I am confused! Monitor calibration!

[Kai]

OK... so I quess I am really dumb. I have looked through the search and found everthing about calibrating my monitor and still not getting it. Is is worth paying someone to come do it? Or... What if I posted a picture on here, could you smart people tell me what I need to do?I just got a new monitor...LG Flatron Wide. My husband picked it out. The monitor I had before I never calibrated and my prints always came back good.

Please Help!

[sapearl]

Hi Audra, welcome to the forum. It depends how critical your work is - how important it is to get exact monitor to print color matching for you.

If you are just doing occasional printing from snapshots, then it's probably no big deal if your color/exposure/density of what you see on the screen matches the prints that you make. But if your doing pro wedding work, product photography, commercial projects or other things that demand exacting precise color matching, then you will need to have it calibrated.

What criteria did your husband use when he picked this particular monitor? - Stu

[Kai]

He picked it based on the contrast ratio. I think that is what he said. He was kinda sleeping when I just asked. I do professional work. Are their people out there that will come to my house and to calibrate it. I use a local lab for professional prints and I use mpix.

[sapearl]

Ah.... a good contrast ratio can be an indicator of a better monitor, but you don't want something that gives you so much contrast that you lose all your midtones and can't see or adjust shadow detail. You really should have looked at the monitors with him and been part of the evaluation process since you do pro work.

Techs won't generally come out and calibrate your monitor. That's not to say that you couldn't find somebody to come out with a harware calibratorator and set it up for your lighting conditions and working environment.

The fact that you use a local lab is a big plus here. Have them make you a standard test print and disk. That is, they should print you a properly color balanced, adjusted 8x10 print and then give you a copy of the disk file that produced that image. Take that print back to your monitor. Load the file in PS and bring it up on screen. Place the paper print next to the image. Do a stare and compare. Adjust your controls until they match.

This is the cheap and dirty way of a fast calibration. The proper way is to use a hardware monitor calibrator. The better ones are usually $175+. Hope this helps ;) .

[sapearl]

Do you do pro wedding/event/portrait work, or are you a design artist?

...... I do professional work. Are their people out there that will come to my house and to calibrate it. I use a local lab for professional prints and I use mpix.

[Phil V]

I'm confused, how are you trying to calibrate it? are you using a spyder or huey or something?

[sapearl]

There is also Adobe Gamma you could use - it comes bundled in Windows, but is just a little bit better than nothing. You could use that as a starting point.

[Kai]

My husband did the adobe gamma and it totally messed me up. Way to dark. I thought about doing it again but am confused by it. I do family, seniors, kids and have done two weddings. My site is http://audrasphotography.phanfare.com/http://audrasphotography.phanfare.com/

[jauiek]

I would just purchase a monitor calibrator if you have the money and do it yourself. The software is pretty straight forward and it is fairly easy to do. I wouldn't mess with calling someone to do it because monitors need to be calibrated regularly and it will get expensive. I personally don't recommend holding a print beside your monitor and judging it. But it isn't a bad idea to use as a point of reference.... you could almost just eyeball it like adjusting the color/contrast on a television at this point...

I am sorry but I think any option other than a proper calibration is cutting corners. If you do this work professionally as long as the client gets a good pic that is what matters, but you don't want to waste your time and money running back and forth to the lab until the picture looks acceptable to sell.

[Bobster]

just make sure your screen doesn't use a TN panel.. TN panels aren't true 24bit displays they only display 18bit (or more with dithering), it basically the same as running a CRT in 16bit mode..

[Kai]

I tried to do the adobe gamma again. too bright. How do I reset to factory settings? I found it last time but can't find it this time.

[sapearl]

Audra, go back into Control Panel - click through and you may be able to find a profile that says FACTORY or Reset, or some such.

[Kai]

i changed my theme and it seemed to work. I have been playing with this for over an hour. Computers are the my biggest frustration. We have a love/hate relationship.

[sapearl]

Theme? As in desktop color or subject theme? I didn't think there was any sort of relationship between that and monitor calibration. That's the thing with digital photography - once you make the move to it, you become your own IT manager.

i changed my theme and it seemed to work. I have been playing with this for over an hour. Computers are the my biggest frustration. We have a love/hate relationship.

[mmahoney]

If you're serious about having your monitor properly calibrated you need to get the proper calibration equipment & software .. there are several threads about this and recommendations on different products are there as well.

Sapearl has suggested having your printer give you a color chart both printed and in digital file format so you can tweak your settings to match theirs. That is what I do and if your printer calibrates and you use the same printer for most of your work it is the best (and most economical) solution.
Mike

[sapearl]

Seriously Audra, the guide print and file is a useful tool. It's not the end-all be-all to really proper calibration, but it makes for a pretty good stop gap measure that will get you in the ballpark.

I use a pro commercial lab that prides itself on consistent print output. And that's the key: consistent processing and output. Processing can be nothing but aggravation without this. If you adjust something on screen to match that test print, it will be reasonably close.

But long term since you want to do weddings pro, you really need to get a good hardware calibrator that you can learn yourself. They are not that difficult to master and will enable you to get proper skin tones, great bridal gown "whites", and appropriate shadow and highlight detail. Eye-One (the old Optrix) makes an excellent calibrator.