calibration

[Jackarchbee]

I am confused about calibrating my monitor. I obviously don't understand the basics and I apologize if my questions are too basic.
I have a laCie 320 monitor and a laCie blue eye V2 calibration device and it indicates that my gamma measurement is off by 3%, kelvin by 9% and cd/md by 27%. (I don't pretend to know what these measurements really are.)
Am I supposed to simply accept these measurements as a color profile, save it and then when I farm my images out to be printed the printer will use that profile and match the colors that I see on my monitor?
Or, as I suspect, is there is much more to it that I don't grasp?
I'd appreciate any help anyone can offer.
Thanks.

John

[Colin Southern]

Hi John,

Gamma is the "translation" from the linear capture that sensors record to a logarithmic scale that humans see. The Kelvin is the warmth or coolness of an image, and the cd/m2 is a fancy term for "how bright the screen is".

Interesting that they're saying "it's out by x%" though, as there are different standards for colour temperature (Kelvin), and monitor brightness is a matter of personal choice -- so no idea what it's assuming as a baseline, but I digress.

Whilst I'm digressing, I should also mention that what you're really doing here isn't CALIBRATING your monitor -- you're PROFILING it ... the two are different things, but folks often get them mixed up.

To answer your question though ... what needs to happen after the device has worked out how much your screen is deviating from the ideal is that a profile is created that corrects these variances - so that you see what you're supposed to see; the profile is used by your computer to adjust what's sent to the monitor.

It isn't of any use to your printers - but - it does ensure that when you adjust your images prior to sending them to the printers that the adjustments you make are the same as the ones you're seeing. As an example, if you had a badly adjusted monitor that displayed everything waaaay too bright - but you didn't know it - you'd adjust the images by making them darker so they looked right - and of course when you had them printed then they'd all look too dark. Profiling ensures you're working from a level playing field.

Hope this helps!

[Jackarchbee]

Colin:

Thank you very much for taking the time to reply. Very well explained.
I promise not to inundate you with questions, but understanding that I'm just profiling the monitor, what then is calibrating the monitor? Or don't I do that?
Again, thanks for your time.

John

[Colin Southern]

Hi John,

Calibration is the adjustment of monitor controls to get it as close as possible - then profiling kicks in to "pick up the slack".

You want the profile to make the smallest correction possible as it gives you the biggest usable range - but most people make monitors worse when attempting calibration, so manufacturers usually just suggest setting the monitor back to its defaults before starting profiling.

[Jackarchbee]

Again, Colin, many thanks for your time. I'm going to print some images to see if they print better now.

John

[Colin Southern]

Again, Colin, many thanks for your time. I'm going to print some images to see if they print better now.

John

Hi John,

Monitor profiling in and of itself will make ZERO difference to how images print, per se - the difference comes from the editing which - on a calibrated and profiles monitor - could well look different to what you started with.

Hoping that makes sense. Case in point ... if you have an image that isn't printing correctly so you profile your monitor and then reprint the image without making any changes to it then it'll print exactly the same. On the other hand, if you profile your monitor - open up a previously printed image - see that it's "way off" - fix it so that it looks good on your (now) profiled monitor - then print it - then hopefully it'll print much better.

Keep in mind though that monitor calibration and profiling is just a small (but essential) part of the colour management process though ... printers also need to be processed - and even differences between additive colour monitors (with about a 6 stop dynamic range and red, green, and blue primaries) -v- subjective colour (paper printing) with about a 4 stop dynamic range & cyan, magenta, yellow, and black colours - needs to be taken into account. And on top of that there are even more colour management techniques for dealing with camera colour accuracy

[PRSearls]

Hello John,

Here is a link to color management information from X-rite you may find useful. Their solutions use their products (which are very good) but the principles are applicable to any hardware. I'm not connected to X-rite in anyway but do use their products. Their webinars are very good. Hope this helps.

http://www.xritephoto.com/ph_learning.aspx

Paul S

[Jackarchbee]

Many thanks, Paul, for taking the time. I'll check it out.

John