Best LCD Monitor?

[rob_s]

I'm in the market for a 19 or 20" LCD flat-panel monitor for Photoshop use with my 10D. Any recommendations?

[gs121002]

Several weeks ago I bought myself a Samsung SyncMaster 192T which isn't bad but then I bought one of our Vice Presidents a Sharp 17" LCD and it is much much better! I can't remember the model but it has a much higher contrast ratio than all of it's competitors. I wish I could just exchange mine for his Sharp. I also have a 20" NEC 2010 LCD / touch screen which is several years old but is very clear, has excellent contrast, and has great color.

Here is a suggestion: if you are going to spend the $$$ for a good LCD then dump your analog video card, spend a few more for a new digital video card, and get an LCD with digital input. I guarantee that you won't regret it.

I would also be interested in hearing what others here like from a photography stand point.

[xuxu1]

rob_s wrote:
I'm in the market for a 19 or 20" LCD flat-panel monitor for Photoshop use with my 10D. Any recommendations?

If i were you.... i would go for a CRT monitor. There are only very few LCD monitors available for serious photo editing. Those LCD´s are specially designed for photo editing purposes and cost a fortune!

Regards
Ed

[MiG82]

You do realise that any LCD short of an Apple cinema display or the Sony equivalent (they just manage to match a CRT) has a pretty crap colour gamut? In other words they can't display very saturated colours.
It'll be a quite a while before I ditch my trusty Sony Trinitron for an LCD. By that time they'll have better gamuts and they'll be fast enough for games.

[xuxu1]

Here´s one (for example):

http://www.eizo.com/products/lcd/cg21/contents.html

Regards
Ed

[iwatkins]

And here is another, by all accounts very good for photo work: Lacie (http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10074)

Cheers

Ian

[MiG82]

Thanks for posting those. They're equivalent to the LCDs I mentioned.
If you are prepared to spend lots and don't need to display fast motion then those four are suitable.
If you want a much faster response time, same gamut and don't mind the size, get a CRT for less money.

[John_T]

Sorry Rob. That's a contradiction of terms, LCD and photo editing. I don't know anybody who wants to do photo work on LCDs, no matter how expensive. There are people who think flat panels look cool, but that won't help you much. I think it will be a while yet before a flat panel monitor with a reasonable price/performance ratio comes along.

For the same money a reasonably good LCD costs, you can get a professional CRT that'll make you very, very happy.

I'm working with two pro 21" CRT monitors at 1600X1200X 1 billion colors at 100Hz. My graphic card has 256MB on board and will drive up to three monitors. All for in the neighborhood of $3,600. If you want the full joy of your 10D and Photoshop, take a close look at what you get.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

I think my take can be intressting in this.

I'm a BIG CRT fan, and would never (for the time being that is) exchange my Barco 808s (custom colorfiltered) for a DLP/D-ila/LCD/LcOS display.

But after my second defective Iiyama 22" pro monitor I tried their 20.4" TFT, AU5131DT(BK), running 1600x1200 with DVI and the 600:1 contrast ratio leaves me not much to be desired :D.

The black level sucks compared to CRT but this is easily come over by.
The detail is much better than on CRT, but the image is rather harsch.

What is better ?
None of the two, if you want to closely examine pictures for faults, over sharpening etc. I love the TFT, when you want to check blacklevel and overall shadow the CRT is king.

HOWEVER, I choose for the TFT for :
1.
Edge to edge focus (one of the problems of both Iyama's)
2.
Tilting to work in portrait mode.
3.
Overal look of the pictures in first glance.

According to my analyzer (spectrum radio meter) the TFT's tracks fairly well on D6500 +/- 500 degrees, it's not the very good +/-50 degrees of the CRT but it will do perfectly.

If you want to EXACTLY see on the screen what you get you can't use both, CRT will mask some oversharpening, TFT will loose in blacks.

As a avid and very aggressive CRT fan I must admit I turned to the dark side (oh wel not dark side (blacklevel)) but after all considerations I would do it again. BUT ONLY with a 20" with at least 600:1 all the other models looked worse.

Hope this helps a bit.

