Monitor Calibration for photos made (sort of) easy

[ConsAreLiars]

Maybe others can suggest other help pages that they find useful.

Since the impact of a photograph depends on seeing the full ranges of colors and the details in the shadow and highlight areas fairly accurately, re-adjusting your monitor might helpful.

There are gadgets and programs selling for $100.00 and up (way up) to help with this task, but I found the links below helpful in getting my two old monitors (one old and crappy, the other twice as old but better) adjusted well enough that what I see on a scan is now pretty close to what I see in the slide.

Below are two pages that cover the subject and give advice on how to adjust your monitor. The author begins each section at an introductory level, but continues on with a lot of more technical info. Just skip any parts that are obscure. The first thing to do is to just scan through the pages and look at the test images, download the other test images he mentions, look at them, see how they look. He offers some advice on what to look for and how to make the needed adjustments. If you experiment with the settings, scroll through the contest photos and see what kinds of difference they make.

http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1A.html

http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1B.html

[Princess Turandot]

1. Thanks for the links..

I don't have a monitor which works well for photography and I'm constantly frustrated by the difference between the screen and printed image, not to mention the difference between the actual subject and the image on the screen. Other than the adobe simplistic thing, I've pretty much given up on the monitor and use the printer functions to address the most likely outcome, such as more magenta in the print than on the monitor.

[ConsAreLiars]

2. Even my Crappo Special monitor

(Sylvania's cheapest) now does reasonably adequate work after using those tools. That said, the 10 year old low end NEC is not bad at all, and there seems to be no way to get the Sylvania to match the NEC. Sometimes "tweaking" is not enough. Still, if you have the time, you might find some improvement.

[regnaD kciN]

3. Even aside from that specific tutorial...

...that web site has some fascinating information. The Tonal Quality and Dynamic Range in Digital Cameras is invaluable.

[ConsAreLiars]

4. Check out his gallery

This is a guy with both hemispheres working quite well. A scientist and an artist. http://www.normankoren.com/index.html

I heard about his tutorials a few years ago and used his introductory and scanner tutorials to help get me started, and then after I settled on Picture Window Pro (PWP) for processing I was have looked through those sections a bit.

Rumor has it he is working on a book, which for me would be easier to read and use than web pages.

I'm still at the trial and error stage, trying get used to the most basic steps. As I muddle along, I find reading his site helps me figure out a bit more of what I am trying to do.

Another kindred spirit is the author of PWP who has put up a number of white papers. They do have PWP "how-to" tips in them, some more than others, but most are are very helpful in understanding how things work in general, since most of the PWP "how-to" stuff in in a separate manual. To see the white papers, click the "articles" tab on the main page http://www.dl-c.com/