Spyder3express

[surenj]

For you boys who have been thinking about calibrating their monitor and never doing it, I can't recommend the spyder3express enough.

It calibrates a single monitor in about 15 minutes or so. The software is simple and easy to use.

I haven't printed any photos yet so I can't really compare, but I can be happy that I can [hoping to] get fairly uniform results in the future. It makes me less anxious about printing on canvas etc... I think the $135 is well worthwhile.

The caveat with the 'express' version is that it can't calibrate a dual monitor setup.

[muzz]

I've gone to buy this from two different retailers and as I have an iMac, both have talked me out of it - they both said it is a waste of time on the iMac. One tried to sell me an Eizo monitor instead.

Has anyone had any success using calibration tools like this on an iMac?

[Murray Foote]

I don't use a Mac so I can't make any comments from experience. However, it's always possible they don't know what they are talking about. I have heard that ColorSynch (I think that's the right word) on the Mac gives a default colour interpretation that is better than the PC. They may be referring to that. However, one of my calibrating systems (Coloreyes Pro) is actually more of a Mac system that a PC system (the PC updates lag quite a way behind the Mac updates). I don't think too many Commercial Photographers would say that you don't need to calibrate a Mac.

[Murray Foote]

Surenj

Does your Spyder3 Express allow you to set brightness? If I recall correctly, some of the cheaper packages in the past didn't allow this. If so, you'll need to set it manually. Too bright a monitor (which may still look OK) results in prints that are too dark.

[Mr Darcy]

Has anyone had any success using calibration tools like this on an iMac?

I tried an original EyeOne on my iMac when I first got it. I quickly abandoned it as the results were far worse than the default settings. I have since found out that this is because I need a Wide Gamut calibration system like the Spyder3.
I can't afford one at the moment, so i make do with the uncalibrated monitor. Like Murray though, I am sure professionals would always use one. I know DaveB does. And I will too when that mythical boat comes in.

[Andyt]

I've gone to buy this from two different retailers and as I have an iMac, both have talked me out of it - they both said it is a waste of time on the iMac. One tried to sell me an Eizo monitor instead.

Has anyone had any success using calibration tools like this on an iMac?

Having recently changed to Mac (27" iMac) from PC, and using the Spyder 3 Elite on both, for me the results are more than worth it, without issues or problems. Highly Recommended

Muzz, Stu at http://www.qualitycamera.com.au/colorvision-spyder3-elite-p-3675.html has these.

Job for today, even though my Mac Book Pro's screen is the best I have seen on a note book, I will calibrate it as well!
I know its a few $'s, but it is well worth it.

Cheers, Andy

[Murray Foote]

Notebooks have come on in leaps and bounds in the last year or so. I have a Sony that profiles at about 90% of aRGB. Their limitation, though is that they all have TN rather than IPS screens so there is always some variance with angle which makes accuracy more difficult.

Regards,
Murray

[muzz]

Thanks Andy,

I've been told that the puck is the same in both versions but the Elite software is different. A Colormunki was suggested as an alternative though. If I thought the Express would do it I'd probably have a go but the extra for the Elite makes it a low priority financially for me.

I did find this link though which I may have to look at.

[surenj]

Does your Spyder3 Express allow you to set brightness?

I think it's fixed at Gamma 2.2 ?? I am not sure. But I do know that the gamma is fixed however. Whether that's the brightness I am not sure.

I got some info from this site before I made the decision. I emailed the owner for some info as well.
http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/reviews/profiling/spyder3pro.html

Scroll to the bottom of the page to see the comparison. BTW the Spyder3pro is only $200 which is peanuts if you print often and want accurate skin tones etc.

[Murray Foote]

No, Gamma is not the same as brightness (or luminance). I'm not sure I understand it well or can explain it well. It has to do with the standard way colours and tonalities are compressed and can be represented in a curve. For PCs a Gamma of 2.2 is normal and Macs are coming around to that.

LCD monitors are usually much brighter when purchased than is required for photographic use. They may be say 200 cd/m2 (candelas per square metre) whereas for accurate prints you would want them to be about 120cd/m2 or even a bit lower. It makes life easier if you can profile to that. What you can actually set your monitor to and still get a good profile can vary with the model of monitor and even its age.

