Question about Monitor Profiles

[anderschr]

Hi everyone, I am new here.

 

I've created a profile for my monitor in Adobe Gamma. The result is satisfying, but I had forgotten that I loaded

the sRGB profile to begin with, and that is what I must have worked off of. Having done this, have I limited the

colors my display is capable of showing? Or is that something separate from monitor profiles?

 

Also, I own a viewsonic CRT, would it even matter if all I could display was SRGB?

[emre]

Your screen looked wrong when you used sRGB and it still looks wrong now that you are using Adobe Gamma. I wouldn't worry about color management until you can get a colorimeter.

[anderschr]

That didn't answer my question. I'm not interested in advice that I should go out and buy a colorimeter, that seems to be the zealous response that you get on many photography forums.

[Ed_Ingold]

Whether you like it or not, you need a colorimeter to profile your monitor. Adobe Gamma and other software-only solutions don't work - not "in the ball park", possibly not "in the county".

 

sRGB is not a profile, it is a device-independent color space - a standard which designates what colors each word in a digital image file should represent. A color-managed program like Photoshop will read the embedded color space and display the image appropriately, regardless of which space you use.

[anderschr]

Telling someone who doesn't print or work among standardized computers that they need a $200 eye-one is presumptuous at best. I own a CRT, you can't be automatically out of the ballpark when you're limited to adjusting gamma, color biases, and brightness/contrast.

 

You say that sRGB isn't a profile, that leads back to my question, what then is the monitor profile I loaded that was called sRGB? Is it just a general profile somehow optimized for that color-space?

[emre]

Calibrating a monitor without a colorimeter is like trying to synchronize a watch without a time server.

 

sRGB is a generic color space; it does not specifically describe the characteristics of your particular monitor. Every monitor is unique, and needs its own profile due to manufacturing tolerance, aging, and environmental conditions. Adds these factors up and you will see that a one-size-fits-all approach is useless.

 

Like I said, get a colorimeter or don't sweat it.

[digitaldog]

>Calibrating a monitor without a colorimeter is like trying to synchronize a watch without a time server.

 

Or by using a sundial on a cloudy day!

 

Toss Adobe Gamma, that's what everyone is saying.

[manuel barrera houston,]

no you have not limited the number of colors, just how they may be displayed.

[Tim_Lookingbill]

If you were able to choose sRGB colorants in Adobe Gamma (not sure if it has this choice) then it may suffice for a CRT but

certainly not for an LCD.

 

Other than that like Manuel stated you're only messing with the hue/saturation using a low quality eyeball calibrator as AG. Hope

you don't mind orang-ish looking hot reds and reddish sky blues.

[Ed_Ingold]

<i>You say that sRGB isn't a profile, that leads back to my question, what then is the monitor profile I loaded that was called sRGB? Is it just a general profile somehow optimized for that color-space?</i>

<p>

It that's not clear by now, perhaps you should be telling yourself, "I guess I don't know much about color management. Perhaps I should buy a book, like the one by Andrew Rodney."

[manuel barrera houston,]

If you have photoshop, go to edit-assign profile, and click something different then what you have and you can see how the colors are effected, must have an image, preferably with bright pretty colors. srgb is what most monitors will be using.

[dreamtimestudio]

To the guys who said sRGB isnt a profile perhaps they should buy a book on color management. sRGB stands for "standard red, green, blue" its the profile used to represent the color space of a standard PC monitor, use this profile if your images will be used on the net. Im not an expert on adobe gamma but i thought it was more to set a white point which shouldnt really worry your profiles (i think...). When your in photoshop try using "assign profile" and set it to adobe rgb and you will see the difference as a preview. Use "assign profile" as opposed to "convert profile" since convert actually changes the basic data, if you have converted a picture to sRGB and saved it, the extra color information the original had is lost, whereas assigning a profile keeps the data but tells the computer how to display it. hope that helps

[david jeffery]

Color management is another art form in the overall process of producing incredible images with the correct colors and it is not simple or easy unfortunaltely.

