Monitor Calibration

[mmeyer]

Hey everyone. I am considering getting some calibration hardware. What brands and have anyone used? Is there something I should look for? I have been looking at the Pantone Huey and Huey Pro.

How do they work if you are having your photos processed at a lab? I find that my photos look very different when processed than when they are on my computer. Do you calibrate to a photo from the lab to make sure they are the same?

Any help anyone can give me would be very much appreciated!!

Thanks

Mike

[Steve Foss]

Mike, I only calibrated my monitor to match what comes out of my photo printer, not buying any type of hardware or calibration device to do that. What I see on my screen almost perfectly matches the prints.

However, because it's not cost/time effective to make my own prints, I use a photo lab, transmitting electronic files to them and getting them delivered to my door within two business days.

I sent them test images that they printed and sent back for free so I could calibrate my monitor to those images, but I haven't bothered. They offer color correction for a small fee per file and I always just check the "color correction" box when I transmit a print order. They've come back perfect every time (including some orders I've made for over 200 prints). So for me, calibration hardware was money I didn't need to spend. If I feel a need to do it down the road I'll deal with it then.

Now, most photographers are pretty picky about calibration, so I suppose I'm an exception, and I should stress that it's just my experience, not necessarily a recommendation against calibration.

I also know that LCD monitors are very difficult to calibrate, and a lot of shooters I know make sure they do their color toning on older CRT monitors for just that reason.

Also, saving for Web in sRGB color space, which is the Web standard, keeps color pretty consistent from monitor to monitor.

[buzzsaw]

Hi Mike. I use the Gretagmacbeth's eye-one Display and would highly recommend it. It is also very economical and recommended by printing houses such as White House Custom Color in St. Paul.

[Dbl]

I use the Pantone Huey been working great for me, I'm looking at adding the Pro version for some other computers. I would also look at The one Buzz mentioned the Eye-One. For the money they are great, and actually I believe they are owned by the same company now.

I use about 4 different photo labs for all my work and using the calibration profile they provide in Photoshop I have yet to have a bad print that wasn't spot on for color.

[mmeyer]

DBL,

Do you mean the photo lab supplies the profile? Or is it a profile you set up with the Huey? Do you match it to a photo from a lab?

Thanks

Mike

[Dbl]

Mike, quick and dirty. Monitor calibration gets you to a known point. Most labs provide a profile that you install in PS so that you can view your photos in PS rendering accurate color to their setup. If your monitor is not calibrated when you view their profile in PS you will still have no idea how accurate your colors are.

Calibration gives everyone a baseline to work from, you are calibrated the profile from the lab is corrected based on calibration so you and the lab see the same colors when viewing them on a screen or print.

It really is much more complicated than that but in essence that is what we are doing with calibration. There are some great resources on the web if you want to spend days learning the ins and outs.

I am far from an expert about calibration, but I do know that my work when printed at various labs looks like what I saw on my screen when I post processed them. I actually process photos different for different labs to get the result I want. I know what I am getting by using the profile from the lab in PS. It is called "soft proofing". I hope that helps a bit.

Dan

[mmeyer]

Thanks everyone for your help. Dan that has answered my questions great. I will contact my labs and see if I can get a profile. Then I will be getting a something to calibrate with. That should get me where I want to be.

Thanks again,

Mike

[Steve Foss]

Mike, you should be able to download profiles from your lab's Web site. I use White House Custom Color in St. Paul and downloaded their profiles last night. Now if I could just figure out how to install them on photoshop I'd be fine.

[Dbl]

Steve, instructions from one of the services I use.

To install ICC profiles onto a Mac with OS X:

You should install profiles in one of two locations.

Copy the ICC profiles to the Users/[your login user name]/Library/ColorSync/Profiles folder.

or

Copy the ICC profile files to the Library/ColorSync/Profiles folder. Note: Installing in this location requires the user to be an administrator of this system.

To install ICC profiles onto a Mac with OS 8.x or 9.x:

Download the profile to your computer. Copy the ICC profile files to the ColorSync Profiles folder located in the System folder.

[Steve Foss]

Thanks, Dan. As I often recommend to others, I went into the Help system and found out how to do it (just as you suggested), and the profiles pop up nicely when I want to soft-proof a photo.

It has not been important to this point for me, but it will be, because I'll eventually be expanding my wedding services to include a full line of printed products, and will be using the LabPrints system with White House to build online blocks of photos for wedding and portrait customers to choose from. With them ordering directly from White House I'll want to make sure that what they see on the screen is what they get in the mail.

[finnbay]

I, too, use Gretamacbeth and have been very happy with it.