Greetings,
Frank

[Belmondo]

For the last couple years, I lusted for a flat panel monitor. I finally bought a Sony 18" flat panel display, and thought I'd died and gone to heaven ---

--- until I realized my color corrections were way off. Then, I bought a CHEAP Viewsonic 19" monitor, and the problem has really gone away. I still use both; I bought a video card with two ouptuts. The flat panely is my first choice for everything except image editing. Actually, in Photoshop, it works really well having two monitors. All the menus and pallettes go on the Sony, and that leaves the entire CRT for the photos.

It has really killed the space on my desk, but it's well worth it.

[John_T]

Interesting Frank, and Tom, I'll give up desk space for screen real estate any day!

I feel the key piece is the graphic card. Even lousy monitors will look better on a good graphic card, whereas even the best monitors will look lousy on a lousy graphic card. Here is mine:

http://www.matrox.com/mga/products/parhelia/256mb.cfm

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

Belmondo.
Calibration of monitors and the correct profiles are very important the deal with CRT is that most are the same, except for example the trinitrons/diamondtron's, with TFT's there is a HUGE difference between them, but after carefull calibration with an analyzer or the adobe settings gamma for each color you should be able to colorproof without a problem, the only REAL problem I found was that the picture on the TFT is slightly harscher in appearence as the print, this is for me a plus point because I'm very sensitive for oversharpening artifacts, with the TFT I can spot these much earlier.

Also check your gamma of your TFT if this is off, you will also experience problems.

Greetings,
Frank

[Belmondo]

J.A.F. Doorhof wrote:
Belmondo.Also check your gamma of your TFT if this is off, you will also experience problems.

Greetings,
Frank

Frank. Thanks for the input. I adjusted gamma very early on, so that's done. I keep the gamma on the flat panel set to give very bright whites. Since I'm not using it for adjusting color, I find I just prefer it that way. The CRT always seems 'dark' to me, and the whites seem a little dreary, but it gives accurate color. Tht's what it's all about.

Thanks again,

Tom

[CyberDyneSystems]

The card is a good point too and Matrox makes the best looking 2d display availabke,. but it really is a mix of the two that you need (like a good amplifier and speaker combo,. if either is not up to the task it will degrade overall quality)

Get a Sony Aperture Grill and a Matrox... That is Heaven! :D

[rob_s]

Many thanks for all the suggestions.

I've been using an Eizo L66 18" LCD for a couple of years and found it much easier on the eyes then the Ilyama 17" CRT I'd been using earlier. However, even though I calibrate frequently with my Monaco OPTIX calibrator, I find that I stil don't always get good matches with the Epson 2200 (using profiles I created for the various Epson papers intended for the 2200).

Thought I would upgrade to something larger (at least 20 in.), which would serve my aging eyes and at the same time allow me to get my PS tool bars out of the way. A 21" CRT is just too big to be practical for me.

Anyone have experience with the 20" Apple Cinema? This can be had for less than $1300., and with a DVIator and DVI card, is supposed to work OK with my PC.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

By the way,
I have to admit I still have a second monitor hooked on for normal office use (work once with 2 monitors and you will be hooked), so I check my colors often on the second one ;D, but lately less and less.

Greetings,
Frank

[John_T]

CDS, you are a delight. Yes my monitors are both Sony GDM-F520s with a .22 aperture grill. I keep these two guys in line with Spyder Pro. What I love about having 256MB on the Matrox is being able effortlessly to zoom or slide windows,any size photo or graphic around both displays as easily as sliding a piece of paper with my finger on a large table, without a hiccup. And the colors and definition are so good so good it's a real joy.

Tom, Rob & Frank, I would love to have three flat panels that would match or exceed what I have, but there are too many factors that IMO just aren't there yet. If you want to drool, look here. Maybe one day...

http://www.9xmedia.com/index.html

http://www.panoramtech.com/

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

I know how good a Diamtron/trinitron face can be, I worked 8 weeks with a Iiyama Pro 22" monitor and it was awesome.

Untill, the first one broke down after 3 weeks with moving lines, the second one broke down after 4 weeks with severe focus problems.
I lost my fait in that monitor, and because we are Iiyama dealer they made me an offer I couldn't refuse on the 20" TFT.
I know some areas are worse, although the primaries of this LCD are amazing (nothing like some others I measured) the blacklevel is the only real drawback. But with the 600:1 contrast ratio it's not a punishment any more.

