Posted by Neale Dyster on June 12, 2010 at 5:22 AM
I've posted about this before and had some help but I'm still confused!
Just got my second lot of test prints back from a lab and they are still too dark.
Getting my head very slowly around colour spaces and soft proofing etc but thinking I may need to get back to my basic monitor calibration and is this where my main problem lies.
I have an NEC LCD2490WUXi monitor and Spyder 2 express calibration equipment.
Had some advice previously to drop the brightness level back , which I have , to 52.7%. When I run Spyder 2 it tells me to set monitor at default settings, which I do and then after calibration I drop the level back again.
The monitor has colour control settings of 1,2,3,sRGB,5,Native and Programmable,
it says sRGB and Native are standard colour presets and cannot be changed.
It also says Programmable can only be adjusted using colour calibration software.
I'm sure I had advice from somewhere to use "Native " setting.
I'm wondering if anyone out there with a similar NEC monitor might be able to shed some (perfectly colour controlled!) light on this for me?
I am no expert but I will share my experience with you as I too have tried to get the printed image to match my monitor. An image on a monitor is going to be tough to get exactly in a printed version. The monitor is backlit while your print is not.
I use the Spyder 3 and calibrating your monitor is a big help in the process.
I generally finish processing my image and then lighten it slightly overall before printing. I have found this gets you closer to what you see on your monitor. It is a simple fix. Try it and see if your results are better. Keep somes notes on the amount you lighten up the final image and print several different levels.
Good luck
Andrew
Posted by Keith Bauer on June 12, 2010 at 12:59 PM
Neale: I have the NEC 2690WUXI. Basically the same as your monitor, but slightly larger. The recommended calibration system for these monitors is SpectraView II. This series of NEC monitors and Spectraview set the video card to neutral and store the calibration adjustments in the monitor itself. Most systems rely on setting the LUT in the video card. Maybe you can achieve fine results with your Spyder Express. I don't know that you can't with the Express. All of the fiddling you are doing with brightness, etc. isn't necessary with SpectraView. In the setup in Spectraview I set a Target calibration based on one of the supplied samples. The only change was to change the intensity to 100 cd/m2 (squared). Then I just hit calibrate and walk away. Make sure you are using accurate paper profiles and have the workflow to allow Photoshop to manage colors correct. If so, you should get very accurate colors. If you softproof in Photoshop using the printer/paper profiles, you can also gain a lot of insight into what might be going on. I don't even bother with test prints anymore as I'm confident in my color workflow to just print what I need. Last night I printed a 17x22 using Ilford Gold Fibre Silk on my 3880 and the colors in the print are fantastic.
I use the same monitor and calibration hardware as does Keith.
Without the advanced controls available in SpectraView, you pretty much just have to turn down your monitor's brightness to match the prints you receive, then brighten up the print files accordingly.
You might try turning down the brightness in your graphics card control panel rather than using the monitor controls.
Posted by Neale Dyster on June 12, 2010 at 9:25 PM
Thanks guys, So I've found spectraview 2 on the web and it seems it is a software only package that is compatible with my spyder hardware. So would I use the "P" setting in the colour control settings on the monitor then?
I think that the actual Spyder puck will work with SpectraView, but it would pay to ask the manufacturer just in case. They're really good with customer service.
I pretty much left the monitor on factory default settings and let SpectraView do all of the work.
The target settings that have worked for me with SpectraView are:
White Point-D65
Gamma-220
Intensity (brightness)-115 cd/m2
Contrast Ratio-250:1
I saved these settings and called it 'MyPhotoEditing.TGT' so I could recall them every time I calibrate.
Of course, your mileage may vary, but I believe this will be a good starting point. You can never get a 'perfect' match between transmissive (monitor) and reflective (print) media, but these settings got me very, very close.
Hopefully, Keith can chime in with his optimum settings.
Discussion
5 repliesJust got my second lot of test prints back from a lab and they are still too dark.
Getting my head very slowly around colour spaces and soft proofing etc but thinking I may need to get back to my basic monitor calibration and is this where my main problem lies.
I have an NEC LCD2490WUXi monitor and Spyder 2 express calibration equipment.
Had some advice previously to drop the brightness level back , which I have , to 52.7%. When I run Spyder 2 it tells me to set monitor at default settings, which I do and then after calibration I drop the level back again.
The monitor has colour control settings of 1,2,3,sRGB,5,Native and Programmable,
it says sRGB and Native are standard colour presets and cannot be changed.
It also says Programmable can only be adjusted using colour calibration software.
I'm sure I had advice from somewhere to use "Native " setting.
I'm wondering if anyone out there with a similar NEC monitor might be able to shed some (perfectly colour controlled!) light on this for me?
I am no expert but I will share my experience with you as I too have tried to get the printed image to match my monitor. An image on a monitor is going to be tough to get exactly in a printed version. The monitor is backlit while your print is not.
I use the Spyder 3 and calibrating your monitor is a big help in the process.
I generally finish processing my image and then lighten it slightly overall before printing. I have found this gets you closer to what you see on your monitor. It is a simple fix. Try it and see if your results are better. Keep somes notes on the amount you lighten up the final image and print several different levels.
Good luck
Andrew
Without the advanced controls available in SpectraView, you pretty much just have to turn down your monitor's brightness to match the prints you receive, then brighten up the print files accordingly.
You might try turning down the brightness in your graphics card control panel rather than using the monitor controls.
I pretty much left the monitor on factory default settings and let SpectraView do all of the work.
The target settings that have worked for me with SpectraView are:
White Point-D65
Gamma-220
Intensity (brightness)-115 cd/m2
Contrast Ratio-250:1
I saved these settings and called it 'MyPhotoEditing.TGT' so I could recall them every time I calibrate.
Of course, your mileage may vary, but I believe this will be a good starting point. You can never get a 'perfect' match between transmissive (monitor) and reflective (print) media, but these settings got me very, very close.
Hopefully, Keith can chime in with his optimum settings.