New Macbook Pro: how to calibrate? Other related questions.

[Joerg Rockenberger]

I finally did the big move to the kingdom of Apple and purchased one of their recently released Macbook Pros...

Now, how do you calibrate the display? Any recommendation for a preferred tool are much appreciated.

Then, I noticed that "Color LCD" is selected as Display Profile under System Preferences / Display / Color. If I switch the Display Profile to any of the alternatives (Adobe RGB (1998), Generic RGB profile, sRGB IEC61966-2.1) available the display looks horrendous, e.g. with a very strong blueish cast with sRGB. Why is that? Is Color LCD a profile from a factory calibration?

Also, this panel contains a button labelled "Calibrate". If I click on it it seems to start some software based calibration routine. Anyone use this successfully?

Then, the brightness of the display seems to adapt to the ambient lighting conditions. Is that normal? I presume that one wouldn't want that for photoediting...

And finally, I heard that Safari is supposed to be "colorspace aware". Do I need to enable it or install something? What effect does it actually have?

Thanks, JR

[Axel Hildebrandt]

John, I switched to Apple about a year ago and never looked back. The good thing about the newly released MacBook Pros is that their color gamut is 60% wider than the previous generation. Did you get the 15 or 17 inch version?

Safari is color-managed, there is nothing you need to do, the images will look like in PS. If you install Firefox you can get an add-on that enables color management. I leave Firefox unmanaged to see the differences more easily.

As for calibration, I use X-Rite Eye One which creates a new color profile. Sometimes I let it run a couple of times and choose the calibration that shows the best result, in other words if you look at an image in Safari and Firefox there should not be a big difference if the monitor is calibrated properly.

I turned off the automatic brightness adjustment but turned down the brightness a few steps. Most monitors are too bright and the whites look overexposed even if they are not because of that issue.

Enjoy your new toy and I hope you will like it as much as I do. Let me know if you have any questions.

[Joerg Rockenberger]

Axel,

Thanks for chiming in! Got the new 15". Love the battery life and trackpad scrolling. Finding my way around the OS...

Do you use the X-Rite Eye One LT or the 2? Can't really tell from the product info what's the difference and how it matters. And I presume the package includes both the PC and MAC software.

Would you mind explaining the following statement? "in other words if you look at an image in Safari and Firefox there should not be a big difference if the monitor is calibrated properly."

Thanks again. JR

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I use X-Rite Eye one Display 2 and it supports both Mac and PC. I'm not sure about the differences, either. I think Artie has it in his online store if I remember correctly.

On uncalibrated monitors the differences in color between the same image in a color-managed or non-color-managed browser can be quite big. If you open one of your images in Safari and Firefox you might see a color shift. After calibration that should be much less the case.

[Joerg Rockenberger]

Thanks for your help. Ordered the Xrite. Hopefully the calibration goes smoothly. Any does' and don't-does in this regard?

JR

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Thanks for your help. Ordered the Xrite. Hopefully the calibration goes smoothly. Any does' and don't-does in this regard?

JR

There is a 'quick method' and a more precise method, I would not use the quick one.

[Joerg Rockenberger]

Axel & Others,

So, I got the x-rite, watched the tutorials and ran it twice in the "Easy" mode. Definitely made an improvement but I wanted to see what the advanced mode can do. Well, but what do you choose for luminance, whitepoint and gamma? I tried the recommendations from the help (90 for laptop display, native, 2.2) but it's almost a bit dark in my opinion now and whites may have a slight yellowish cast. And the result is not that different from the easy mode. Also, at the end it says the white point is at 7200K which is obviously much higher than the 5000K recommended in the tutorial.

What do you folks use for those settings?

And then, how do you individually adjust the RGBs on the MBP? I suspect one can't but I am not sure...

Thanks in advance. JR

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I went with the suggested values. Most monitors are too bright and the white point is 6500K if I remember correctly. I ran it a couple of times and picked the profile that looked best.

[Joerg Rockenberger]

Thanks Alex for staying with me here.

I played around a little bit changing the value for the whitepoint and running the calibration but I am coming back to the profile using the native whitepoint. Seems to give the best result so far.

However, most pics with whites in the forum appear overexposed now. I can see well all steps in the gray scale monitor calibration strip at the bottom of this page though.

Somewhat at a loss.

Are you (or anyone else) calibrating a macbook pro display or a regular panel?

Thanks, JR

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Thanks Alex for staying with me here.

I played around a little bit changing the value for the whitepoint and running the calibration but I am coming back to the profile using the native whitepoint. Seems to give the best result so far.

However, most pics with whites in the forum appear overexposed now. I can see well all steps in the gray scale monitor calibration strip at the bottom of this page though.

Somewhat at a loss.

Are you (or anyone else) calibrating a macbook pro display or a regular panel?

Thanks, JR

John, I recalibrated my MacBook Pro today. I set the white point to 6500 since the native point had a slight greenish cast. If the whites look overexposed decrease the brightness of the screen until you see details in the whites in a properly exposed image. If you go to Applications > Utilities > DigitalColor Meter and set it to "RGB as actual value, 8 bit" you can move your mouse over white areas and you should be able to see texture in the whites if the value is in the 230 vicinity.

[Joerg Rockenberger]

Wow. Thanks for the prompt reply and tip re the DigitalColor Meter. Glad to hear that we're working on similar machines.

The brightness of my display is at about 2/3 of full brightness. During the last calibration I think the value was around 100 cd/m2. Just above the recommended 90 for laptops. I will redo the calibration with 6500K.

If I look at Doug Brown's recent skimmer image (http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/showthread.php?t=39658) it appears to me that the whites around the face are overexposed. Using the color meter on the whites just in front and below the eye I get values in the 240s for GB and 252-4 for R. Would be curious to hear what you're seeing/measuring.

Doug, hope you don't mind. It is a superb image.

Hopefully others see this thread also and can benefit from it in the future.

JR

[Axel Hildebrandt]

On my monitor the white areas on the head are between 250 and 255 in the reds, a bit less in G and B.
The brightness on my monitor is about 10% below maximum. I couldn't get the luminosity down to the green area even with the brightness all the way down.

[Joerg Rockenberger]

Seems like we're measuring the same.

Just rerun the calibration with 6500K but the resulting profile is definitely too warm on my screen. Will stick for now with the native.

Interesting that you can't bring down the brightness to the level recommended to the eye-one match software. Something obviously must have changed in my newer model.

And to give something back: generate a bookmark in safari (i presume it also works in firefox) and enter the following javascript into the address area:

javascript:if(window.screen.availWidth%3Ewindow.ou terWidth+window.screen.availWidth*0.05)%7Bwindow.m oveTo(window.screen.availLeft,window.screen.availT op);window.resizeTo(window.screen.availWidth,windo w.screen.availHeight);%7Delse%7Bwindow.moveTo((win dow.screen.availLeft+window.screen.availWidth-800)/2,window.screen.availTop);window.resizeTo(800+wind ow.outerWidth-window.innerWidth,window.screen.availHeight);%7D

Upon clicking this bookmark any safari window will go full screen or half-screen if pressed again.

Learned it today at the Apple store.

JR

[Axel Hildebrandt]

If you bought the computer recently, you have the newer kind of monitor. Thanks for the script. I will give it a try.