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LCD Calibration
- Thread starter ern
- Start date
I have the Dell 2408WFP A02.
I play World of Warcraft, Battlefield Heroes right now.
I dont want to get to crazy with the price as it seems like an item that doesnt get used very often. Can it be used for LCD Televisions?
Definitely no 300 dollar mark. Around 50-150 tops I guess, unless other reasons can justify the price increase.
I play World of Warcraft, Battlefield Heroes right now.
I dont want to get to crazy with the price as it seems like an item that doesnt get used very often. Can it be used for LCD Televisions?
Definitely no 300 dollar mark. Around 50-150 tops I guess, unless other reasons can justify the price increase.
Gaming doesn't usually require color sensitivity in my experience. If I see something purple and I know purple things hurt me, I shoot the purple thing. The only problem I have is when I go to someone else's monitor and that purple thing is suddenly yellow, I have to relearn that yellow things hurt me. Does what shade of yellow or purple matter? Something to ask yourself a bit, not to be harsh.
Color calibration usually matters when doing things that are color sensitive, like video editing, image editing... but some can justify it for watching movies and browsing the web if they want to know what colors they are supposed to see (and to know if they have wide gamut and if there's over saturation and all that good crazy stuff). If you plan on going into this kind of thing, save up for a good one.
If you know all of this already, then feel free to completely ignore this post! =)
Color calibration usually matters when doing things that are color sensitive, like video editing, image editing... but some can justify it for watching movies and browsing the web if they want to know what colors they are supposed to see (and to know if they have wide gamut and if there's over saturation and all that good crazy stuff). If you plan on going into this kind of thing, save up for a good one.
If you know all of this already, then feel free to completely ignore this post! =)
Ooo, learn something everyday. Why not?
Games do not generally follow color space standard such as HDTV - REC 709 so calibration may not be useful...
I would got with the X-Rite Eye-One Display LT which can be had for $140 at Amazon.
Unfortunately, the Spyder 2 & 3 are known for having quality issues.
The best option is the X-Rite Eye-One Display 2 but it may be an overkill for most.
http://www.curtpalme.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10457
I would got with the X-Rite Eye-One Display LT which can be had for $140 at Amazon.
Unfortunately, the Spyder 2 & 3 are known for having quality issues.
The best option is the X-Rite Eye-One Display 2 but it may be an overkill for most.
http://www.curtpalme.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10457
Two parts to calibration.
1: correct gamma curve:
Most games reset the gamma curve when they start.
2: Create profile:
Vast majority of games don't read color profiles.
Most movie (all?) viewers aren't color aware and will not correct your wide gamut oversaturation.
Basically I don't think you will get much benefit if games/movies are your main usages.
Games/movies will likely show no effect because they don't read profiles so won't adjust for color gamut.
Movies will likely support gamma curve correction though, but it won't correct oversaturation from wide gamut.
Games will likely turf your gamma correction and ignore your profile meaning calibration will have no effect at all.
Currently if you don't like over saturated colors, avoid wide gamut panels. Calibration doesn't work with most software.
Mac OSx is completely color managed. Windows games "throw out" any calibration color lookup adjustments loaded into the video card prior to playing the game.
Only Monitor Calibration wizard and Powerstrip can preserve LUT calibrations in games, but not gamut transformation, so the color is more accurate, but still too oversaturated.
There's a special version of Media Player Classic that can be set to support wide gamuts better:
http://mpc-hc.sourceforge.net/
This is your best bet to achieving non-oversaturated videos using MPC HC:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=912720
There are usually a few parameters you select in calibrating a monitor with a software/hardware package:
1) White point "temperature" in Kelvin. Generally 6500K or D65 is the standard unless you require a special white point for print work or other specialized uses. The first step to calibrating is selecting the white point, and then you use the "Custom RGB" mode on this monitor and change the red, green, blue values to achieve the target white point prior to profiling
2) Target brightness in cd/m2 (candela/meter squared). You use the brightness control to achieve the target brightness as close as possible. 120 to 140 cdm/2 for white level are most common settings
3) Gamma value. sRGB or 2.2 gamma are most common unless, again, you require a custom use for print or specialized photography or video work.
