Optimum settings for Monitor Calibration

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Orinocco

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Hi there.

I hope I have posted this in the correct place. If not my apologies, and I trust the site admin will feel free to move this as they deem appropriate.

I am just starting out in the whole RAW Processing world, so as I want to do things properly, I have just purchased the i1 Display Pro Calibration kit.

I wonder if anyone can help me with the optimum Display Settings when running this piece of kit when calibrating a Dell SP2309W monitor. As is usual for all things Dell the documentation what little there is of it tells me pretty much nothing and is more or less useless. I have had a search on line and couldn’t find much on the web either.

First off the i1 Display Pro asks for the Type of monitor. Options are: CCFL, Wide Gamut CCFL, White LED and RGB LED. From what I picked up on line I get the impression (though I could be wrong) that my monitor is a CCFL type. What I have no idea about is whether it is wide gamut or not.

It next asks you for a White Point setting. Options are: CIE iluminants: D50, D55, D65 & D75 or Native, Daylight Temperature, x-y or Measure.

Finally it asks for Contrast Ratio. Advice I have read says to set this to Native, which I plan to unless advised otherwise.

If anyone on here could give me some advice or pointers I would be most grateful. My apologies if my droning on has bored you to tears as well!
 
I'd go with CCFL for monitor type. Not Wide gamut .Set your white point to D65 initially unless you have a good reason to change. My contrast ratio is set to native, which seems to work well, although I must get round to doing some tests. Some suggestions say 300 is better for prints. I've yet to test this.

On the next page you will need to set illumination levels. You need to know what levels work well within your environment. Use the default 120 Cd/M2 for a start. Leave the gamma set to 2.2 .

Calibration is best done in subdued lighting so as not to affect the readings.
 
CCFL (not wide gamut) for your monitor.
D65
120Cd/M2 luminance.
2.2 gamma.

That's kind of a default go to industry standard.


It should profile well, but it's only a 6bit TN panel... don't expect miracles.
 
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Hi

I've been away these last two weeks hence my delay in getting back on here. Many thanks to you both for taking the trouble to help me out. I really appreciate it.

I realised following the research I did on the web before turning to you for advice that my monitor is really primarily designed for gaming rather than processing photographs. As a result I will be taking your advice about not expecting miracles Pookyhead.

As a matter of interest can either of you recommend a monitor that is good for photo processing and won't break the bank?
 
Orinocco said:
Hi

I've been away these last two weeks hence my delay in getting back on here. Many thanks to you both for taking the trouble to help me out. I really appreciate it.

I realised following the research I did on the web before turning to you for advice that my monitor is really primarily designed for gaming rather than processing photographs. As a result I will be taking your advice about not expecting miracles Pookyhead.

As a matter of interest can either of you recommend a monitor that is good for photo processing and won't break the bank?
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Dell
 
Dell U2412M - £175 (IPS)
Dell S440L - £181 (VA)

That will leave you enough cash to get a calibrator as well. I recommend the X-Rite i1 Display Pro.
 
To be more specific said:
23 inch upwards and between £300 - £500. I am no pro so not looking for a pro rig and fully realise that would be way outside this budget. I do know that you get what you pay for though and If I'm going to spend money to replace the monitor I've got, then I might as well buy a good one.

Any advice will be gratefully received.
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Dell U2413 + X-Rite i1 Display Pro.

In your price range NOTHING will touch that combo. The U2413 actually needs that calibrator to be hardware calibrated, so as far as I'm concerned you shouldn't really buy one without the other.

If you have another brand of calibrator already, then you can software calibrate it just like you may have been doing already, but hardware calibration is worth the effort as you're calibrating at a 14bit level.
 
Pookeyhead said:
Dell U2413 + X-Rite i1 Display Pro.

In your price range NOTHING will touch that combo. The U2413 actually needs that calibrator to be hardware calibrated, so as far as I'm concerned you shouldn't really buy one without the other.
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This is a serious question (as I'm genuinely interested in the answer).

I believe you have monitors that are h/w calibratable. Have you ever tried calibrating a monitor by software only then doing it with the same calibrator but in hardware? I'm interested in the perceived differences you get....
 
I've already got the X-Rite i1 Display Pro so that's a good start! I'm drooling over the Dell u2713h as well. What's your take on this monitor? If it's any good I reckon I could stretch to an extra thirteen quid!
 
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arad85 said:
This is a serious question (as I'm genuinely interested in the answer).

I believe you have monitors that are h/w calibratable. Have you ever tried calibrating a monitor by software only then doing it with the same calibrator but in hardware? I'm interested in the perceived differences you get....
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In terms of colour accuracy, there's not a massive amount in it. The biggest difference is in tonal qualities. Whenever you software calibrate a monitor, you're actually introducing a great deal of crap you don't want, mainly banding and artefacts in subtle tones. This is because the vast majority of computers have a 8bit output (256 levels of red green and blue). When you alter the video cards gamma response, because the histogram is effectively already full, there's nowhere to put the new information, so basically, bits get cut out.

