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Budget IPS monitor for grading
I was wondering if anyone had suggestions on a budget monitor for color correction. I’ve owned the dell U2410, the U2412, U2413, and the hp zr2440w and zr24w. They have served me fairly well in the past, but I was wondering if there are any newer models that people might suggest that are in this price range and size ( around $1,000 or less and 24″-27″).
I’ll be using it alongside a 5k iMac. Some options I was considering are the Del U2713, the NEC MultiSync EA244UHD (if I want to go 4k but only 24″), or the MultiSync PA272W-BK (if I want to go 27″ but only 2.5k). The apple thunderbolt display is also an option just to have a monitor of the same size and with a similar look. Does anyone have any experience grading with any of these monitors? How superior do you think the NEC monitors would be versus a calibrated thunderbolt display?
Lastly,I don’t have any experience running full screen playback via thunderbolt, I’ve always used a decklink card via SDI and a hd link pro for any monitors without SDI input. Will Resolve 11 allow me to run full screen playback via thunderbolt? What is the typical hardware setup for people with iMacs and the new Mac Pros who no longer have PCIe slots? Please don’t tell me I need to get a thunderbolt PICe chassis with a decklink card!
Thanks for your help!
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4 Replies
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I’m not convinced you can calibrate a Thunderbolt display very well. You’re not going to get consistent results for color correction unless you have a color managed output (outside the operating system) through a BMD card. Eizo and Flanders make decent monitors that can be calibrated reliably.
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What card options do I have since I don’t have any PCIe slots since I’m running an iMac?
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If you’re not planning to capture and looking for a video I/O only for monitoring, check out UltraStudio Mini Monitor from BlackMagic. https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/ultrastudiothunderbolt Works great. If you think you need to capture video as well as monitor, UltraStudio express. I’ve been using these for a long time now and am pretty happy with BM products. AJA also have similar offerings, but a bit expensive.
HP have a really good monitor, I keep forgetting the model. It is one of the dreamcolors. Although, I’d say get a Flanders for colour grading:)Kannan Raghavan
The Big Toad Films Pte. Ltd. -
The most important thing you can buy if you are using cheap monitors that don’t come calibrated is a probe. I like the X-rite I1 Display Pro. If you get the free calibration software HCFR you can also calibrate TV’s and even professional monitors using the I1 probe. I have calibrated various LCD monitors and when placed side by side with a flanders are about 90%-95% accurate. Before calibration they would so wildly off it was laughable. Depending on what type of material you are working on that may be good enough. I have a panasonic BT-3DL2550 HDSDI monitor as well, and many pro monitors can be picked up cheap on ebay. Out of the box it also wasn’t quite accurate and needed to be adjusted. I find that the REC 709 color space has stronger red tones than most computer displays, and subsequently have to also use my GUI monitor for checking how reds will show up on most computer monitors. I use an HP ZR2740w for GUI.
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David Chai – Writer . Director
http://www.davidchai.com
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