I tried in the repair period several other TFT's (the advantage of having a few in the showroom :D) and they all could not please me for not even 50%, this one is pleasing me for 90%, the correct working CRT was 95%, but what I want to bring over is, check very closely if buying an LCD, some are there some are not even close.

Greetings,
Frank

[rob_s]

Frank, what computer and video card are you using with your Iiyama 5131DT?

[rob_s]

How important is the 600:1 contrast ratio? The reason I ask is that the Apple Cinema displays (and their Sony equivalent) have only a 350:1 ratio, and yet are considered to be among the best in the class if not the best.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

At the moment a Radeon based card, but I will be switching to the Matrox soon.

The contrast ratio is the difference between full white and full black.
If you want this correct you should measure a checkerboard of white and black squares and measure those.

Than for example:
Black 0.5 ftlmb and white 30ftlm will yield a contrast ratio of 60:1. This is the right way to do it.
Most manufacturors however measure a full on full off method, meaning they raise the contrast VERY high, even beyond the punt of clipping and measure a full white screen, after that they will measure a full black field, thus getting very high contrast ratio's.

In real life the contrast ratio is VERY important especially for photo work, with a 150:1 contrast ratio blacklevels will be very poor and color fidelity will be dull, on a 1300:1 contrast ratio black level will be totally black, and the color fidelity will jump of your screen.

600:1 for a TFT is very very nice to look at, with very good blacklevel (except in a darkned room) and lively colors.

Most problems however with digital display's is the primaries reading.

There is a standard for Red Green and Blue called the SMPTE standard, this is measured in a CIE chart.
This chart will give you a Green, Blue en Red point in the total gamma of colors.

http://www.colorfacts.com/colorfacts/help/images/CFInstrumentCIEChartwithGrid.jpg

Ok to understand the working of monitors read on.....

We see only 3 colors, Red, Green and Blue.
We are VERY sensitive for Green, less for Red and only 11% for Blue.
This is also shown in the CIE chart, Green on top, Red higher than Blue and Blue on the bottom.

With the right combination of these 3 colors we can make white, all the combinations of white can be seen along the black body curve, the black curve in the middle. To understand calibration and color it's important to understand that green is no part in the measurement on an analyzer. That's why we don't talk about 6500 degrees on a monitor but on D6500, meaning this is an EXACT coördinate on this black body curve.

With this point as a reference we can get almost every display dialed into this point. Meaning that when measuring a grayscale it will read D6500 over the total scale from black to white (+/- 400 degrees can be called rather good tracking).

Still this is not the complete truth, although most people stop here.

One VERY important thing (maybe the most important thing) is how the primaries are displayed.

When taking a fosfor based CRT projector for example we have 3 tubes, one Red, One Blue, One Green. All these tubes are often filtered to get the exact green, Blue and Red coördinates of the SMPTE standard. When combining this with the D6500 calibration you will have PERFECT color representation.

The problem is in these primaries for digital display's. Often for example green is much to high, meaning that green will be too much on a display, this will give everything on the display a greenish tint, this is often seen in the older TFT monitors.

It goes even further away when green is not above the SMPTE point but goes to the right under that point, everything that supposed to be green will be yellowish (a problem of almost every digital projector).

It can even get more bad when also red is not in its position making the triangle totally out of balance, Colors will look very unnatural with yellow and orange casts, what should be green and red.

If you search out for a good TFT you should always try to find out how it's primaries are displayed, this is however information the manufacturers are not giving. When not having an analyzer you should therefor make a picture with a grayscale in for example 10 steps, and a few areas with intense green to less green and the same for red and blue (also for example in 10 steps).

You can than easily see color casts, it's not an exact science (an analyzer is) but it will show you that 50% of the TFT's will be out of the question immediatly.

Also it would be nice to have a bar with a gradiant fill without steps, to check the possibility for the TFT to show colors without banding, or digital steps.

Hope this helps a bit.
Sorry for the long story.

Greetings,
Frank

[MiG82]

Calibration removes colour casts. The problem with the LCD primaries is that they are closer to the white point. Hence most LCDs can't display colours as saturated as CRTs can. This can not be fixed with calibration.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

please read the piece :D.

Calibration does NOT remove colorcasts, calibration gives you a good whitepoint, in extreme cases this will remove colorcasts a bit.