 

You could work on an image on your monitor, get sample prints made and then try and re-adjust the colors in the original file to get them closer to the desired result and that may be all you need, but for great results proper color management and calibration is best.

 

It's like someone saying they grabbed a camera and shot a picture and the colors were not right. What camera, what film, what exposure, what developing???? Don't feel bad as there is a lot to consider.

 

I was a little shocked when I realized what was needed to fine tune great images and I am only beggining to learn the art.

 

I also recommend "Color Management for Photographers" by Andrew Rodney, Focal Press ($44.95)which will provide you with the information you need.

 

Have fun with it!

[digitaldog]

Well sRGB is a color space, it an be defined and used via a profile. So is sRGB a profile? Well sort of but that's really not

the way I'd discuss it. The sRGB color space is a synthetic color space that like the other RGB working spaces is simply

defined mathematically by providing a white point, three chromaticity values and a TRC (what is often incorrectly called

"gamma").

 

This may be helpful:

http://www.adobe.com/digitalimag/pdfs/phscs2ip_colspace.pdf

[anderschr]

I ordered an eye-one online and I'm quite interested in what it will do for me after reading these replies. I'll make sure to let you know if it doesn't beat the profile I spent much of my time working on-- which seems possible since after all it's a CRT.

 

I tried "assign profile" and it does bring in more colors. The strange thing is I can convert those colors to sRGB without noticing a difference, and then assign adobe rgb again and it's as if it will just keep saturating the image. Is assigning the adobe 1998 profile good practice, or is there loss of information? I have a point and shoot panasonic, I believe it delivers images in sRGB.

[Tim_Lookingbill]

Assign Adobe 1998 profile only to images whose RGB data was written in that space. Make sure you know what space your

digital camera writes its jpegs in and assign the appropriate profile in Photoshop.

 

Shooting RAW won't matter what you set your camera output color space to. The Raw converter will use it's own settings to

arrive at the preview you see and write the data to the output space chosen in the converter. Remember assigning only affects

the preview not the data. Converting does change the data and keeps the preview the same.

[anderschr]

If anyone's still reading this thread. I'm working on my profile, oscillating back and forth between 9300 and 6500k-- but having a problem. Everytime I create a profile and restart, the monitor shifts into 9300k no matter what profile is loaded. Something may be interfering. I've uninstalled adobe gamma, could it possibly be the nvidia control panel?

[digitaldog]

The problem is some kind of gamma loader that's updating the older LUTs and not the newer profile.

[anderschr]

I don't know what it is. I've tried uninstalling the nvidia drivers and eye-one software, and installing the original viewsonic drivers. It continues to boot in 9300k, and strangely on my monitor the 6500k option is still highlighted. You move it off and back however and it returns to true 6500k.

[anderschr]

I'm able to avoid the monitor reverting by selecting "user color" on the monitor, which has RGB sliders. From there I have attempted to create a 6500k white point through eye-one match. However, the new white point I've created is slightly different than the preset on the monitor, it is more red-- which one do I trust?

[emre]

The one that EyeOne prefers, of course. Don't trust presets.

[anderschr]

I would agree, but the eye-one has me change the sliders depending on if I have a light on, it isn't constant. I suppose I'll have to wait until the sun goes down and calibrate in darkness.

[emre]

Absolutely. You should calibrate in the dark and work in dim light.

[anderschr]

I did two tests in my darkened room, under the same conditions. Both had me move the RGB sliders around quite apart from eachother, which I find odd. Granted, what I have looks better than the monitor's more green 6500k, but the inconsistency in calibration doesn't make it seem as if I've reached a standard. I'll have to try again tonight.

[digitaldog]

If you've got an LCD that's high end (using high bit internal LUTs), don't be messing with the RGB sliders/settings what so

ever. Calibrate to a native white point and leave them alone, they buy you nothing.