Calibrating a Laptop......is it worth it?

[snappd]

Hi all

I have a 4 month old Dell 1520 laptop which I am considering calibrating......firstly, is this a pointless exercise? I have read lots of conflicting outcomes....some say it made a significant difference to their colour accuracy & others say it just isn't possible as they don't have the adjustment capabilities.

Has anyone calibrated their laptops with any degree of success, or are these people imagining things?? If so which calibrating tool would you recommend?

The reason behind the question is that I seem to have alot of photos coming back with too much saturation, too dark, or some wierd hue.....I'm yet to find out if it is the fault of the laptop or the printing process......have had prints done at good ole Harvey Norman & RGB (Indooroopilly) with limited success even with RGB's printer profile uploaded (the RGB photos came back looking flat & muddy)........still learning about all this too so maybe my preferences in CS3 are all wrong. I think (at work at the mo) I have my work space set to Adobe RGB same as the camera....should I change everything back to sRGB?

I'm thinking mabye I should calibrate my Desktop PC which was not really intended for photo processing as it's used for business, & then compare the same photos on my laptop........God I am soooo confused

I know this is a difficult question to answer without seeing examples, but any ideas would be appreciated thanks.

[Glen]

I found the range of adjustment on my Asus wasn't wide enough to calibrate it properly, so in my case it wasn't worthwhile. I would think that different notebooks would have substantially different adjustability. I would suggest changing one thing at a time in your workflow, my first would be calibrate your desktop first. Hopefully someone with a better knowledge of workflow will chime in on brands, member DaveB sells different calibration items, he may be able to advise better. His thread is here PM or post there to ask for updated prices

[snappd]

Thanks Glen
I have had a look at my colour settings & it seems I must have changed it back to sRGB at some stage.... see below




I also noticed this.....



Shouldn't this be set to 'windows RGB' ??
I tried that link to DaveB's thread but it seems I don't have permission yet....not to worry I will PM him.

[Nnnnsic]

I would say that most laptop screens are high enough quality to be bothered about calibrating. In my experience, very few laptop displays are actually 16.7 million colour panels and as a result, you're calibrating off of a fake 16.2 panel. Even many of the Macbooks (and some Pros) have the same problem.

[DaveB]

You can (and possibly should) calibrate and profile a laptop display, but it's not something I'd recommend using for critical colour editing.

For instance, I do most of my work on my laptop and have its display calibrated/profiled, but when at my desk it's connected to a 24" LCD which is also calibrated/profiled. The laptop display doesn't have the same range of brightness, has only 64 shades each of red/green/blue, has a gloss finish, etc. I do my critical colour work on the external monitor, but by having the laptop display set properly also, it means that if I'm in the field and do some basic edits (e.g. in Lightroom) I'm not going to be totally off.

If you've got computers (Mac and/or Windows) that each have a single screen, you can use the Spyder2express ($145) to calibrate and profile all of them. If you have systems with multiple monitors and want to set them all so the colour/brightness/etc is identical (something that Windows XP makes nigh impossible: you usually have to choose one monitor and accept that the other will be "off") you should use something like the eyeOne Display v2 (price jumps up to ~$360), or one of the Spyder3 series. Again, for Mac and/or PC.
Some of the Spyder3 units will also allow you to calibrate/profile data projectors.
If you want to create your own printer profiles, there's a Spyder package that includes a spectrocolorimeter to measure the prints, or you can go cheap and get a ColorMunki for $650ish to do monitors/projectors/printers. The quality of the printer profiles won't be quite up to the quality of those produced with the more expensive gear, but it's good enough for some people, and convenient to have your own.

Whatever you do, you should try to calibrate all your machines (including the desktop) to remove major problems. Even if the monitor on the desktop isn't up to scratch for serious photo work, you should get it in the right ballpark!
If Photoshop can't find the profile that describes the current behaviour of the monitor (that profile is created during the calibration/profiling step) then any previews you try to do with proofing printer profiles, etc will be doomed. I'd keep your default RGB profile at AdobeRGB, have Photoshop "Preserve embedded profiles", and as a first step get your monitor(s) calibrated/profiled.

