I've always considered the color quite accurate but now I have some
minor doubts. My wife wanted to go shopping for tile for the kitchen
backsplash. She asked if I'd take a picture of the (predominantly) gray
quartz counter top (but also speckled throughout with bits of white,
black, tan, very pale yellow and browns). To her that meant I'd walk
in, take a shapshot in the kitchen and 5 minutes later produce a print
that you could lay on the counter and not be able to tell that it was
there. Then she'd know if the backsplash tile was right for the countertop.
I did indeed try something like that and disabused myself that it was a
simple task in about 3 minutes. Daylight was streaming in from the left
rear (patio sliding doors) and tungsten from above... ugly colors. I
decided that I needed to use flash and simply overpower the tungsten.
Overpowering the tungsten was easy. But the on-camera flash created a
huge reflection from the glossy quartz. Time to get the flash
off-camera... go find the Canon off-camera flash cord (which also works
with Oly) and get a seemingly good color image. Wait. I want to lay
this on the counter and not be able to see it. The pattern on the print
needs to be exactly the same size as the real pattern. Back to the
drawing board. Lay a ruler on the counter to measure off 7" to make a
5x7" print. Get out stepladder to get exactly the right distance for 7"
to exactly fill the frame. Take test shot. Hey, it looks great on the
screen. Now time to make a print. I've always assumed my HP printer
with HP ink and HP paper makes good and fairly accurate color. Well,
that ain't so... or is it? Seems I can't carry my 24" Dell flat screen
into the kitchen to actually compare the colors. Adjust color, make
print, adjust color, make print,.... etc. Some 13 prints later I had
one you could lay on the counter and you would have a hard time seeing it.
Believe me, this was not a scientific process. Try it sometime.
Chuck Norcutt
On 7/12/2015 11:37 AM, Bob Whitmire wrote:
If it looks good, and the same, before and after calibrating with the old
technology, and people on the list aren't whispering about the wacky colors
in your posted photos, then I'd say you're good to go.
That said, I suspect the old CRT sensor won't work with flatscreens, so I
don't think you're getting a proper calibration. The only test would
require either spending money, or borrowing someone else's software and
hardware to see if current technology would make a difference.
I confess to having gone overboard on color management in the past. I
suspect I went to a lot more pain than actually was necessary, but it made
me feel better to know I was adding extra steps to my workflow and taking
years off my life. <g> I also softproofed my images with icc profiles for
each paper I used, and downloaded the profiles from Miller's and Bay for
the stuff I set away to the lab. Did it make any difference? Damned if I
know. <g>
--Bob Whitmire
Certified Neanderthal
On Sat, Jul 11, 2015 at 7:32 PM, Chuck Norcutt <
chucknorcutt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Damn! I thought I was going to learn something profound about calibrating
flat screens. Well, I guess I did but not what I thought.
Now this is the real Reader's Digest version. I have an old X-Rite
EZ-Color Suite bought in the land of CRTs. Then I bought my existing Dell
24" IPS flat panel screen. Colors looked great out of the box. I applied
the EZ-Color puck and software and somewhere recall reading/hearing/seeing
that this CRT thingy might not work so many wonders on the flat panel. It
did allow me to go through the process but I don't know that anything ever
actually changed. The color looked good going in and looked good coming
out. So, I have not a clue whether the ancient CRT era thingy works at all
or does anything of value. The color still looks pretty good to my eye and
I haven't been inspired to do anything else. What do you think?
--
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