2 monitors – 2 very different image colors

[John Rofrano]

It is amazing how out of calibration different monitor are right out-of-the-box. What you need to do is get a hardware calibrator. I use the Datacolor Spyder3 but you can get a Pantone Huey or other device. The key is that your eye alone really can’t do a good job of this. What the Spyder3 does is measure the color accuracy of each display and builds a profile that it loads into your video card each time your computer boots so that both monitors display the same accurate colors.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[D. Eric franks]

Of course your audiences’ monitors aren’t going to be calibrated either, so while John is right (of course!), it could be argued that, by and large, it doesn’t matter. There are definitely situations where it does matter (e.g., broadcast, corporate clients, brand identity and just plain getting it right), but I basically don’t trust my monitors anyhow or the environment esp. with LCDs, it makes a difference whether the fluorescent lights in the office are on or how much daylight is pouring into my home studio. And I don’t trust my 40+ year old eyes anymore either. All that is to preface the FREE recommendation that the Vectorscope and (especially) the Waveform monitors are good tools to spend an afternoon learning. You can then tell – at a glance – many things with absolute certainty.

NOTE: On the other hand, even if you are 100% certain you’ve got everything exactly and technically correct, there is still the Art…and there’s always the client. Both can trump the monitors on occasion.

[Bob Peterson]

OK, I’m confused. At some point, you have to know what your colors really look like. It’s better if they are at least correct when you render the video than that they be a total toss up.

However, vectorscope and waveform monitors sound intriguing. Could you point me to an explanation of how these are used to white balance a video?

[Gilles Gagnon]

I have the same question as Bob.

Is there a way to “white balance” a monitor (LCD in my case)?

At least we would then know that even if something I’m seeing is not white, it will most likely appear white(-ish) on most tvs or monitors.

[Terry Esslinger]

Say guys
Take a look at this thread in another COW forum
https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/208/875822

[John Rofrano]

> …it makes a difference whether the fluorescent lights in the office are on or how much daylight is pouring into my home studio.

…and the Spyder3 remains connected to your computer at all times monitoring room light conditions and alerts you when the ambient room light has change significantly enough to warrant recalibrating your monitors. It is a precision instrument for accurately determining color.

> And I don’t trust my 40+ year old eyes anymore either.

Which is why I recommended getting are hardware calibration device. Even if you have young eyes, you can’t detect 256 shades of gray but these devices can and will give you an accurate gamma curve that you can trust.

If this is just a hobby, then I agree, you can use the standard calibration tools that come with your video card and hope for the best.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Stephen Mann]

” Is there a way to “white balance” a monitor (LCD in my case)? ”

No. It is impossible to correctly calibrate a consumer LCD monitor. Studio LCD monitors cost a few thousand dollars each, so if you spent a few hundred dollars for the top of the line LCD, you still can’t accurately calibrate it for video.

There is no “black” on an LCD. It’s an illusion. Try putting a black image on the screen – it’s really gray. There’s also no “white” because the color of white depends entirely on the color of the LCD backlight. There’s also no contrast control because the contrast is directly affected by the viewing angle.

For this reason, you can NEVER depend on your LCD display for color and video level settings. This especially means your camera’s LCD displays.

If you are in the market for a new monitor, look seriously at the LED/LCD displays. The LED’s provide the backlight and white is possible, and black is more black because the LED backlight can be turned off for individual pixels.

You can still find pro video monitors (heavy picture-tube units) on eBay for $200-$300. I have a pair of Sony PVM-14U monitors here. I also recently bought the Color Munki (because it also profiles my printer for photographs). Even two identical Dell LCD monitors next to each other still look slightly different. It’s close to what I see on the Sony PVM, but it isn’t “perfect”.

But, I don’t need perfect. 99% of my product will be viewed online or on home TV’s, usually LCD or Plasma TV’s. So, calibrating my monitors and getting a “pass” on my home TV is *good enough*.

Steve Mann
MannMade Digital Video
http://www.mmdv.com

[Gilles Gagnon]

Great info! Thanks!

So, If one does not have a “fancy shmansy” monitor, is there a way to tell Vegas using the color corrector, to color correct by saying

“Hey Vegas, I’ll tell you what’s white on this footage and you can color correct from there” ???

if so, what’s the correct way to do this?

[John Rofrano]

> So, If one does not have a “fancy shmansy” monitor…

You don’t need a “fancy shmansy” monitor, you just need a “calibrated” monitor. While it is nice to have an expensive accurate monitor, there is still no excuse for not calibrating the monitor that you already have. (especially if you have two and they don’t agree!)

> is there a way to tell Vegas using the color corrector, to color correct by saying “Hey Vegas, I’ll tell you what’s white on this footage and you can color correct from there” ???

Once you determine what should be white, you can select the Complimentary Color Picker from the High color wheel in the Color Corrector and use it to adjust for white. Likewise you can use the Complimentary Color Picker from the Low color wheel to adjust for black and the Mid to adjust for gray.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Bob Peterson]

Actually, white balancing means that the color temperature of an image is correctly adjusted. White balancing an image usually works best when you get neutral grey correct. Neutral grey, or something close to it, is much easier to find in an image than either pure white or pure black. Yes, the temperature adjustment is not likely to be perfect, but it’s much closer to being accurate than what you get when there is no monitor calibration.

However, one of the points above was questioning how one can use scope displays in Vegas to determine when colors have been adjusted reasonably accurately. That was how the term white balance entered the discussion.

My system uses a NEC Multisync CRT as its monitor, and it calibrates very nicely. I can guarantee that it did not cost a few thousand dollars.