Mac OS X ColorSync

Hello,

I use Mac OS X's built-in ColorSync module to calibrate my monitor. I know many of you will be tempted to leap in and start accusing me of utilizing an amateur method of calibration that will guarantee me inferior results, but I would kindly request to not go on that tangent. So anyways, on to my question.

At the first screen I am asked to turn up contrast all the way to max, and then adjust the brightness until some little greyscale circle/square pattern is supposed to look a certain way. No matter what I do with the brightness from 0 - 100 the pattern never really changes, so as a result I'm never quite sure where to leave it. So I did some experimentation and tried multiple calibrations starting with various brightness settings: brightness at 50, at 100, at 80 etc. and named the profiles accordingly (with the setting in the name). In the end when I toggle between them, the results are drastically different. Then, when I visit a calibration test pattern page like the wonderful http://www.lagom.nl/lc​d-test/ some of the calibrations seem to show decent results and some show heavy clipping in blacks or whites. So can anyone help me simplify and streamline this process a bit? Also what confuses me is that shouldn't it not matter what the brightness and contrast is set to initially, because that's what calibration serves to normalize anyway?

What display are you trying to perform these steps on, and what OS version? Most Apple displays do not have a contrast control and, presumably, you have disabled any automatic display brightness adjustment.

Contrast controls the brightest display luminance, and brightness controls the black point. Does the target that you are trying to adjust look correct, and no amount of adjusting makes it look incorrect, or is it that the target looks incorrect and no amount of adjusting will bring the target into the proper adjustment?

Is the attached screenshot the doohickey you are trying to adjust? Are you using "expert" mode that gives you other controls (like white point, gamma, etc.)?

kirk

Ah yes - I forgot that most Macs have a built-in monitor so I didn't even think of getting into specifics. I have a Mac Mini running whatever the most current OS X is. The monitor is a 27" Planar LCD display which has separate brightness and contrast controls.

I am using Expert mode.

Yes - that is the doohickey I am referring to. No matter the adjustments it seems to just consistently look the same (where everything in the pattern is very close to the same shade of grey).