The primaries of digital display's are often not UNDER the SMPTE points but above and that's the problem, in other words, green will be too green resulting in a misconfiguration of your picture, resulting in dull pictures on CRT monitors.

The misunderstanding is that CRT's are more natural in color display and that is absolutly correct, meaning a skintone will be dead on on a calibrated CRT monitor whilst on TFT or any other digital display it will be ever so slightly or huge off.

HOWEVER the newer TFT's are much better with the primaries because they are now not only developed anymore to blow you away with cartoon colors but they are more and more build for our purposes.

AGAIN I insist on noting that I'm a very very fundemetalist when it comes to CRT technologies, in my Home Theater there will be a CRT projector for many years to come, but on my desk there now is a TFT monitor, only a shame it costs an arm and a leg, and still needs alot of work before it gives the results I like. Still I believe color is beter/more natural on my previous CRT, hower coloruniformity, sharpness and ease of use is MUCH improved, I love to work in portrait mode.

So I'm not TFT is better than CRT, but I'm also not CRT is better than TFT for our work, I only want to remove some fairy tales about TFT's there are some good ones out there but they are hard to get by.

Greetings,
Frank

[ahmadof]

one that i haven't seen mentioned is the one i use a formac gallery. the 19" has just been updated with incredible specs. i have had it only a week, but i would never go back to CRT. colors are spot on and the contrast ratio is unbelievable. just a suggestion...
Omar

[Zap37]

You may want to try one of these.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=536256&sourceid=qDQQP5wbEE2tAklsv3Sr&siteid=0038366399&Sku=S08-2102&bfinfo=999

[CyberDyneSystems]

WOW! Thats a great price even for a refurb!

$230.00 bucks for Display Nirvana!

[Malaxos1]

I am with all who said to get a CRT, I have bought a top model laptop for photo editing and have been greatly dissappointed. I now use it just for veiwing and even then it isn't great. The problem with LCD monitors is that there is too much contrast and there is loss of detail when veiwing. I have a 19" trinitron and highly recomend getting one. I have yet to see any LCD that is good enought for editing...Dean

[rob_s]

Frank -

Thanks for the dissertation on the importance of the primaries, which I found helpful. It is frustrating that information regarding the color gamuts of particular monitors is not available, making it hard for someone without the appropriate analyzer equipment (nor a sample on which to exercise it) to make an intelligent decision. The reviews one sees on the net tend to be both superficial and, I'm guessing, unreliable.

I spent this afternoon looking at various monitors at my local retailers (such as Fry's), and discovered still another set of considerations. In particular, I want to move up from the 1280x1024 that I currently run on my 18" Eizo to at least 1600x1200 (to get toobars out of the way). What I discovered was that on 20" flat-panels, text & Windows icons were unconfortably small. Even the 21" ones have a smaller dot pitch (.27mm) than my 18" 1280x1024 (.28mm). This made me think that I really need to go for a 23" LCD with 1600x1200 native resolution, such as the Viewsonic VP230mp (the 23" Apple Cinema for example, is 1900px wide, and has very small dot pitch).

It's ashame the 22" Apple Cinema is no longer made, as this would have been the ideal compromise at 1600x1200. But even this had only 350:1 contrast, and I gather from some comments on line that it tended to deteriorate after one year!

Alternatives still under consideration are the 23" Viewsonic (VP230mb) which is very expensive ($2600), the 23" Sceptre X23s-Naga, and the Planar ws231. The first two have contrast ratios of 500:1 or so. The Sceptre can be had for around $1700.

Bedankt -
Rob

[MiG82]

I'm talking about proper calibration, not just white point calibration. When creating a proper colour management profile you check many different colours. The aim is to have a certain colour display exactly the same as it does on another device (if you are within the gamut of your device). By definition you can't have any colour casts after this is done.
A comprehensive profile compensates for a lot more than just whitepoint.

All the data I've seen for CCFL backlit LCD displays shows that their primaries are lower than CRT primaries. I doubt that digital projectors use CCFL (cold cathode fluorescent lighting) so discussing their primaries is irrelevant to the average computer LCD display.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

@mig82.
Do you use a spectrum radio meter for measuring ?
If you do you will find that most cheaper LCD's TFT's will have a point higher than the standard SMPTE point for green, meaning green will look radio active and the overal picture will have a green cast.

