Frustated & need help. Calibrated w/ monico optix pro, still off.

Cindy

Sure hope someone can help. I recently purchased Monoco Optix XR Pro and have now attemted to calibrate and profile my monitor at least 30+ times 'used both the regular and expert modes'. My visual calibrations were better than this. :cry
I've followed the instructions to the 'T' and my mid-tones are off. Overall range is great. I can see the difference between every gray scale chart on the net I've found... it's the mid-tones primarily reds, oranges, browns that are off.

I ran the evaluate monitor profile checker on several of the profiles and all are showing that the pale orange and pale yellow are out or my profiles gamut range.

Prints come back from smugmug always darker & with some colors oversaterated and other colors faded... yet when I view proof in PS-CS2 them they always brighter and more vibrant... and even that doesn't match the on screen display from smugmugs site :scratch The very colors that Optix shows are out of gamut for my profile display/view fine in Internet Explorer (optix uses the same color checker spots that are on smugmugs calibration print on-line (btw I have the print of it to and it doesn't match the softproof view or the on-line view).

My workflow is entirely sRGB so shouldn't my sRGB display (whether in PS or on-line) match the smugmug calibration print??? Or at least close???

Thanks in advance for any insight. If you need more info I'll be glad to answer any ?'s tomarrow - I've pulled most of my hair out these past couple weeks and need sleep desperatly.

Cindy

Cindy

Forgot to share... monitor is:
... a Dell Ultrasharp 2001FP. Bought new in January of this year.
Cindy

lynnma

Cindy wrote:

... a Dell Ultrasharp 2001FP. Bought new in January of this year.
Cindy

Hi Cindy welcome to dgrin.. I can't help you on this one but there will be others who will be able to.. hang in there and they will be along shortly I'm sure. Panic not.. I'm sure things will work out.:D

Cindy

Thanks lynnma. I've called Color Gear (where purchased). Their very nice, sorry they couldn't help though as it's above their heads. They gave me Monicos headquarters. I called them and talked to 3 different people so far... all transferring me to someone else. Now I'm waiting for them to call back :cry Sure hope it's soon as I have 3 seperate photo events that need processed asap. I could go ahead but one is a Wedding and even though the color is close I'd rather not even tough the pics until the color is correct. Cindy

lynnma wrote:

Hi Cindy welcome to dgrin.. I can't help you on this one but there will be others who will be able to.. hang in there and they will be along shortly I'm sure. Panic not.. I'm sure things will work out.:D

ian408

Have you looked on www.xrite.com? Specifically http://www.xrite.com/support_front.aspx?line=32&SearchPart=654

There are a list of documents here that might help. I would check the ones
having to do with monitor calibration.

Ian

David_S85

Cindy, any progress yet with the calibration issue?
.
.
.

Cindy

Yes - I read their pages. Thanks for the link though. And Nope, no progress yet. Uggghhhh! Just got home from another shoot and back to work on this monitor now. Hmmmmm.... hopefully not another long night.

Monico headquarters have not been much real help at all so far. Allthough this is my first time using a Pro calibrater (major $ calibrator anyway) I'm not completly ignorant to setting up my display (I had allmost spot on results visually by using adobe gamma & other on-line helps... after reading TONS of info on the subject). I've read & read & read untill I'm color blue in the face - lol.

Basically they told me to not change the rgb controls at all during the process and let the profile make all the adjustments in the video via the profile. They also said smugmugs calibration print was not good to compare to my monitor whether during proofing or any program (CS2, windows, none)... they recommended I convert my prints to the profile smugmug provides for proofing before uploading them on-line (however I'm under the impression that the profile is ONLY for proofing & not for converting to... If I were to convert to it then what I uploaded won't be recognised on-line or by ezprints as being profiled... but they'll see it as sRGB when in fact it isn't.

Anyhow... back to work trying other settings with it. If I don't get it soon I'm just gonna install it and revert back to visual calibration (so far this thing has caused me much more grief than visual ever did. Go figure :cry

Any suggestions welcome.
Cindy

Cindy

ezprint profile
This is strange...

Tonight after I re-calibrated and profiled for the uptenth who knows how many times now (lost count)... things are looking much better.

