| |
|
Arizona State University Main Office Location: |
ASU English Home > Computing Support > Workshops and Tutorials > Tutorials > The Importance of Monitor Profiling The Importance of Monitor Profiling (or why do my digital images look different on your monitor?) Digital photography has quickly grown to dominate the photographic landscape. Nikon even announced this year (2006) that they will no longer produce film cameras. Digital cameras make it quick and fairly easy to take pictures and learn about photography. One area that has become a problem is getting accurate color on multiple monitors and in printing. The reason for this discrepancy is that monitors all have slightly different color characteristics and can be set to different color temperatures. In addition, monitor colors shift slightly over time as the monitor ages. Our perception of monitor colors also shifts depending on the temperature and amount of ambient light in the room. So, what all this means is that when you adjust images in Photoshop, your images might look very different on another computer. The only way to minimize the differences is to try to match your monitor to a standard. Enter monitor calibration. There are a number of monitor calibration kits out there. I recommend the Gretag MacBeth Eye-One Display 2. The Eye-One Display 2 contains a colorimeter and calibration software. The colorimeter sits on your monitor and measures the output in order to make a profile that matches your monitor with the colors that the computer is displaying. The software guides you through the calibration procedure and takes about 15 minutes. The results of having a calibrated monitor can be quite striking. CRT monitors should be calibrated every couple of weeks while LCD monitors should be calibrated every couple of months. LCD monitors have become quite popular recently. They save desktop space, run cooler and look cool as well. One issue with LCD panels is that most lack enough colorspace (or depth of color) for critical image work. Yes, a $150 CRT displays more colors than a $400 LCD. In fact, the only LCD panels that can display more than a sRGB colorspace are NEC and EIZO’s Lumiled panels (the EIZO ColorEdge 19 is selling for $1649), but these are currently cost-prohibitive for most amateur photographers. Recommended Calibrators (links to ColorMall):
|
|
||||
|
||||||