Re: Monitor calibration

[Dave King <kingphoto@mindspring.com>]

Michael,

Liked your post on matters archival.  

Here's my two bits on your questions.  Use 6500 as the color temp for now,
and keep in mind that many color imaging pros use 5000 calibrated monitors
and 5000K viewing light to judge the prints in.  That will seem like an
incredibly warm screen image to you after looking at a 9300 screen, but
many feel it provides a more accurate representation of a reflective page.
And the eye does adjust to it quickly.  Trying to get good printed results
in a room with bright non-daylight balanced florescents may be tough.  You
may want to do most of your imaging work in an environment where the
ambient light can be dimmed a bit.  Use the default phosphers.  With Win 95
you're probably better off (for now anyway) using the sRGB setting for your
monitor.  It's the industry standard default setting for non-color managed
PC's, and you're likely to get a better screen to print match this way.
But there are color (working) spaces that are capable of considerably
better results (wider color gamut) in a fully color managed system, Adobe
RGB 1998, for example.

This list is an excellent resource for many reasons.  You'll find links and
references here over a few months reading that will lead you to the
materials that will help you master a fairly complex process.  I suggest
Blatner and Frazier's Real World Photoshop 5 as the best overall tutorial
between two covers.

And if you find you want to move into desktop printing on a serious level,
consider upgrading the imaging workstation computer to a Win 2000 box (when
they become available), or a Mac.  I use a Dell PIII 500 with 512 megs ram,
22 gig HD, built in CD burner, and 19" Triniton Dell monitor which I
plunked down $3300 for about 6 months ago, this after fooling around with a
laptop with Win 95 and an Epson 600 for about a year.  Macs have a more
mature color management system, but windows boxes can be made to work, and
Win 2000 is by all reports better than 98.  You may run into frustrating
limits with 95, particulary if you want real color management in your system.

Whoops!  You did say you wanted to get into this slowly!  Good results can
be had fairly easily, it's that last 20% that gets complicated... Have fun,
and good luck!

Dave
 
At 09:23 AM 12/30/99 -0500, you wrote:
>OK, I'm trying to approach this color management thing slowly. Lots of
>messages I've saved, but it's still confusing, so I thought I'd ask slow and
>simple questions.<g> For the record, it's a PC with Win95 and I have Pshop
>5.02.
>
>First item is monitor calibration. I've used Adobe Gamma, but a couple of
>items I'm unclear about. Both my monitors (at home and at work) permit you
>to set the color temp at 9300K, 5000K, 6500K (on the one at work) and "user
>selectable." One monitor manual says they come at 9300 because that's the
>best color for use in offices with fluorescent lights (which I have at work
>but not at home). Any suggestions on the best choice? I used the default for
>a long time, but when I switched to the "daylight" color, the screen looks
>warm to me. Should I set the monitor to the temp of the available print
>viewing light?
>
>One other item in the Adobe Gamma setup asks for "phosphors." Nowhere in my
>monitor manuals does it tell me this. Gamma wants to default to P22EBU
>phosphors. Does this really matter?
>
>Finally, should I use the color management wizard in Pshop to set my monitor
>to sRGB?
>
>Thanks.
>
>--
>Michael Keller
>Old + New Media

-
Turn off HTML mail features. Keep quoted material short. Use accurate
subject lines. http://www.leben.com/lists for list instructions.