First Time Calibrating Monitor

[linpelk]

Hi,
I just got my Spyder3 Pro in the mail. I'm trying to calibrate my imac monitor. When installing, it asked me if it had brightness, contrast and/or backlight controls. Obviously, it has brightness and I was able to find the control for contrast, but I'm assuming that backlight is the same as brightness and that there isn't another slider/control for that (I couldn't find anything about it) Please correct me if I'm wrong. Ok, so it said to set these to the "factory default". How do I know what that is? On the info. on the setup process it suggested that if you didn't know what the "factory default" is, then usually brightness should be at 100% and contrast around 50%, but I've never touched my contrast slider on my settings and it was all the way down at the bottom. Since I've never fiddled with that, I'm assuming that THAT is the factory setting. Should I adjust that up to 50%?
I kind of went through the rest of the steps not really knowing if I was doing it right. After it was done and you could see the comparison pictures, it almost seemed to have more of a magenta cast to it. Is it possible that my eyes just got used to looking at the uncalibrated screen so the "cooler" look feels more comfortable to me? How do I verify if I calibrated it correctly?
This whole "color management" part of photography is my big hurdle right now and I'm taking BABY steps toward understanding it. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[bburzycki]

Man I hate monitor calibration - it's just that simple... so many models, so many controls that are not the same..and that does not even dive into vid card types and quaility issues with all of them...

If you bought the thing new - just call or hit the Spyder site and ask.. they might have a quick solve for what = what on different brands as I am sure they get the question daily...

 

[linpelk]

Man I hate monitor calibration - it's just that simple... so many models, so many controls that are not the same..and that does not even dive into vid card types and quaility issues with all of them...

If you bought the thing new - just call or hit the Spyder site and ask.. they might have a quick solve for what = what on different brands as I am sure they get the question daily...

That's a good thought. Thanks for the reply.

 

[dhilberg]

Regarding backlighting, I stumbled across this on the Datacolor website:
Do I have brightness or backlight control on my LCD monitor? - Powered By Kayako SupportSuite

I would think your monitor's manual would be able to shed more light on the backlight/brightness issue.

As for factory defaults, there might be a way to reset your monitor to the factory defaults. My monitor has this option. Check the manual and proceed from there.

It should be calibrated correctly provided you did exactly what the Spyder 3 Pro told you to. If you print a photo in sRGB and compare it to the same one on your monitor they should look pretty close to identical (provided both are in sRGB). This is the point of monitor calibration.

Your eyes adjust to what you see, so when you change it (calibrate) it will look funny at first. Your eyes will adjust again.

I have the Spyder 3 Pro and it's very easy. You shouldn't have any problems getting your monitor calibrated.