While my first article on monitor calibration dealt primarily with
color modes, this article will go into many aspects of calibration.
The software and hardware used for this article were contained in
the MonacoEZcolor Bundle. This bundle consists of the
MonacoEZcolor software package and the MonacoOptixXR colorimeter. I
chose to test this package because it was advertised with my Epson
Stylus Photo R2400 printer. I am going to start out with my
findings. I will go into depth later in the review. Using the
MonacoEZcolor software, version 2.63, I profiled my older Epson
Stylus Photo 1270 printer and my Epson Expression 1680 scanner. I
had been relatively satisfied with the color from my scanner since
"perfect" color in the images scanned was not critical for their
use. However, I had not been satisfied with the printer and had
spent a lot of time trying to work with it. This software solved
all of my problems and took about 5 minutes to profile each piece
of equipment. Both can be profiled together. This software gets a
rating of excellent for profiling my scanner and printer. I
love my new Epson Stylus Photo R2400 except for the results from
the Watercolor Radiant White paper, which were dull and muddy. The
R2400 is on another machine. In a few minutes I created a profile
for this paper. What can I say, except to say it was perfect! Now I
will create all my printer profiles using MonacoEZcolor software,
even ones I was satisfied with. All I can say is,"truly amazing!" I
also profiled my CRT monitor, which I purchased eight months ago.
Here, I did not like the results. Neither the software profile, nor
the combination with the colorimeter were satisfactory. I profiled
my monitor using both the software, which is done visually, and the
colorimeter/software combination, which relies more on its own
measurements. The profiles were very similar. Once the profiles
were created and the computer restarted, a screen appeared asking
if the profiles should be accepted. This screen was in Spanish even
though the program was installed in English. Since I use Symantec
Ghost to make images of my system before I test products, I ghosted
back a few times making sure I disabled Norton Anti-Virus, etc. I
kept reinstalling the software and re-attaching the colorimeter
each time the software and hardware worked in the same manner and
each time the same screen in Spanish appeared. Once the profiling
was finished, I looked at files that I had created in Photoshop
using the North American PrePress 2 settings as suggested by
Photoshop CS2, which suggests a workspace of Adobe RGB. I made sure
that all my files reflected this workspace to keep everything
consistent. The first things I noticed were that the hardware or
colorimeter generated profiles were very similar to the
MonacoEZcolor software generated profiles. Both had a cast of pink
on areas that were white or very light, and the screen was much
brighter than I was use to with the image washed out or
pastel-like. I decided to go back to the profile I had used
previously. This profile was the generic one for one of the
monitors, a P95f + made by Viewsonic (I was later to realize, that
this profile actually meant nothing, which I will explain shortly).
When I tried to go back to it, my screen looked the same. It would
not change by just changing profiles. The profiles would have been
listed in the white box shown below (unfortunately, I deleted them
before I did a screen gra.). At the time there were three profiles
listed in the box: my P95f + one, and the two generated by the
Monaco software and/or hardware. To get to this screen below, one
right clicks on the desk top and then left clicks on
settings>advanced>color management.
All these profiles reside in a folder found in
Windows/system32/spool/drivers/color.
As I stated before, I went to change the profile to the one I had
used previously and the screen looked the same. Then, I realized
why. Let me present what actually occurred. When I started with
this monitor, I let it warm up at least an hour, turned on the
monitor and adjusted the hardware in it (I still check it visually
periodically). It has more adjustments than the illustration below,
with slider instead of knobs for choosing colors, brightness, etc.
The picture is a simplification. So, I adjusted the brightness and
contrast so that I had a good tonal range of black to white. I
usually leave the contrast at 100% and manipulated just brightness.
Since I found that none of the color temperature settings looked
good, I went to User Determined Settings and moved the
colored bars back and forth until there was not a caste to the
white and the gray was neutral. All monitors have these settings
set up differently, but the principle is the same.