Once these values are adjusted manually based on what the software tells you, then the software will take current measurements of red, green, blue levels by flashing different color combinations in a circle or box UNDER the colorimeter's sensor window, and then produces gamma adjustments that help the monitor more closely match your target values. It will, in some cases also alter the brightness of white, but it's best to get as close as possible with the monitor controls as this needlessly can rob contrast.
The best, inexpensive colorimeter is the Eye One Display 2. It can handle wide gamut monitors, like the 2408WFP, and is very good at detecting low black levels. Both of these characteristics are not as well implemented in the Spyder 2/3 sensor/colorimeters.
Hope that helps.
Often when the game loads up and sets 3D mode, it blows away the gamma LUT in the videocard and replaces it with its own.
This is more the "profiling" side than the "calibration" side.
Calibration will help you set your whitepoint, colour temperature, blackpoint, etc... A lot of these things really aren't all that adjustable on LCDs.
Even when you set the colour temperature of your whitepoint, you'll find that most displays don't gamma track each channel through the range of brightness. This means that your monitor may display a perfect white, but as the intensity reduces the greys might get pink or blue.
This is where LUT correction comes in to correct the whole gamma curve. Per-channel RGB LUT values are loaded into the video card (the same way you can adjust the gamma tracking from the control panel) to perform the correction. Most 3D apps will discard and replace this data.
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The preceeding folks probably have more calibration knowledge in their pinky than I do in my entire body... but I thought I'd share my recent experiences and frustrations on the subject.
I have a Dell 3007WFP-HC and I wanted to calibrate it. I wasn't too worried about the colors, though surely I'd like for them to look as good as possible. For me the brightness of the monitor just wasn't good enough. Even at max, I would find my games looked way too dark. I could barely see the grey backgrounds on the posts in this forum as well.
I bought the Spyder2Express since my manual tweaks hadn't really produced the results I want. Sadly I was pretty disappointed with this piece of hardware on my monitor since it seem to calibrate it to be even darker. After trying all sorts of things with the lighting in the room to try to trick the Spyder to make the monitor brighter, I gave up on it.
I could increase the gamma via the drivers. However this only worked on the desktop, but seemed to get wiped away when a game loaded.
I finally found two things that seemed to work. ATI Tray Tools, I can create color/gamma profiles and apply these to games. I can even setup different profiles for different games. And it works great. Another thing I found is the Windows 7 monitor calibration in display properties actually also seems to work in games, so I am able to adjust settings here and have them stick too.
I have a Dell 3007WFP-HC and I wanted to calibrate it. I wasn't too worried about the colors, though surely I'd like for them to look as good as possible. For me the brightness of the monitor just wasn't good enough. Even at max, I would find my games looked way too dark. I could barely see the grey backgrounds on the posts in this forum as well.
I bought the Spyder2Express since my manual tweaks hadn't really produced the results I want. Sadly I was pretty disappointed with this piece of hardware on my monitor since it seem to calibrate it to be even darker. After trying all sorts of things with the lighting in the room to try to trick the Spyder to make the monitor brighter, I gave up on it.
I could increase the gamma via the drivers. However this only worked on the desktop, but seemed to get wiped away when a game loaded.
I finally found two things that seemed to work. ATI Tray Tools, I can create color/gamma profiles and apply these to games. I can even setup different profiles for different games. And it works great. Another thing I found is the Windows 7 monitor calibration in display properties actually also seems to work in games, so I am able to adjust settings here and have them stick too.
Yoshiyuki Blade
2[H]4U
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- Aug 17, 2005
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- 2,881
That kinda defeats the purpose of monitor calibration, doesn't it?
Yoshiyuki Blade
2[H]4U
- Joined
- Aug 17, 2005
- Messages
- 2,881
I see... so it was defective?
No. In fairness to the Spyder2Express, it did say it wasn't for wide gamut monitors. But for the price I figured it was worth a shot.
And my monitor also has some anti glare coating on it that I think messes with the Spyder2Express calibration too.