Ideal calibration settings?

[Eigengrau]

Hi there,

I just got a monitor calibrator (Huey PRO) and it did the job pretty quick and easy, but the problem is, the monitor looks a little warmer than I'm used to, so whites look reddish to me. To anybody familiar with this stuff:

Is this because monitors are typically adjusted to be eye-pleasing rather than accurate, and I need to get my eyes used to correct rather than showroom settings? Or, can I adjust from D65 to D75 because I find it more appealing, without killing my ability to see photos as they will print?

Also, gamma 2.4 looks nicer to me on the display, even though I know 2.2 is the standard. Is this going to screw up picture accuracy too?

If there are any decent reference websites, that would be awesome - most I've found are trying to sell me things. First priority is editing accuracy, although if it is at all possible I'd also like my display to "pop" while I'm at it.

Thanks in advance!

[Venturi]

Monitor calibration is more than just settings (temp and gamma) as I found out soon after getting my Spyder3Pro. The ambient light in the room your monitor sits affects things, and so does the monitor itself. I never could, and never will here, get my monitors calibrated to 6500 Kelvin & Gamma 2.2.

The first issue I had was the floor lamp at my corner of the office was one of those that only took special compact fluorescent bulbs; I've replaced that with one that takes good old fashioned soft white incandescent bulbs. The other issue was my monitors (dual SyncMaster 226BW), nice as they are, aren't bright and contrasty enough to overpower the ambient light. The Spyder software kept recommending 6500/2.2 but after doing a bit of reading up on calibration I started tweaking it back until I could reach the targets. The "correct" calibration for me ended up being a target of 5800 Kelvin & Gamma 1.8.

The finished calibration didn't look right to me either at first, but after a couple days it looked "normal" to me again. I also sent a few photos I had post processed afterwards out to be printed and they matched up to the display very well.

[Eigengrau]

I was thinking that maybe it would just take some getting used to.

What I'm trying to figure out is why the calibrator gives my 3 options after correcting the display - I've got D50, D65, and D75, and gamma 1.8-2.4. If I had to pick what looked best to me, I would say D75 and gamma 2.4. What the software defaulted to was D65 and 2.2. I'm wondering which is more accurate, because I thought the point of the exercise was that the software could tell what was accurate better than I, so why would it give options to tweak that afterward?

The huey does have an ambient light sensor that adjusts to available light at any given time, so hopefully that will help. We just installed halogen track lighting that seems pretty pleasant and neutral, with a little bit of that incandescent yellow. Hopefully that's good?

Where were you reading up, exactly - any helpful links?

[Jim Royal]

I would agree that it is usually a matter of getting used to it.

Some monitors come with a default setting of 9300K, which is as blue as a noon sky. Swtching them down to 6500K makes them look dingy yellow by comparison. But after a few days of staring at such a screen, it looks completely natural.

The issue with colour temperature and gamma is not accuracy, but appropriateness. 6500K and Gamma 2.2 are generally the best match for printing photos. If you were outputting to an entirely different medium -- say a baseball field video board -- then different monitor settings would be appropriate.

Adjusting colour accuracy is an issue for correcting any biases that are built into the display, as often happens. You want your greys to be neutral and the monitor's output of different shades to be even.

I use a Sypder3 Pro on an HLP 2475w display, and I think the results are pretty good. I also use halogen track lighting, although I'd prefer more indirect bounce lighting.

[Venturi]

Originally Posted by Eigengrau

Where were you reading up, exactly - any helpful links?

Unfortunately I didn't bookmark anything. I just started by googling "monitor calibration" and then went through various variations on the theme googling on any term I didn't quite understand - getting a coherent definition of "gamma" in proper context, for example, isn't as easy as it sounds and I'm still not 100% on it.

[Eigengrau]

Originally Posted by Jim Royal

The issue with colour temperature and gamma is not accuracy, but appropriateness. 6500K and Gamma 2.2 are generally the best match for printing photos. If you were outputting to an entirely different medium -- say a baseball field video board -- then different monitor settings would be appropriate.

Awesome - that's exactly what I was wondering. I wasn't sure if it corresponded to the conditions of the source material, or the expected output format - but that makes a lot of sense. It makes me want to calibrate the computers I use now at work, because the change back and forth kind of throws off my calibration.

[Eigengrau]

It does seem like there's a lack of reliable information out there - googling has been mostly unsuccessful for me so far.