I don't do anything with creating profiles, I'm a calibrator by profession for Home Theater and projection systems, this is a totally different ballgame than being a profiler :D I know.

Still the base is the same, we both want the best possible color presentation, as before mentioned I tried ALOT of TFT's, we own a PC shop and I have tried almost every new TFT that has come in, in 99% of the cases the result is bad, read BAD for photowork. What I was trying to say is that there ARE some out there which are perfectly addequate for photo work.

As long as I see on my printout (canon i950) what I see on my screen this is more than addequate for me (and I think 90% of the viewers here) I don't have to proof anything for magazines or print, but I do the occassional order or shots for commercial use, I used a CRT the last year and am still a bit not used to my new TFT but especialy the portrait setting, the sharpness and the coloruniformity are amazing with THIS monitor.

I agree with the person that the lightoutput is WAY too high on TFT's but that's why there is a contrast setting, just lower that to arround 20% and it will look the same as a CRT (I still have a second monitor next to the TFT).

@rob_s.
Personally I find the 1600x1200 resolution perfect readable (but I'm only 32 with good vision maybe that's helping), if you buy a Iiyama you will find software which will zoom the icons on a windows machine, and offcourse in Windows you can opt for bigger fonts.

@malaxos.
TFT's on laptops are REALLY the worst you can have, not viewing angle, very very poor contrast, no blacklevel at all, and offcourse this is normal, please understand my TFT has the same price as the normal complete laptop we sell in the store (not even the cheapest).

Greetings,
Frank

[CyberDyneSystems]

Just digging up an old thread with much discussion on this subject;

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=10496#77469

:)

[MiG82]

J.A.F. Doorhof wrote:
@mig82.
Do you use a spectrum radio meter for measuring ?
If you do you will find that most cheaper LCD's TFT's will have a point higher than the standard SMPTE point for green, meaning green will look radio active and the overal picture will have a green cast.



I don't do any measuring. But I have read a few technical papers where they did (I was researching to see how capable LCDs are at displaying colour). I've got no idea why my findings are different (I haven't found higher greens), so I must back down for now :(
I'm guessing it's safe to say that those cheap LCDs aren't calibrated? If that is the case, that's why there's a green tint.

As an aside, I've got a question that I can't find the answer to. Why did the original NTSC phosphors stop being used? They allowed a much larger gamut yet only early colour TVs used them.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

Rest assure, my TFT also has not perfect SMPTE values, Green, Red AND Blue are off by a rather high margin, however maybe this is what saves this monitor from the others.

Because to be quit honest I find the picture on the TFT better than on my CRT next to it, well ok the second monitor is a Samsung 900P 19" which has no valuable means of calibration, but tracks rather well after some tweaking of the never to be understood colorcontrol.

If you like reading about the fosfors and SMPTE standards, please read this:
http://www.videoessentials.com/res_facts.htm

I would like to state (before it's misunderstood) that in COLOR the CRT still rules, followed by the better TFT's, in other area's such as coloruniformity, sharpness and ease of use the TFT's are winning by very large margins, Sometimes you have to choose what fits your purposes best. On Home Theater for me that's CRT without a milisecond of doubt, for my PC on which photoworking is VERY important it's now a TFT.

Greetings,
Frank

[rob_s]

The PC World article at the following link makes an interesting point, which is that the contrast ratio specs provided by the various manufactures are totally unreliable, even for the better-considered brands. Take a look at the article entitled "LCD Specs - Useless?"


http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,110483,00.asp

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

This is always a fact.
You must know I review projectors for our HT forum, and we are alway's calibrating before the review, I never EVER measured a contrast ratio on the full-on full-off method which is above 800:1 althought the manufactorer often claims, 1700:1 or higher.

When measuring checker boards, the best is the D-ila with a shocking 400:1 :D.
Most LCD's stuck at 70:1 at best :D.

HOWEVER, we never really publish these measurments because most people don't understand the figures.

For example:
When you have a 50ftlmb output and a average blacklevel the contrast ratio would be better than a 12ftmlb output and very good blacklevel. To be honest I always would opt for the 12ftmlb projector.