With hardware calibration at 12bit or higher, you can expand the histogram of anything well beyond what the video card is outputting, as all the alterations happen in the monitor, not the video card, and gamma curves are translated beautifully smooth with no bits missing. Gradients are perfect, and tonal responses in fine artwork perfectly rendered.

Another advantage is that the calibration happens independently of the video card so things like upgrading video card drivers, or reformatting the machine will not affect the screens calibration.



Orinocco said:
I've already got the X-Rite i1 Display Pro so that's a good start! I'm drooling over the Dell u2713h as well. What's your take on this monitor? If it's any good I reckon I could stretch to an extra thirteen quid!
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Where have you seen it £13 more than the U2413? That's very cheap! You sure that includes VAT, shipping etc?
Are you sure you're not looking at the U2713H? There's a BIG difference between the H and HM versions. The HM version is narrow gamut, white LED backlit, whereas the H is true RGB LED backlit, and has a 99% Adobe RGB gamut.

The U2713HM does NOT support hardware calibration!!! Only the U2713H does.
 
Pookeyhead said:
Where have you seen it £13 more than the U2413? That's very cheap! You sure that includes VAT, shipping etc?
Are you sure you're not looking at the U2713H? There's a BIG difference between the H and HM versions. The HM version is narrow gamut, white LED backlit, whereas the H is true RGB LED backlit, and has a 99% Adobe RGB gamut.

The U2713HM does NOT support hardware calibration!!! Only the U2713H does.
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Sorry Pookyhead I should have made myself clearer there. I meant the U2713H which I have seen for sale at £513. That's thirteen quid over my budget. My apologies for the misunderstanding and for not being more precise :bonk:
 
Pookeyhead said:
The biggest difference is in tonal qualities.
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Yup.. that makes sense. You have 16 million colours displayed with h/w calibration as you are matching (0, 0, 0) to black in the monitor rather than matching it to black by mapping the colour outputs. If you profile the the monitor by using the card then you are effectively cutting down on the number of steps you can display properly.

BTW: with digital outputs, you don't need to recalibrate if you change cards. 128, 128, 128 is the same whether it comes from an Nvidia 770 or Radeon 4650. The mapping applied (128.128,128) -> (x, y, z) is common to all cards so the profile goes with the monitor not the card.
 
arad85 said:
BTW: with digital outputs, you don't need to recalibrate if you change cards. 128, 128, 128 is the same whether it comes from an Nvidia 770 or Radeon 4650. The mapping applied (128.128,128) -> (x, y, z) is common to all cards so the profile goes with the monitor not the card.
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With Win7 and 8 and NVidia cards (Can't say whether this is true for the red team) replacing the old driver with a new one, and ticking the box to completely remove the old driver (which is best practice) seems to replace the default colour settings in windows. Probably because as the old drivers are removed, there is a short period during the process when your system is running with no drivers installed at all. Your old ICM profile is still there, but it's no longer the default colour profile. Not a massive issue, but unless you realise that can happen, you may think you're profiled, but you're not. If your default settings weren't that for out, it may not be visibly noticeable at first.

Orinocco said:
Sorry Pookyhead I should have made myself clearer there. I meant the U2713H which I have seen for sale at £513. That's thirteen quid over my budget. My apologies for the misunderstanding and for not being more precise :bonk:
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Does that budget include the i1 Display Pro though? No hardware calibration without that.

[edit]

Sorry... just seen you already have it.. then yeah... go for it. So long as it's the H and not HM... yep!
 
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Pookeyhead said:
With Win7 and 8 and NVidia cards (Can't say whether this is true for the red team) replacing the old driver with a new one, and ticking the box to completely remove the old driver (which is best practice) seems to replace the default colour settings in windows. Probably because as the old drivers are removed, there is a short period during the process when your system is running with no drivers installed at all. Your old ICM profile is still there, but it's no longer the default colour profile. Not a massive issue, but unless you realise that can happen, you may think you're profiled, but you're not. If your default settings weren't that for out, it may not be visibly noticeable at first.
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Ahh - yes, if you don't know what you're doing....

I use Argyll and dispcalGUI to load the profiles on my monitors. i1 Display Pro coming tomorrow (to replace the i1D2).
 
You'll love the i1 Display Pro. The software is great. The only reason I stopped using it is because I need ColorNavigator to hardware profile the Eizo. (well technically there are ways around it... but I like ColorNavigator too).


Don't use the ambient light levels feature... it sucks. You shouldn't have software adjusting luminance any way. It should be set statically, and you should control your environment if it's a dedicated space you work in.
 
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Well my shiny new U2713H came today and I'm already in love with it. The difference in quality compared to my old monitor is very very noticeable. I just looked at something using the old monitor on another computer and thought yuk! I am really pleased I went with your advice.

With regards calibrating using the Colour Calibration Solution, which colour space do you recommend using? I'm presuming your selection determines the Luminance setting with the option to overwrite it, is this correct?
 
I'd profile the screen in Adobe RGB1998 setting in the Dell software to make use of the wide gamut.

As for other settings:

luminance = 120cd/m2
gamma = 2.2
blackpoint/black level = as low as poss, or 0
white point = 6500K or D65 (same thing)

If non of the presets are that... create a custom one.
 
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