For example using smugmugs calibration print as a viewable test and reference:
- In windows and online (non-color managed apps) things look much better than any other time I've ran Monico but still quite a bit off.
- Just simply opening the print in CS2 the colors shift even slightly closer (set-up w/ sRGB as the default working space so I don't understand 'why' the colors shifts since & if windows itself is truly based on sRGB... which if I'm correct shouldn't calibrating the monitor bring the default display back to a correct sRGB... if so than why the difference in viewing??? Someone please enlighten me as I'm confused here.
- When I view the smugmug proof colors using their supplied profile the colors get for the most part even closer (example what was a bright orange Reeses package now shifts to the correct orange). However my dark shadow details for the most part get brighter instead of shifting a bit darker as they should according to comparison. Example the lower left picture of the girls black hair gets really light looking.
** Now the big surprize: Just for kicks I converted the picture to ezprints profile supplied by smugmug... and then clicked on view proof. The colors did very, very sligthly shift but now even closer yet. I then converted it back to sRGB and it gained back some of the brighter default print but surprizingly the proof view is now allmost spot on when comparing to the actual print. Which makes me wonder... what would happen if I actually now uploaded this and had it printed... how close it would really be??? I sure wouldn't want to have to do this to every print I upload and order from smugmug but if it actually does the trick... hmmmmm. Anyone else tried this?

My current printer won't even allow me to turn off color management but I have a R1800 coming next week... we'll see what happens then.

Cindy

David_S85

Sounds better
Looks like things are looking up.

Cindy wrote:

surprizingly the proof view is now allmost spot on when comparing to the actual print. Which makes me wonder... what would happen if I actually now uploaded this and had it printed... how close it would really be??? I sure wouldn't want to have to do this to every print I upload and order from smugmug but if it actually does the trick... Cindy

Yes, that would be the best thing to do if you believe the calibration is now correct or close enough. Only one way to know. Press the Order button! If its what you had planned for, then you shouldn't need to recalibrate for every print.

Baldy

Cindy, can you tell us a little more about your system? It isn't a Mac, is it?

Cindy

No. Here's My setup:
Monitor: Dell Ultrasharp 20 inch 2001FP. Purchased new from Dell Jan 2005 along with a new Dell Dimension XPS Gen4, intell Pentium 4 processor.
Video Card: 256MB ATI Radeon x850 XT
OS: Win XP Pro
This enough info?
Cindy

Baldy wrote:

Cindy, can you tell us a little more about your system? It isn't a Mac, is it?

Cindy

I meant Yes I can supply my system info... pc+...
Here's My setup:
Monitor: Dell Ultrasharp 20 inch 2001FP. Purchased new from Dell Jan 2005 along with a new Dell Dimension XPS Gen4, intell Pentium 4 processor.
Video Card: 256MB ATI Radeon x850 XT
OS: Win XP Pro
This enough info? Ask whatever you need to know.


Baldy: I read your post at: http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?postid=128833#post128833
and the blog entry but didn't see any replies.

You wrote in your blog: To make Photoshop and your browser look almost identical, choose sRGB as your monitor profile. Then continue with life. One less thing.

But... that doesn't tell us what our prints will look like before ordering as everyone's monitor displays sRGB depending on how they've set up brightness, etc. Which is why I bought the Monoco Optix XR Pro... so I could judge & proof in advance what I'd be recieving back from the lab. What about those of us who've spent $$$'s to calibrate & profile our monitors so they'd display correctly??? And ultimatly come close to matching smugmuts calibration print when view the proof set-up in PS-CS2

I wish I could figure out the problem... hopfully before I pull my hair out. Before calibrating when I was doing so visually... I could get things fairly close... by fairly close I mean I was still having to guess far to much regarding what my prints would look like when I got them back. But at least when viewing proof they looked closer than what I'm still getting now.

????? - it's not mentioned anywhere but 'should' we or should we not covert our files to ezprints profile before uploading? I havn't been but when I convert to it and then also click to view proof... it's closer... but isn't that a double wammy that would result in worse prints yet?

Thanks in advance to any & all help.
Cindy

TristanP

Cindy wrote:

????? - it's not mentioned anywhere but 'should' we or should we not covert our files to ezprints profile before uploading? I havn't been but when I convert to it and then also click to view proof... it's closer... but isn't that a double wammy that would result in worse prints yet?
Cindy

I would go right to ezprints with this question. They've always been helpful when I had questions.