Editing: Monitor Color Balance

[weegegirl 2]

Hi,

I searched and found not.

Question for the editors out there...

Every monitor is slightly different with how they display colors. What I'm looking for is some sort of software that will place the perfect color balance settings on my monitor, that I can use with all the computers I work on. That way, when switching between computers, there will be less variation in skin tone, etc.

I have the famous gray scale graphic (see attached) that helps you with your basic settings (you should be able to see an outer and inner shade of gray in each one of the 24 blocks).

I guess I'm looking for something a wee bit more advanced. And I'm really only learning about all of this stuff.

Can anyone out there help me out?

Thanks in advance,
Liz

(edited for typo)

[XDV 0]

so soft. exist on the market specialy design for the people who are in photo and imagery buissness . it's a thing you but on your monitor and with the software you can balance your color.

will try to get you some brand name today

[weegegirl 2]

Quote

so soft. exist on the market specialy design for the people who are in photo and imagery buissness . it's a thing you but on your monitor and with the software you can balance your color.

will try to get you some brand name today

thanks so much - that's exactly the kind of thing i'm looking for.

• Quote

[TAVI 0]

---------------------------------------
Ale, Ya!
Pafuera, Padentro, Pafueraaaaaaa
Hispa # 12

[XDV 0]

here one link to one solution for a reel color setup of your monitor



https://secure.colorvision.com/profis/profis_search.jsp?op=search&type_id=41

[weegegirl 2]

Quote

here one link to one solution for a reel color setup of your monitor

https://secure.colorvision.com/profis/profis_search.jsp?op=search&type_id=41

XDV... That's great! Just what I was looking for. I'm ordering a copy today of SpyderPro and I'll let everyone know what I think in a week or two.

There's nothing worse than working with a video or photo on one screen - switching computers - and all of a sudden you are looking at something completely different.

Thanks a lot! You rock!

[XDV 0]

cool... hope it will work great for you, will watch for your review.

X

[base598mn 0]

Try getting a video card like the Matrox card so that you can convert your video out signal to NTSC and then you can biew your video on a NTSC television as you edit so that you can see the actual colors the end user will see when watching it on DVD or VHS. Comuter monitors have millions more colors than TV monitors.

[XDV 0]

But your matrox card worth nothing if you are working at digital photo in photoshop !

[weegegirl 2]

Well, here's a question...

If you are editing video and photography primarily for the Web and CD ROM, what color standards would you use? Do you think that software like SpyderPro would set you somewhere in the "average" for users?

What I mean is, even if you calibrate your monitor to be as accurate as possible while you are designing/developing, it's still going to look different for each user (on their personal monitor). How would you go about getting something that will work for "most users."

Not looking for a specific answer, just opinions.

• Quote

[bryce 0]

Web color settings... sigh. at least you're not asking about prepress color spaces.

Calibrating with a spyder is the first step... it's going to get you looking at things properly. but like you've said "it's still going to look different for each user"

The answer... Profiling. if you set up photoshop's color management properly every file you edit and save will have a color profile embedded in it. which is good, because most browsers nowadays have some sort of color management module that will convert the file to that system's native working space. it's still not going to change the fact that 99% of all people out there have never calibrated their monitor before. (and no, adjusting the brightness and contrast to see a little grey square inside another grey square is not really calibratiion... it's very loose approximation.)

Using a Spyder will affect different areas of the monitors colorspace and shift problem areas, make skin tones warmer/cooler.

I've attached a file to visually explain this a bit further.

the palatte represents all visible color, of course a monitor can't display everything our eyes can see, but if we say your monitor can display all the colors in "B" and you make a pretty file (It looks pretty on your screen because you're using all the available color) then you send that file to someone who owns a computer with Monitor A... al of a sudden that person is going to see something that's pretty muddy and crappy in the green tones... the reds and oranges are all about the same but a lot of the color information is just not there so it's crappy.

What a profile does is it sits behind the image and when it gets loaded into an application that has a CMM (Color management module) it'll take a look at B and make it Fit into A... so that the end user has the same end product being thrown into their eyeball by the screen.

if you want a pretty no bones way to get it right in photoshop, (first off, search photoshop's help file for "color management" it's a pretty useful refrence in the later versions) use the "Web graphics defaults" under the color settings.


Some sites to check: www.adobe.com/support/techdocs/c9fe.htm : A bunch of terminology and definitions
www.color.orgthese guys are the ones who created color management, (bless their hearts) the site is easy to get lost and confused in, but the try the FAQ first... it's good to print out and leave next to the john.

Does that Help at all? or just lead to more confusion?

-Bryce

[quade 4]

Are you talking about colors for print or TV?

I get the feeling that a LOT of folks are talking about print media and a calibration tool for print would be perfectly appropriate for that purpose, but totally inappropriate for setting your monitor to correctly view it for televsion purposes.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[bryce 0]

I was specifically answering the question about web based color calibration.

[quade 4]

Yeah, I'm just trying to find out what the orginal poster of this thread wanted to know about.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[weegegirl 2]

Quote

Yeah, I'm just trying to find out what the orginal poster of this thread wanted to know about.

Ok, first off... Bryce... that was excellent and you have no idea how much I appreciate the information! I'm trying to soak up as much knowledge on this stuff as I can right now, and it's really hard to find a starting point sometimes.

To answer Quade's question... I'm more concerned about how video will look on the web, but also photography.

The problems that I've been running into with video, is that as soon as I transcode the video down to the different bit rates I need, the video seams to get a lot darker. So I've been tweaking the levels, brightness, contrast, etc to make it look more accurate as a final product. My concern is... what looks good to me on my monitor may look like junk on JoeBlow's monitor.

All the information that people have provided me with so far has been great. I'm used to editing video that will appear on tv... not a computer... and so I feel a bit like a fish out of water right now. The good thing is... as sick as it is... I totally love this stuff, so I don't mind being confused and having to re-learn everything I know.

Thanks for the help guys!

[JayhawkJumper 0]

It may still look bad on other people monitors if they aren't calibrated to your monitor, and if its shown on TV's, every TV shows colors differently, and so do projectors. For just small videos, I really wouldn't worry about it too much, if you do a huge project that you want to sell, you might want to send it to an on-line editor some place like Photo-Kem and they can tele-cine it which will make all your colors match up accurately, but thats really pricey.