I'm not sure where brightness fits into the list in the Northlight Images review, maybe "Custom B/W Luminance Control". Better profiling software (I suspect this doesn't apply to the Spyder3 Express) also gives you empirical measures of how well your profile went. This can be useful so you can try different options and see which one works best, or potentially so you can see when your (now older) monitor is drifting away from being profilable into the cactus zone.

In any case, the difference is only in software and if you later decide you want to upgrade you should be able to upgrade just the software. You can also probably download the manual for the full software so you can more fully understand the difference. If so, you need to retain perspective. Calibrating and Profiling should be fairly simple in practice. It takes some study to start with especially but as with many things it's also possible to make it more complex than it needs to be.

[photohiker]

I've had an 'Eye-One display 2' for a while (what kind of peanut invents names like that?)

It uses Gretag Macbeth 'Eye-One Match 3' software on Mac and PC. (same peanut, apparently).

Anyway, the system works just fine for all the PC's and Macs at home, it's definitely worth doing, and works for dual monitor setups without any dramas, and on first use, brings them noticeably closer together in terms of colour.

Gamma 2.2 is where it's at, and no, that is not brightness. Macs used Gamma 1.8 for a long time, but have recently caved in and adopted 2.2 so there is at least one thing they do the same now

The system has an optional step to measure the ambient light for intensity and colour temp which may inspire you to control the light in your workspace once you realise how far away from ideal spec it is.

Don't know if the Spyder3 is superior, be nice if it was, hopefully competition will drive quality up and prices down...

Michael

[photohiker]

LCD monitors are usually much brighter when purchased than is required for photographic use. They may be say 200 cd/m2 (candelas per square metre) whereas for accurate prints you would want them to be about 120cd/m2 or even a bit lower. It makes life easier if you can profile to that. What you can actually set your monitor to and still get a good profile can vary with the model of monitor and even its age.

Quoted for truth.

I bought a new Dell U2410 S-IPS display recently. Out of the box, the colour was not convincing, and the brightness was literally off the scale. Using the monitor on-screen brightness control, the scale of which is 1-100, and 50 being default, a setting of 1 still delivered somewhat more than 120cd/m2, but close enough. My 3 year old NEC 2090uxi struggles to reach 120, but the colour on that is still very good.

Michael

[DaveB]

The newer iMac screens are wide-gamut monitors, and the older Spyder2 calibrators (and the i1 Display2) struggle with these. But the Spyder3 and ColorMunki devices are fine.

However, the software functionality in the various packages is the big difference.

The Spyder3express software doesn't let you select colour temperature (set to 6500K, which is fine), gamma (2.2, again this is fine) or luminance (hmmm). With a new iMac you can probably turn the brightness down to minimum and just cope with that. It might still be brighter than optimal, but it'll be better than being at full brightness (and your monitor will last longer too!).
Turn the brightness down, then run the Spyder3express calibration/profiling.

The Spyder3pro (hmmm, Stu has good prices on these!) is the starting point I recommend for my students. It gives you some choice of these settings, including being able to target a specific luminance (and/or report what it actually achieved). It will also cope with systems with multiple monitors (the express software just does a single monitor).

The elite software adds things like projector calibration as well as more choices in colour/brightness/etc (which can be important when trying to achieve "excellent" matching of multiple monitors, although the capabilities of the "pro" software are OK for most people).

The ColorEyes Display software can be used with some of these devices, and does a fantastic job even with multiple monitors.

The ColorMunki device is excellent (it's actually a full spectrophotometer rather than just a colorimeter like the Spyder). It can be used for printer profiles, projectors, as well as "just" monitors. But its software isn't quite as flexible as I would like. For example it doesn't offer a facility to guide you through adjusting the internal RGB balance of the monitor (which is a useful and effective calibration step on a display such as the Dell U2410). It does a good job on these screens, it's mainly just that if it had a couple of extra features it could do a "fantastic" job.

Does this help?
I'm currently using a Dell U2410 monitor (love it!) and I used an Eye-One Display2 to fine-tune the colour balance in the monitor, then use the ColorMunki to do the profiling work. I also have a Spyder3elite and an Eye-One Pro in the shop, but the ColorMunki's doing a great job.