Community color calibration project
mod
This is something I’ve been thinking about doing for a while. Color correction seems often ignored by video game artists for one reason or another. It seems a large barrier to entry is simply not wanting to buy a color correction device.
This is where I come in. I have a Datacolor Spyder 4 Elite and am willing to loan it out to established members of the polycount community.
How it works:
* “Established members” is 100% subjective and up to me, initially I am going to stick with people I know on a more personal level, if it goes well this may be relaxed a bit.
** Fee may decrease as initial cost of device is paid off. I don’t intend to make a profit off of this/start a hardware rental service.
*** Limited to people living in the US, at least initially.
I provide no guarantees that the device works with your hardware. You must make sure you meet any technical requirements. http://spyder.datacolor.com/portfolio-view/spyder4pro/
Please feel free to ask any questions about the color correction device loaning project in this thread. Post general questions about color correction in this thread: http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=65367
This is where I come in. I have a Datacolor Spyder 4 Elite and am willing to loan it out to established members of the polycount community.
How it works:
- Established members* can post in this thread to request the device
- You will send me $15**, plus shipping cost(~$7-15 likely) via PayPal, I will send you an invoice and further payment information
- I will send the device via USPS*** with tracking, signature confirmation and insurance
- I will send you instructions for installing the software(namely the auth code), the software can be installed on multiple computers and works with multiple monitors per system.
- Within 14 days of receiving the device, you must return it via a shipping service that provides tracking and signature confirmation. You will be liable for any damage occurred in return shipping so insurance is recommended, USPS service is not required(UPS and FedEx are fine).
- If you damage or break the device you will be responsible for the net cost(initial cost minus current fees collected from previous users).
- You can request the device multiple times. Common recommendations state that you should recalibrate every few months. I’m not sure how necessary this is. First time users will get priority. If you plan on recalibrating often, you should probably buy your own instead.
* “Established members” is 100% subjective and up to me, initially I am going to stick with people I know on a more personal level, if it goes well this may be relaxed a bit.
** Fee may decrease as initial cost of device is paid off. I don’t intend to make a profit off of this/start a hardware rental service.
*** Limited to people living in the US, at least initially.
I provide no guarantees that the device works with your hardware. You must make sure you meet any technical requirements. http://spyder.datacolor.com/portfolio-view/spyder4pro/
Please feel free to ask any questions about the color correction device loaning project in this thread. Post general questions about color correction in this thread: http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=65367
Replies
the difference it makes is extremely noticeable especially if you have multiple displays. what i thought was white was apparently rather blue!
Yeah I noticed my displays all had a yellow tint to them. The extra tests you can run to check for color and tonal accuracies are really cool too.
Its magic, now I can pull reference images from my main monitor to my secondary and the colors match very well, even though my two monitors are different brands and my secondary has a lower quality panel.
i'm running a dell u2312, which is a 6-bit colour monitor, and a cintiq 22HD which is an 8-bit colour monitor. and i though i had them fairly close before i ran the calibrator haha.
i was so wrong
btw, when you said you noticed a yellow tint, do you mean before or after calibration?
Interesting stuff!
Yellow tint before, calibrated it looks very neutral, greys are grey, whites are white, etc.
I didn't find any concrete answers but I believe the biggest difference is support for multiple monitors on one system with the Elite model, which is really important IMO. The hardware for all of the models is the same, its just software features that differ I think.
i got the spyder 4 elite as well and so far i am not satisfied with the profiles it makes. as for monitor, i am using a dell U2410 with 10 bpc display. it also has a sRGB color mode built in and it does a pretty good job i think.
i am mainly concerned about color accuracy rather than conforming to sRGB space. so far, the profiles spyder made seems to be off in respect to RGB accuracy. sure it truncates the space to sRGB but at the cost of accuracy. even doing a color accuracy test confirms my suspicion.
i ended up using the generic sRGB profile and manually adjusting rgb signals and testing color accuracy again to make sure white is white and etc.
i am looking into getting the x-rite i1 display pro because as it turns out spyder is only a glorified profile maker while the x-rite is suppose to be able to adjust the monitor settings directly which seems like actual calibration if you ask me.
however, i also found some negative remarks about x-rite and not being very compatible for PCs.
this one seems to be more "professional" but at a high price tag:
http://www.basiccolor.de/basiccolor-discus-en/
speaking of wide gamut, i wish more people would start working in adobe RGB already. i know the reason behind using sRGB but most new digital displays are wide gamut and few years from now all displayes will be wide gamut.
I picked up an i1 Display Pro not long ago, and I'm incredibly happy with it. The only issue I ran in to was a missing .dll file with the original install from the disc, downloading the latest version of the software from their website fixed it and didn't take more than a minute. I also liked that there's no activation code to speak of, the software unlocks to the "full" version by simply plugging in the device. So on my wife's computer, I was able to just download the software from the website, plug in the device, and calibrate.
My wife's monitor had issues hitting the target values for luminance the first couple times it tried to auto-adjust the monitor settings - but I blame that on the monitor (it's a really...cheap, piece of crap 17 inch from...Wal Mart, I just wanted to test the colorimeter on another setup). I found out that the monitor was set to a "warm" temperature, rather than "user", and so the software wasn't able to auto adjust from that preset.
The device itself I couldn't be happier with.
that is good to hear, but what is your monitor ? is it wide gamut ?
Not sure, I've got a 2408wfp which is 8bit AFAIK, I haven't done any print work yet which is why I am concerned with color accuracy, but I noticed an immediate improvement on the 3 screens I used it on(8bit 2408wfp *VA, 6 bit IPS laptop and my secondary display, which is probably another 6bit screen, though it is *VA). I don't have any screens higher than 8bit.