Remember, I stated I had installed a Viewsonic profile for my
monitor. In reality, even though I chose this profile, the default
color and brightness hardware settings in my monitor were still
active. That is very important to remember. Then, I had to change
the hardware settings the percent of red, green, and blue. Using
the profile did not gain anything because I had to manually make
changes anyway, and visually decide how to proceed. It was not as
if I had been able to start from a certain theoretical fixed point
and then add monitor profiles. If that were the case, "canned" or
readymade profiles still would be fallacious. Only those created
from "scratch" would work because monitors age over time, room
light changes, etc. Thus, theoretically the monitor profiles made
with the MonacoEZcolor Bundle should have worked. Now we get to the
profiles generated by the MonacoEZcolor software and the
MonacoOptixXR colorimeter. Remember, all the whites looked pink. To
produce these profiles, either I, or the colorimeter, manipulated
the Red, Blue and Green of the monitor. When the profile was
finished, these bars, when physically looking at them in on the
monitor screen, had changed. If I went to reinstall a different
profile, they did NOT move back to where they were before I created
the now former profile. In other words, they only moved while
creating the profile. Thus, I was left with the problem of having
to create a profile that did not have a pink caste to it the way I
always did in the past without the help of software. Basically what
we are seeing here is a monitor with hardware driven controls that
are changed only in two ways, by hand or through software when
creating a profile. If I discard the profile that was created by
moving these bars and opt to substitute a profile I had previously
created, it would sit on top of the hardware part of the profile I
had discarded. To put it briefly, one can work with a monitor
profile which is part hardware controlled and software controlled
or one can work with a monitor profile that is just hardware
controlled. We haven't even touched the manipulating of the video
card where monitor color can also be controlled. That, for me, is a
last resort. Going back to the MonacoEZcolor monitor profile, I
decided to go back and work the dials on my monitor so that I had a
neutral gray screen, proper gradations of black to white bars where
each 10% change was differentiated, and where my test hardcopy was
similar to what was on the screen. The only variation I made was to
up the brightness level in a manner similar to the MonacoEZcolor
monitor profile. Guess what? When I did that, the screen images in
Photoshop CS or CS2 were too light and the prints made on the Epson
R2400 were too dark (the Epson 2400 allows printing using
Photoshop's color management). This made sense because I had not
lightened the pictures within Photoshop, but just my monitor as a
whole. So, I went back to where I had been before all of this. I
did learn from the colorimeter monitor profile, that I was using
too much blue and my screen was a little bit too dark. I did reduce
the blue and lighten the screen a tiny bit. I have seen many overly
bright monitors and printing problems as a result! A lot of this is
common sense couched in extremely fancy terms and lost in the
shuffle of words. The next step in this printing journey was to
create a printer profile. I decided to try one for my older Epson
1270 in conjunction with my flatbed reflective scanner. First, I
printed a pattern from the MonacoEZcolor software. I then attached
the IT8 target card, which is a standard for calibrating scanners.
Below is an IT8 target by Monaco. The really nice people at X-Rite
said I must use their target because it will reference a specific
version, which I will need later. I found that I had an IT8 target
from Agfa, which looked basically the same. However, the exact
shade of each color is what is critical.
First, one prints out a set of bars from the MonacoEZcolor software
with the printer and then combines it with the IT8 target and scans
it.
Finally to create the profile, one must match a reference file for
the specific target. To do that, one chooses a file in the
MonacoEZcolor software to match the number on the IT8 target that
is shown, above, by my white arrow. Well, the file on this target
was for 2004 and the latest file in the software was for 2003.
There were no instructions stating what to do. Later I found
instruction in the onscreen manual. However, the instructions
stated to go to the
Monaco website, and click download. There was nothing at that
site that had anything to do with downloading these reference
files. I finally found them linked to a screen that was updated in
2002 while the screen they were on was updated 2005. I almost
didn't look because the first screen, 2002, referred to
MonacoEZcolor version 2.5 and the one I was using was 2.63. While I
do not like to just find fault, I do feel that the amount of time I
wasted looking for these reference files was totally unnecessary
and very preventable. As you can see from the beginning of the
review, I was very satisfied with the profiling of my Epson
Expression 1680 and really thrilled with the printer profile for my
Epson 1270. Immediately below is a picture of two scans. The one on
the left was made using the MonacoEZcolor software and the one on
the right was created using the scanner's automatic scanning mode.
The one on the left is much closer to the print that I used as a
target. Note: these images have been manipulated a number of times
so they could appear in the article and there has been a
degradation of color. The image on the left is actually more vivid
than it appears here.
What I found that was very critical, was to make sure that when I
set up my scanner with the new ICM profile, I set my target the
same as the color space in Photoshop.
The profiling of my printer was worth all the hassles. Previously I
had not been able to print images that were relatively one color.
Now they came out perfectly. Below is an example of the Print
Preview screen from Photoshop CS2 using the printer profile I
generated.
In the above example, the software suggests that the user choose
Perceptual rather than Relative Colorimetric. I printed using both,
and visually just looking at the prints as a whole, could not see a
difference. Below are the examples of how the images printed. The
top image was printed letting Photoshop determine the colors and
using the printer profile created by the MonacoEZcolor software.
The bottom image was created using the Epson 1270 printer's
internal printer color management. The basic settings in the
printer of media type and print quality stayed the same.
I did not know in the "printer" Color Management setup for the
1270, whether to select no color management or ICM.
The controls are not the same as they are on the R2400 and other
newer Epson printers. I tried and did two tests leaving the setup
in Photoshop CS2 the same. The print from the setup where I chose
No color Management was a little darker than the one where I
chose ICM. But the color values in both were the same.
There is a lot of good information on the X-Rite web site about
calibration, but it is sometimes hard to find. In conclusion, I
found the software for creating profiles of my printers and scanner
to give me excellent results, but I did not like the profiles that
were created for my monitor.
- The Paula Sander's Report is a regular
Renderosity Front Page featured column, where Paula investigates
and comments on graphic software, techniques, and other relevant
material through her reviews, tutorials, and general articles.
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