Contrast ratio's are just the new magic word for resellers and manufactorers.

Take my TFT.
I have the contrast on 23, but before clipping occurs I can go to arround 50, however I feel the need to wear sunglasses at that moment, actually I'm limiting my contrast ratio........

What's best.........
Believe your own eyes, and adjust like YOU like it (and than offcourse calibrate the display).

Greetings,
Frank

[John_T]

Well... if I could ge one of these,

http://www.monitoroutlet.com/844555.html

or one of these,

http://www.superwarehouse.com/IBM_T221_Black_22_LCD_Monitor/9503DG3/p/39752

driven by one of these,

http://www.matrox.com/mga/archive_story/sept2003/p_hr256.cfm

LCD would be perfect!

[rob_s]

John - a question for you -- say you won the lottery and actually had one of these super-high res monitors + video card sufficient to drive it. How would you manage your desktop and non-pixel-oriented applications given such small dot pitch? Would you switch back and forth between the ultra-high settings and doubled-up pixel mode?

Frank - your point about believing your eyes only has a lot of merit. Unhappily, it's tough for a consumer to actually test drive many of these -- I'm located in Silicon Valley, for example, where high-tech stuff abounds, but the local stores don't display many of the high-end monitors. And even if they did it would be hard to make relative judgements without putting them through their paces and comparing side-by-side. So those of us who don't have direct access to the necessary test equipment have no choice but to rely on discussions such as these and pro's such as yourself.

Speaking of contrast ratios, here's a question for you: I find that calibrating my LCD results in cranking down the brightness well below the maximum level; the blacks are, as a result, at a much lower absolute level than they would be at higher brightness. Does this make the contrast ratio any more or less critical in terms of color rendition? For example, is the range so compressed that the eye could not differentiate the blacks at the bottom end even if the monitor could display them?

****************************************

On another note, two items that might be of general interest:

(a) I learned from the Iiyama regional sales mgr today that they have just released a new 21.3" LCD with1600x1200 max res, 500:1 contrast, and very fast response. The sales mgr said he had just seen it, and was very impressed. I don't know what the price is yet.

(b) Having had an opportunity to purchase a 1-year-old Apple Cinema 22" off of EBay, I spoke to Nicolas Hellmuth of FLAAR, who has purchased & used many of these in his org. His council: DON'T BUY THEM -- after a year of use, evidentally, they deteriorate. This is something I've seen references to on a Mac forum as well.


Cheers -
Rob

[MiG82]

J.A.F. Doorhof wrote:
Take my TFT.
I have the contrast on 23, but before clipping occurs I can go to arround 50, however I feel the need to wear sunglasses at that moment, actually I'm limiting my contrast ratio........



What do you think of this? We would have more than 8 bits of intensity and we'd hardly ever use pure white on bright displays.
In my opinion using the brightest white for applications and so on is stupid. It is too bright for me when I set my monitor up for photos.
IMO, the brightest white (in conjunction with a very bright display) should be used only where it is supposed to be uncomfortably bright for the viewer (like the sun in a sunset photo and a sheet of paper in direct sunlight).
This would make things much more lifelike.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

@Rob.

I always adjust the blacklevel with the Nokia monitor test programm, and keep all the black bars in view (the advise to have from 3%).

That means indeed the blacklevel is at it's minimum possible. The lower the blacklevel the higher the contrast ratio.

Example:
0.1 ftlmb black
50 ftlmb white
Would yield a contrast ratio of 500:1

0.05 ftlmb black
30 ftlmb white
would yield a contrast ratio of 600:1

You see that even with a lower white level contrast ratio can go up. For monitor's I usually use somewhere in between 30-40 ftlmb output.

The REAL problem with digital display's is the white and black crunch (don't be allarmed YET).
See it like this.

To go from totally dark (impossible with digital) to piekwhite takes on a CRT unlimited steps.
On a digital display to get it right you would need for example 255 steps.
HOWEVER, because most monitor's can't display 255 steps but let's say 220 the have 35 steps who are gone. Most of the time the manufactors choose to leave some in the black (called blackcrunch) and some in the white (called white crunch, NOT clipping).

So in a perfect digital display it would be:
1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.----------------------250.251.252.253.254.255

But in real life it's more like.
1.10.15.20.25.................240.250.255.

