Test Card.

MScotts

MScotts

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Could someone point me to a link that displays a colour and greyscale test-card so I can calibrate the monitor prior to processing my latest batch of images.

Ta, Andy :thumbs:
 
Type "test card" into google images and there are loads of them :)
 
Cheers... I found a few earlier, but thought there might be some suggestions on here that sort the wheat from the chaff (and with google, you do get a lot of the latter :lol:
 
I think virtual photographer used to have a good one on their site, don't know if it's still going.
 
How do you go about using one to calibrate the screen?
 
The idea of using a reference image to calibrate your monitor is a simple one. You simply adjust the brightness and colour of the monitor until it matches the print. Then in theory the screen should match subsequent prints.

Unfortunately this only works to a limited extent and can have pitfalls. Unless you are very skillful, and I'm not, you wont be able to match the contrast of each channel. You usually end up with a compromise. This can result in some what unpredictable results.

Generally you can get a reasonable match for brightness and white point. Contrast is a bit trickier, but can be done . ( I did this many years ago with Windows NT, an OS that had no colour management at all. The results were , shall we say variable. ).

If you really want to calibrate your monitor, and you want to ensure good print matching then you really need a device such as the Huey. This is really the only way to accurately calibrate and maintain that calibration. OK the Huey is £60-£70. but it does save one hell of a lot of grief
 
Good idea - I just went for a stroll, and found:

1) http://www.reeddesign.co.uk/testcard.htm

2) Via 'http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1A.html#TestPrint':
"A good test image is useful for evaluating your monitor's quality and calibration as well as the match between the monitor and printer. I found a nice image on The Digital Dog's website. Go to http://www.digitaldog.net/tips/index.shtml and shift-click or right-click on Printer Test File. Winzip (or a similar utility) must be installed on your system to turn this file, whose default name is Printer Test file.jpg.zip, into a JPEG. The 1600x2000 pixel image, shown greatly reduced on the right, includes a portrait with good skin tones, color and grayscale step charts, and the Gretag Macbeth® ColorChecker color rendition chart. (Bruce Lindbloom hasColorChecker RGB values for various color spaces-- sRGB, Adobe 1998, etc.; Babelcolor (Danny Pascale) has an outstanding description of the ColorChecker.) While you're at Digital Dog's site, check out his many excellent articles and tutorials."

I've calibrated based on these, although I've no idea how accurate they are...
 
Chappers said:
Unfortunately this only works to a limited extent and can have pitfalls............
Click to expand...

That and your other post detail are very true mate. But using one from the suggestion(s) above) has got to be better than leaving your monitor (or lappy screen) 'as-is', which is likely to be well off the mark in comparison

Andy :)
 
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