Basic Monitor Calibration & PhotoShop Colour/Color Settings

David Myers: DIGITALMASTERS australasia
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The top 'bar' of the calibration image above comprises alternating 0% black and 5% grey squares.
You should ONLY JUST be able to perceive the bar as bands rather than an all black strip.
The bottom comprises 21 steps of neutral grey in 5% steps from 0% black to 100% white.

1
ROOM LIGHTING
Turn off or lower your room lighting If you are doing any colour imaging for professional print output!
Screens are illuminated by light coming from behind so any light hitting the front will make the
blacks look grey and meaning will never see the full range of tones in the shadow areas.

2
CONTRAST ADJUSTMENT
Locate your monitor's hardware controls and set the contrast to 100% maximum. If you have a traditional
CRT monitor that is more than 2 or 3 years old the screen phosphors may have faded and the colour
'guns' may no longer run at full, linear output. If your image may always look unsaturated with
murky grey blacks you should replace it. We recommend Apple, Eizo, NEC and LaCie.

3
BRIGHTNESS ADJUSTMENT
Adjust the brightness CAREFULLY until you can ONLY JUST see the bands in the top bar of the image above.
Keep an eye on the grey squares below - especially the three at each end of the scale.

4
MONITOR TOO BRIGHT

If your adjustment looks like the effect in the image above your monitor is TOO BRIGHT There are 21 grey steps
in the bottom bar - See how the LAST three segments have gone white  If left like this you would see lots
of shadow details in images but highlights would be too light with 'washed out' areas in clouds etc.

5
MONITOR TOO DARK

If your adjustment looks like the the effect in the image above your monitor is TOO DARK
There are 21 grey steps in the bottom bar - See how the first three segments have gone black
You would see lots of highlight detail in images but shadows would be 'blocked up' with no detail

6
COLOUR TEMPERATURE
If your monitor controls activate an onscreen display look for a dialogue that refers to
'Colour Temperature' - a preset colour balance to match the colour of daylight at different times
9,300†K (degrees Kelvin) is cold blue skylight - the approximate colour of an unadjusted CRT monitor
5,000†K (Or 'D50') is warm noon day sunlight - The tradition target for print industry monitors
Imaging professionals use a setting of 5,500†K to 6,500†K to display neutral to cool greys

7
COLOUR BALANCE
If your monitor hardware controls activate an onscreen display with 'Tint' settings or RGB adjustment
'Sliders' you can open a reference image to 'Fine Tune' your display so it matches a reference print
from your printer. If you do this while viewing the image with 'Soft Proofing' in PhotoShop
you can get very accurate monitor calibration and greatly reduce print wastage!

8
REFERENCE IMAGES
A reference image should contain a neutral greyscale with no colour shifts, skin tones, colour patches
such as industry standard Kodak or Macbeth charts and any images typical of your type and
style of photography or artwork. Do not use a photo of unknown tonal and colour values
as you will be trying to calibrate your monitor to match an 'uncalibrated' image

This Kodak reference image was modifieed by us and converted to Adobe RGB colour space. The above image
was then converted to 'sRGB' for viewing in web browsers. The greys are neutral and the skin tones have
proved to print well on a variety of printers. You can download view the full size version and view
on-screen to make basic adjustments to your monitor settings. You should print the full size
version with your printer paper profile then use PhotoShop's 'Soft Proofing' to view the
image with the same paper profile. View the print with a daylight balance lamp
then you can adjust your monitor to match it. This is a basic adjustment
only and we highly recommend the use of a proper calibrator

Download Adobe RGB: 250mm image in 'Adobe RGB' Profile for all professional RGB prints: 'Adobe' RGB Image (1Mb)

 

Using a reference print to perform a basic monitor adjustment

10
PHOTOSHOP SETTINGS
PhotoShop needs to know what 'RGB Workspace' you work in. This needs to be configured in 'Color Settings'

If you are primarily involved in producing images for web, use images from consumer level digital cameras and
print scanners, print via home quality inkjet, laser, quickprint lab, kiosk or Fuji Frontier printers use 'sRGB'

If you are an imaging professional primarily producing images for print, use images from pro SLR digital cameras,
digital backs, pre-press film scanners, print via photo quality inkjet, Giclee & prolab printers use 'Adobe RGB'

Adobe RGB is the Preferred Color Setting and colour 'Profile' for all imaging work an d 'Digital Master' files as it
provides a greater colour and tonal range. You can always 'Convert Down' to sRGB for low end 'quickprints'
and web images but if you inadvertentlly use sRGB for a professional print job you can't get back the
missing colours and tones by converting to Adobe RGB. Check your PhotoShop Settings and get
used to switching between Adobe RGB for pro work and sRGB for web and quickprints!

11
WEB IMAGES
If you are primarily involved in producing images for the web you now know you should work in sRGB Colorspace.
To ensure your images look good onscreen in web browsers you need to 'Embed' the sRGB profile.
Images display differently with each ICC profile or if 'untagged'. See our web image page: click here!

12
CALIBRATION DEVICES
'Print matching' calibration is reasonably accurate as you have visible proof that your monitor is matching
images from your printer.  As monitors age, the colours fade and the illumination becomes dimmer
and as monitor calibrators are now available from $100 we recommend that you use one!
Monitor calibrators attache to or hang in front of your screen and correct for small
imperfections that the eye can not see. The software supplied allows for
known 'industry standard' presets to be targetted and take away
the guesswork - We use the Eye-One calibrator from X-Rite

13
COLOUR MANAGED PRINTING
Below is a video tutorial guiding you through colour managed print workflows for both Mac OSX and Windows.
Click on image below to run high resolution video. Quicktime required: Free Quicktime Download

Author: Russell Brown - One of the developers of Adobe Photoshop
View his brilliant tutorials online:  The Russell Brown Show

QUESTIONS? eMail DAVID MYERS

DIGITALMASTERS australasia
homepage

By Appointment  •  14 Kitchener St.  •  Balgowlah 2093  •  Ph. (02) 9949 6090  •  Location Maps  •  Email:  David Myers
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