Though I feel like the color accuracy test on the Dell tested out pretty high after calibration.
Yeah I had the same issue with my secondary screen too, a cheap asus PW201 or something, it just can't match the brightness of my Dell. Oh well, will probably be in the market for a new secondary screen soon, maybe just pick up another 2408.
My Gramps who is a photographer wants to buy a spyder and split the costs between the two of us, but my monitors are REALLY low end. At the time that I bought the first one, I wasn't doing any sort of art, I was playing games.
I recently got a second one for obvious reasons, but the thing is that these monitors have a very strong tint of blue to them, and I do not at all think they are accurate.
Would you suggest investing in a couple of new monitors or just buying a spyder and hoping for the best? Seriously though, these 2 monitors costed me like 300 bucks total... meanwhile its like 700 bucks for a nice IPS monitor. I don't wanna just slap a bandaid onto my problem, but then again I don't exactly have the money hahaha.
It is not, I picked up the i1 largely because it seemed a decent thing to go for in the event I decide to go that route in the future. Right now I'm using a relatively cheap Samsung SyncMaster SA300 series monitor (old, tried and true monitor died earlier this year at a bad time, but this one's not so bad - do wish I could've afforded an IPS panel though).
If I'm remembering correctly, the first step in the calibration process for the i1 was to choose your display type (ranging from standard LCD, RGB or White LED, wide gamut, etc).
This article, which was helpful to me while I was calibrating, seems to indicate that the i1 at least will not have any issues with wide gamut displays. I would imagine the Spyder 4 Elite to be in a similar position.
Color calibrating will likely improve your color, especially if you have a heavy blue shift or if you're seeing big differences between your two monitors.
However, I would suggest getting a better monitor(s) instead. The panel in your LG is a TN, which means poor color reproduction and poor viewing angles(color may differ drastically depending on how you view it).
You can get quality IPS Panels for less than $700 though.
Dell U2410 IPS 10 bit panel is about $500
Dell U2412M IPS(e-IPS?) 6 bit panel is about $370
Or a used/refurb Dell 2408wfp which is an S-PVA 8-bit panel, for under $300.
You can find a variety of other e-IPS panels too, most are 6-bit but still a very big improvement over a TN.
If you go down to 22" or 23" you can find some extremely affordable e-IPS panels too, though usually at 1080P instead of 1920x1200.
Panel types can get confusing but its basically(best to worst, for arts):
IPS (H-IPS, S-IPS, etc)
VA (MVA, S-PVA, etc)
e-IPS
.....
CRT
Litebrite
TN
Its awesome that you guys are doing this, best of luck!
Thanks for the advice! I wish I had some money to replace these, but I don't.
Better than nothing I suppose...
-The benefit is you wouldn't have to remail it every time someone needs it. That's gotta be a PITA to repackage every time, take time out of your day to go to UPS/FEDEX location.
-The disadvantage if its traded multiple times without your inspection, something might get damaged, and there wouldn't be one person to accept (or take) responsibility.
If you want to let a local friend use the calibrator that is fine, however I don't want other people dealing with shipping it(other than back to me of course). I considered this but decided against it, I really just want to have control over how its shipped and who its shipped to.
I ship things almost everyday for a secondary business that I run so shipping isn't an issue for me.
I considered having a system where one user ships it to the next user, but it seems like a logistical nightmare and I have no way to verify the thing still works etc. So I just don't feel good about doing it that way.
Would you be OK with me keeping an updated list(in the first post here) with a queue, your username and the city you live in? This way other local polycounters could see where it is and get in contact with you in person to use it. Of course people could "opt out" if they didn't want to deal with that as well and actually responding to people would be up to your discretion as well.
^Yea It Is better the way you have It now, It will be a butt load of his said she said if somehow they made a boo,boo. Nice idea, managed to (temporarily) sort out my color issues in the meantime, though I do see the 2nd monitor is more white/blue slightly desaturated but they match up and I use the Adobe profiles for both monitors and Adobe photoshop, still don't feel so comfortable but I got to make due with what I got.
Hope this works out in a good way after all though will help a bunch of people out I'm sure.
Is it a recommended practice to calibrate a monitor even if its new? I just purchased a Dell U2713HM and I'm wondering whether to look into a colorimeter to guarantee my colours match the standards of my clients. Am I over thinking this?
Any advice is greatly appreciated.
this,
i just got the 2713, out of the box it was extremely close but because i have two other monitors i had to calibrate them all so they match each other. right out of the box you probably won't notice much difference (if any) as they factory calibrate the 2713 range to sRGB, but over time it could slip so definitely look at getting a colorimete at some point.
What colorimeter did you decide on? I'm leaning towards the i1Display Pro. I'd like to keep using my old monitor (22" Samsung SyncMaster225aw) till it completely dies, and I have a 12" Cintique. It would be nice if all three match like you mentioned.
i have a dell 2713, 2312, and a cintiq 22hd all calibrated together. the spyder (elite) software has a multi-monitor calibrator built in. not sure about the model you're looking at, sorry!
So Spyder 4 is out, and they have an elite and pro version. The Pro only lets you set colour temperatures of 5000K, 5800K, 6500K.
gamma of 1.8, 2.0, 2.2, 2.4
/w no custom Luminance control (Is this a big deal?)
and can do multiple monitors.
The difference between the Elite and Pro is $80. Can I get away /w the pro version, or should I bite the bullet? What pushed you into buying your Spyder3Elite? (Sorry for all the questions)