use the Spyder Pro system from Datacolor: http://spyder.datacolor.com/

But, there are several systems that aren't too expensive. I won't claim broadcast level, absolute mission critical calibration, but definitely helpful and workable on computer monitors.

 

[James Hogarth]

Ah yes I've seen spider in action before I'll take a look at their site thanks Terry

 

[Mike Nagel]

James,

the Spyder is one of the worst meter ever. Don't buy it. It's crap.

Get the i1 Display Pro (i1D3) from X-Rite, it's the best budget colorimeter. Buy the OEM version (not the RETAIL), the OEM version is supported by more Pro applications.

Since you want to calibrate for color critical application, u then need to get a spectro to create reference offsets for the i1D3. Get the i1Pro rev D (used or new) off eBay.

- Mike

 

[Ruben Carmona]

Dear James,

I don't know what experience leads Mike to this conclusion, I'm sure he had a bad one.

My experience with Spyder is good so far. I am photographing for 4 years as a professional and I used 2 different Spyders since then.

First I had a Spyder3Pro. I buyed it and had a red tint on all my calibrations. So I contacted the support and got a replacement in a week. Didn't even have to send my defective Spyder.
With the replacement it worked fine. Got the right colours that matched my prints when I compared to SoftProof in Photoshop.

Since half a year I have the Spyder4ELITE. I read about the iterative grey balance of the elite version which gives me an even smoother calibration of the gradations of grey (you can see the difference when creating a gradient from black to white in Photoshop between a calibration with this balance and without it.)

At the end all of these devices are technical ones, so some will make bad experiences with them. Be sure you collect some more experiences. You can't do nothing wrong. If you decide for a monitor profiling with a colorimeter, you're already one step ahead! :ihih:

 

[Mike Nagel]

Dear James,

I don't know what experience leads Mike to this conclusion, I'm sure he had a bad one.

My experience with Spyder is good so far. I am photographing for 4 years as a professional and I used 2 different Spyders since then.

First I had a Spyder3Pro. I buyed it and had a red tint on all my calibrations. So I contacted the support and got a replacement in a week. Didn't even have to send my defective Spyder.
With the replacement it worked fine. Got the right colours that matched my prints when I compared to SoftProof in Photoshop.

Since half a year I have the Spyder4ELITE. I read about the iterative grey balance of the elite version which gives me an even smoother calibration of the gradations of grey (you can see the difference when creating a gradient from black to white in Photoshop between a calibration with this balance and without it.)

At the end all of these devices are technical ones, so some will make bad experiences with them. Be sure you collect some more experiences. You can't do nothing wrong. If you decide for a monitor profiling with a colorimeter, you're already one step ahead! :ihih:

yeah, this is unfortunately only 1/100th of the required workflow

the Spyder should be avoided, but tehre's no need to discuss it when the i1D3 is the much better budget meter at roughly the same price - not the best colorimeter, that's the K10-A for US$7,000 but for it's money the i1D3 is very good.

Second, any "grading" or "color adjustment" that you do on a screen calibrated with just a colorimeter for professional work, is simply a prayer... EVERY colorimeter needs to be profiled to a spectro, and that includes the K10-A.

the red push (--> contamination) that u experienced on ur first spyder is not a problem at all, ALL colorimeter will drift over time and develop a huge color shift... that's why they are active meter and should only be used w/ a spectro (--> reference meter) offset which gives them color accuracy no matter how big the color drift of the colorimeter is...

all colorimeters are already inaccurate when they come from the factory, some more some less but they will all eventually be useless on their own... so I hope by now it is clear that using just the colorimeter is never a good idea (unless u just can't spend the extra buck for a spectro and u have to)...

regarding the impression that ur screen is color accurate by just using the spyder, theoretically that could be the case, but running a fully detailed delta E report is obviously what needs to be done...

ur eyes are easily fooled and they also condition very fast to not so greatly calibrated screens...

 

[Nook Kim]

Mike sure sounds like he knows what he's talking about. I think Ruben was kind of lucky that he was matching his monitor to his prints, meaning he knew exactly what his monitor should look. One of the difficulties for broadcast/theater monitor calibration is that you can never validate your calibration if, as Mike pointed out, anything within your calibration workflow is faulty. With a faulty meter, your monitor will likely be out of spec and you won't even know it because your calibration software says you're okay based on the meter's performance. When Mike says it's 1/100th of the monitor calibration, he means no joke.

Follow Mike's advice and check out CalMan from Spectracal for the software. They have made things a bit easier.

 

[Mike Nagel]

Mike sure sounds like he knows what he's talking about. I think Ruben was kind of lucky that he was matching his monitor to his prints, meaning he knew exactly what his monitor should look. One of the difficulties for broadcast/theater monitor calibration is that you can never validate your calibration if, as Mike pointed out, anything within your calibration workflow is faulty. With a faulty meter, your monitor will likely be out of spec and you won't even know it because your calibration software says you're okay based on the meter's performance. When Mike says it's 1/100th of the monitor calibration, he means no joke.

Follow Mike's advice and check out CalMan from Spectracal for the software. They have made things a bit easier.

okay, so here's a bit more...

with the screen mentioned by the OP - iMac 2013 27" - which has no internal LUT storage, u have these options for calibration:

1) ICC based calibration using Spectracal's Calman RGB, Argyll CMS etc

2) 3D LUT based calibration using an internal 3D calibration LUT inside Davinci Resolve, which will then ONLY calibrate the signal from Davinci if you use that screen for grading

3) 3D LUT calibration using a dedicated sw that takes control of your graphic card, such as the one offered by eeColor

(2) & (3) are by far the best options, even cheaper, non-Pro hardware such as this screen can be calibrated to a good degree.. it will never overcome issues like screen uniformity, viewing angle, backlight contamination etc, but that is just what you pay for in pro hardware...


(1) is the quick fix, which does not do much and cannot be used for color critical work... ICC based calibration cannot target a gamut (e.g. Rec 709 / sRGB) so u're stuck with whatever gamut your display outputs...

Argyll is better than Calman RGB and Argyll is free.

The very best results - and that includes ICC based calibration - provides Lightspace.