This is not exactly the same for every monitor, videocard, setup. But in general this is THE problem of the digital display's.

That's why I continues say that CRT is not yet beat on all areas, CRT will rule a long time. So if you are a real pro who is making alot of money with critical prints or very expensive model shoots I would think about getting indeed a CRT. HOWEVER if you are like me a very active hobby photographer with sometimes (I hope) a paying customer for a childerens/animal portrait then a VERY good digital TFT could be favourable.

Space is no issue on my desk, however I want to run at high resolutions like 1600x1200 and I want perfect sharpness and coloruniformity. Out of the box my 2 Iiyama's were very very close to perfect but I lost faith after both of them broke down, after working for a week or 2 with this TFT I was sold to the very easy picture, the good detail and the wonderful portrait setting, also I LOVE the size of the desktop now :D.

I know the limitations of the TFT's, blacklevel is poor (even on this one), colors are not exactly on their primaries, but there is no colorcast anymore (out of the box there is) and the pictures for my eye's look the same on the monitor as in print.

I would stress however everyone to FIRST testdrive a TFT, a good supplier would give you that chance, I know we do it for our customers.

Greetings,
Frank

[John_T]

Well Rob, I wouldn't buy any of them. I put those links up as half joke, but also as an example of what exists. Those rigs are really for special applications and might not even be appropriate for my uses, even if it would be a massive overkill. Just like you, for many things I really have to try them out hands on because ultimately it is a personal decision. I can only accept what other people say or report to a certain extent. And checking things out in a shop or showroom doesn't reveal things that become evident over experience in time.

I exhaust all sources I can find on the web, which includes finding somewhere I can check something out physically, and often find some geek who delights in exhausting me with details and experience.

When something has been really important to me, I've had the nerve to call up the manufacturer and say "I'm a management consultant and I'm interested in your product X and I want you to prove to me I should buy it." And also been pleasantly surprised when they have said "Of course! We'll send you a demo unit. What's your address?"

And how often does it happen that after intellectual exhaustion, you actually see the thing, it works fine, but it is as ugly as mud and you don't want to be confronted with that every day?

One thing that sold me on my monitor, which fulfills my needs and expectations in every other way, is a single button titled "Picture Effect". Professional > Standard > Dynamic. Professional is the calibrated level for serious photo work. Standard is brighter for office work and Dynamic is still brighter for web browsing and (rarely) games. Little things, for the everyday and over the long term, can count for a lot.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Don't trust the lables :D.
Sorry to burst that bubble.

But when I measure a monitor on the prosetting (or sometimes labled as 6500K) I almost always don't measure a perfect D6500K.

Also you need to recalibrate once each month if you are REALLY serieus about your colorproofing.


Greetings,
Frank

[rob_s]

Guys -

On my brother's suggestion, I set up a simple experiment to determine the contrast ratio of my 18" Eizo L66 LED monitor as a function of brightness settings.

The methodology was just to create a black fill image and white fill image (in PS), and use the light meter in my 10D to measure the exposure value of various brightness settings. I used a 50mm lens positioned 50cm from the monitor, set the aperture to F8.0, and measured the shutter speeds. The results were as follows:

@Max Brightness:
Black = 6 secs, White = 1/45 secs.
Contrast Ratio = 270:1

@Optimal Color Calibration Point (as set by Monaco Optix Colorimiter - in between max and min):
Black = 10 secs, White = 1/20 secs
Contrast Ratio = 200:1

@Min Brightness:
Black = 10 secs, White = 1/8 secs
Contrast Ratio = 80:1

Evidentally, my color calibration point was at minimum black level. I cranked up the brightness to learn that the colorimeter had calibrated the monitor at a brightness level just below the point where the black level would rise. In other words, the calibration point gave me close to the highest brightness that achieves the minimum black level.

Anyway, this answers the question I posed above as to whether decreasing brightness improves contrast ratio. The answer appears to be no - at least in the case of my monitor, the best ratio was had at max brightness, not at min black level. However, the difference (270:1 vs. 240:1) is, from a practical point of view, inconsequential.

Out of curiosity, after performing the experiments, I looked up the contrast ratio spec given by Eizo. Guess what -- it was cited at exactly 270:1.