[soarer]

I'm having the same problem, I only have a laptop as my computer died about 2 months ago. Editing photos on the laptop the when i upload the photos onto flickr, the picture is very saturated... Now i just compensate and desaturate a bit just to be on the safe side. Are there any free calibration tools that anyone knows of?

[DaveB]

Are there any free calibration tools that anyone knows of?

If you're running OS X, have a look at SuperCal. Otherwise, no.

I only have a laptop as my computer died about 2 months ago.

Can't you connect an external monitor to the laptop?

[snappd]

Hi Dave

Thanks for the info....I think the best option for now would be to calibrate the PC (windows XP) & the laptop (vista).....then further down the track I will look at external monitors. I don't do any printing at home so would the 'spyder2express' be the best for my situation? taking into account that I will be adding the external monitor at some stage.

Also is there any specific type of monitor I should look for..... what do you guys use? & how do they connect to the laptop.....is it just a matter of getting a USB type connector?


Ta
Snappd

[ATJ]

I agree with Dave's comments. I use a laptop for all my work but for critical work it is connected to a calibrated LCD panel. I have calibrated the laptop LCD as well and switch to that profile when using only the laptop LCD (when on the road or in the field). I can notice a huge difference on the laptop LCD between when it is calibrated and when it is not. Even if it is not perfect, it is a darn sight better when it is calibrated.

[ATJ]

For instance, I do most of my work on my laptop and have its display calibrated/profiled, but when at my desk it's connected to a 24" LCD which is also calibrated/profiled. The laptop display doesn't have the same range of brightness, has only 64 shades each of red/green/blue, has a gloss finish, etc. I do my critical colour work on the external monitor, but by having the laptop display set properly also, it means that if I'm in the field and do some basic edits (e.g. in Lightroom) I'm not going to be totally off.

By the way, Dave, how can you tell Windows to use the default profile you just changed to without a reboot? I use my eye-one display 2 (which I bought from you) to create two profiles, one for the laptop LCD and one for the separate (and better) LCD. I have not found a way to switch the profiles (and make them active) without a reboot.

[DaveB]

There are two parts of the profile. The profile itself (which will be used by Photoshop et.al.) and the calibration data which is loaded into the graphics card.

Through the Display Properties dialog (or through the Color Control Panel applet: have you downloaded that from microsoft.com/prophoto ?) you can change which is the current display profile, but for that profile to be valid you need to load the matching calibration data into the graphics card.
After changing the current profile, just re-run the "LUT loader" program that the calibration software installed into the Startup folder.

[who]

Hi Dave

Wanting your advice here -- running a 2 screen setup under Vista Home Ultimate - laptop screen (Dell XPS M1530 - supposed to be an 8 bit screen - glossy finish - 1440x900 resolution LG Philips panel) + definate 8 bit 24" LCD (Dell 2407 WFP-HC).

Would like to calibrate both, but most work is done on the 24".

Has Vista fixed the XP calibration issue (one monitor only) you previously mentioned? I can hope

And what would be a good / the best calibration solution too for what I need - and price (via PM if preferred) - I'm not worried about printing.

Thanks a lot

[ATJ]

After changing the current profile, just re-run the "LUT loader" program that the calibration software installed into the Startup folder.

I assume it is this one?

"LogoCalibrationLoader" "C:\Program Files\GretagMacbeth\i1\Eye-One Match 3\CalibrationLoader\CalibrationLoader.exe"

Thanks

[stetner]

The other thing to consider is if you drive 2 monitors off of one card, ( probably depends on the card) the 'LUT' can only be loaded for one monitor, which means you cannot calibrate 2 different monitors side by side and get results that look good on both.

I fought with trying to calibrate 2 monitors with a spyder 3, until having the support people tell me about that.

I am now going to try calibrating one, then using apples built in tool to calibrate the other.

Doug