Posted by Mat Malone on September 9, 2010 at 1:23 PM
Do you guys calibrate your monitor for contrast? On my home computer I actually have 2 monitors: a good IPS-panel monitor I use for Photoshop and an inexpensive wide-screen TN-panel monitor I used when I just need more desktop space. However the TN monitor has a lot less contrast, and my images look a little washed out. My monitors at work are pretty close to the IPS, maybe a little less contrasty.
My problem is that the last time I calibrated my monitor using a Spyder2Express I don't remember seeing an standardized way to calibrate contrast. So if someone critiques an image saying that it needs more contrast or the shadows opened up, it seems like it may be pretty unreliable depending on the viewer's situation. Let's not even get into the luminosity of the viewer's room!
Is there a monitor calibration tool out there that calibrates contrast? Or is contrast just a hard thing to judge?
The general guideline for monitor contrast if you are printing is 400:1. I am not familiar with your colorimeter or software, but you might poke around to see if you can set the contrast ratio.
As I said, 400:1 is a general guideline. If that ratio doesn't work for you, you might want to experiment. BTW: My monitor is calibrated at 400:1 with a luminance of 110 Cd/m^2. This gives me a good match, but I always have to do a little tweaking to get exactly what I want in the print.
--P
Posted by David Bostedo on September 9, 2010 at 3:49 PM
...it seems like it may be pretty unreliable depending on the viewer's situation.
This is almost always the case for color/contrast/etc, and sometimes sharpness. (Unless you know the persons setup and know them to have a well calibrated system - but it's sketchy even then.) I would always take comments like that as a suggestion for something to look into and make sure is the way you want it; I wouldn't make changes if I had a good calibration and liked what I saw. This is especially true, as Preston said, if prints matched well.
Posted by John Mumaw on September 9, 2010 at 7:32 PM
Contrast in your 'Kauai Light Show' photo looks fine with my calibrated monitor.
Posted by PHEROLD on September 10, 2010 at 2:54 PM
The better monitor calibration tools out there allow you to set a specified contrast ratio to aim for (as opposed to aiming for a specific white point and lowest black point.) ColorEyes Display, the EIzo software and the NEC software all have this option. If hitting a specific contrast is really important in your situation, then you could pursue this more, but for most people - what they want is for their monitor to reproduce their images the best it can.
Since contrast ratio is basically the difference between how bright your whites are and how dark your blacks are, then where you set your brightness has a direct effect on your contrast. The white luminance value is a given when calibrating, so a lot of the nicer monitor profiling packages allow 3 options when choosing the black point: Hit the minimum the display is capable of, hit a specific black point (to match another screen for example), or have the black point float in order to hit a specific contrast ratio.
My guess is your TN monitor's inability to get very black is probably what's reducing your contrast. There's not much you can do about that except calibrate your good monitor to not be quite so black, and then you'd have the same low contrast on your good monitor. Yipes!
Posted by Larry Puckett on September 11, 2010 at 8:26 AM
In contrast to John's view, on my old laptop your Kauai Light Show looks washed out and there is a halo along the ridge next to the ocean. So it pays to have a good calibrated monitor--Larry
Discussion
5 repliesMy problem is that the last time I calibrated my monitor using a Spyder2Express I don't remember seeing an standardized way to calibrate contrast. So if someone critiques an image saying that it needs more contrast or the shadows opened up, it seems like it may be pretty unreliable depending on the viewer's situation. Let's not even get into the luminosity of the viewer's room!
Is there a monitor calibration tool out there that calibrates contrast? Or is contrast just a hard thing to judge?
The general guideline for monitor contrast if you are printing is 400:1. I am not familiar with your colorimeter or software, but you might poke around to see if you can set the contrast ratio.
As I said, 400:1 is a general guideline. If that ratio doesn't work for you, you might want to experiment. BTW: My monitor is calibrated at 400:1 with a luminance of 110 Cd/m^2. This gives me a good match, but I always have to do a little tweaking to get exactly what I want in the print.
--P
This is almost always the case for color/contrast/etc, and sometimes sharpness. (Unless you know the persons setup and know them to have a well calibrated system - but it's sketchy even then.) I would always take comments like that as a suggestion for something to look into and make sure is the way you want it; I wouldn't make changes if I had a good calibration and liked what I saw. This is especially true, as Preston said, if prints matched well.
Since contrast ratio is basically the difference between how bright your whites are and how dark your blacks are, then where you set your brightness has a direct effect on your contrast. The white luminance value is a given when calibrating, so a lot of the nicer monitor profiling packages allow 3 options when choosing the black point: Hit the minimum the display is capable of, hit a specific black point (to match another screen for example), or have the black point float in order to hit a specific contrast ratio.
My guess is your TN monitor's inability to get very black is probably what's reducing your contrast. There's not much you can do about that except calibrate your good monitor to not be quite so black, and then you'd have the same low contrast on your good monitor. Yipes!
There's more on this and how an LCD monitor produces black here:
http://www.colorwiki.com/wiki/Monitors_Part_One
-Patrick Herold
Tech Support
www.chromix.com