Regards -
Rob

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

This is not creative way of testing :D.
But don't pull out the champagne yet.

The brightness control will not result in deeper blacks when the bottom is reached, that's why you can't measure any increase in contrast ratio when going below the blackpoint:
Total darkness is often at for example 20, going below 20 will not better blacklevel because it's allready 0.

Now for the change you see, that is quite logical.
Contrast & brightness always interact.

So lowering blacks beyond the absolute blackpoint will ALSO pull the contrast a bit down, resulting in worse contrast ratio.

When setting contrast, always check brightness again, and when setting brightness always check contrast again, and so forth.

Greetings,
Frank

[John_T]

No Frank, I don't think I made myself clear. I calibrate my monitors with Spyder Pro and Optical in the professional setting, 6500 and gamma 2.2 which is really perfect for photo work, but a little hard on the eyes for text in internet and other applications. I then have the option with one button to change to standard and dynamic for the other applications without affecting the Optical calibration under professional in any way.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Aha,
Clear.
On my CRT and TFT I leave the calibrated setting on always, don't like the harsh settings of the other settings (although that was on my Iiyama 22" CRT).
The TFT doesn't have settings.

Greetings,
Frank

[CyberDyneSystems]

rob_s wrote:
John - a question for you -- say you won the lottery and actually had one of these super-high res monitors + video card sufficient to drive it. How would you manage your desktop and non-pixel-oriented applications given such small dot pitch? Would you switch back and forth between the ultra-high settings and doubled-up pixel mode?

Cheers -
Rob

Assuming a windows PC, In Display properties and settings all manner of text that you PC displayes can be adjusted in size,. including ICONS,. pop up menus etc...

Running at ultra hi resolutions does pose its problems,. but they can all be overcome by about 45 minutes or so of tweeking and customizing your display properties.

Note that WindowsXP,.. having been released in an era where "normal" resolutions are allready higher than they tended to be in the Win95/98 era,. has allready enlarged most of the default text and menu settings to compensate.

As I say,. all these can be enlarged again,. making text readable and Icons clear,. but you still get the super hi res for graqphics work.

[rob_s]

John - good point about tweaking the settings. It does mean adjusting settings in all one's applications, however - not just the Windows stuff, and many applications are designed to look best at a certain fixed resolution, since they calculate painted object widths in absolute pixels.

Frank - what is the definition of "absolute black point", and how does it differ from the minimum level of black the monitor can display?

[John_T]

Often here and other places I see photos that have been edited on uncalibrated monitors and I think to myself "My God, do they know what their photos really look like?" So I cycle the effect button through Professional > Standard > Dynamic and get a good idea of what they see. Not much point in telling them anything other than calibrate your monitor, get a new monitor and/or get yourself a new graphic card, but then again that just whips up an endless hoo-ha because they obviously can't see what I'm talking about.

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

Hi,

Absolute blacklevel would be total absence of light.
Correct brightness on the monitor would be the setting on which black is as dark as possible but one step above is still visable.

Greetings,
Frank

[John_T]

Looks like I didn't reload the page before the last post.

Right CDS, I run at 1600X1200 @100Hz and Giga color on two 21" monitors, and change screen fonts, etc. accordingly. I've gotten used to having a lot of things small and generally prefer it because it gives me more screen space. Of course when other people who are used to working at 1024X768 @60/75Hz and 16 bit color look at my screens they don't grasp it. "How can you stand every thing so small?"

And I don't think the super-duper hi-res stuff would do anything more for me better than what I have now, unless I was doing satellite imagery or brain scans. Of course I'm always willing to be surprised, though there is always the point of diminishing returns...

Rob, I find I have better results disabling all application color management and just keep my monitors calibrated and profile the output. All these programs have their own idea of color management and usually only end up getting in each other's hair and drive me nuts trying to trace down where something didn't come out right. This way they all look the same and so does the output.

[kaipu]

If i were you.... i would go for a CRT monitor. There are only very few LCD monitors available for serious photo editing. Those LCD´s are specially designed for photo editing purposes and cost a fortune!

Whcih ones are those ???

[René Damkot]

S-IPS panels.

This is a *very* old thread, so some things have changed a bit...

Here is a good read: Click (http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/display/lcd-guide.html).

[miglo]

The best LCD is the biggest one I can afford.