Colorvision Spyder 2 Software Download Mac Updated

Colorvision Spyder 2 Software Download Mac

Colorvision Spyder2 PRO Studio Test Review
© 2006 KenRockwell.com

I'd go Spyder2 Limited hither, Spyder2 Suite here, Spyder2 PRO hither, Spyder2 Plus here, or I'd get any of them here, and the explanation of which does what in the article below

INTRODUCTION

The ColorVision Spyder is super easy to use and well worth the $63 - $300 it costs, depending on the package y'all cull. I remember when these instruments used to exist complicated, toll $10,000 and did a lot less.

You don't need any color, contrast or even brightness controls on your computer or monitor. The software controls everything.

It transformed the screen of my iBook from a soft, whimpy blue to solid, warm, delicious, vivid and accurate color. Await at the snapshot above of the Spyder stuck on my laptop's previously calibrated screen. Does it look neutral grayness? It sure does!

I got one of these when I got a laptop with an LCD screen. The Colorvision Spyder makes a huge difference not just in matching my prints, but too it makes my images look fantastic on everyone else's screens, similar yours.

It allows your monitor to match industry standards. This lets y'all create images on your monitor to look as practiced as possible on equally broad a range of other people's monitors, every bit well as giving you prints as they looked on your monitor.

It doesn't necessarily brand the images on your monitor "better." It makes them match accepted standards. I learned this working in Hollywood: it doesn't matter what it looks similar on your screen; information technology matters what information technology looks like on everyone else'south. Near people, including myself, honey images on a calibrated monitor.

If y'all use whatsoever laptop or flat panel LCD monitor I'd suggest you too get i of these. This is because LCDs vary wildly from brand to brand. LCDs almost always look great, yet if you don't calibrate them they probably won't match anyone else's monitor. That means images you carefully create on your monitor probably won't wait equally skilful anywhere else. Since I publish and share all my work it'due south of import it look practiced everywhere.

THE SYSTEM

The system is ii pieces. I is a CD ROM with the software. The other is the hockey puck with a USB cablevision you see higher up. Information technology comes in a well designed box with a custom foam insert which can be used every bit a great cheapskate case.

THE VERSIONS

See also Colorvision's own site here for details. These modify faster than I can update ths page.

The various versions of the system offer software with more or less tweaks, and also additional software unrelated to calibration. No one has been able to tell me what I'thousand supposed to do with the DoctorPRO and Colorist software that came with my Spyder2PRO, the most expensive version.

I suspect most folks will be very happy with the least expensive Spyder2express, if its few presets are what you need for your monitor. You need 6500K white bespeak for CRTs and native white signal for LCDs.

The most expensive versions are for nuts like me who want to make absolute chromaticity measurements. The fancy versions as well let you calibrate your monitors to arbitrary nonexistent non-standards, which seems pretty silly.

All the current systems use the same sensor and are equally accurate, so long every bit the offering the settings you need.

THE SENSOR

The Spyder sensor has a pull out honeycomb. You leave the honeycomb in for LCDs and laptops and take information technology out for conventional CRTs. The honeycomb restricts the bending of credence so it'south not fooled past the color variations seen from the sides of LCDs.

In that location is a sliding weight stuck on the cord. You movement it up and downwardly along the cord. The weight balances the sensor while it dangles in front end of your monitor.

For my LCD I let the weight clip to the tiptop of the monitor and let the spyder hang at the correct position.

BASICS: CRT vs. LCD and How to Calibrate Them (click)

PERFORMANCE

Installation

EASY! This was my biggest fear. I plugged in the sensor, popped in the CD and kept hit all the defaults. Earlier I knew it I had my contour and it looked great!

It'due south easy to install, easy to utilize and it just works. I can't say plenty good about it. Everything should exist this easy.

Usage

Be sure to plough off your screen saver, since it will accept 7 minutes to run and you won't exist using the computer. If the screen saver pops on or the screen automatically dims you have to first from scratch. If you lot don't know how to conciliate the screen saver and then wiggle the mouse on one side every then often, or go on striking the SHIFT key, to keep it awake. On my Mac I go into Apple Menu > Organisation Preferences > Energy Saver and slide the "put the display to sleep" slider to "Never." Remember to put information technology back when you're done.

Equally you click the next pointer it will eventually inquire yous to stick the sensor on the middle spot of your monitor as I prove in the photo above. It so throws up a series of test colors and measures them for 7 minutes total. At the stop it's created a color profile you name and salve. I e'er put the date in my profiles and so I can tell them autonomously.

Gamma Preferences

Use two.ii, the standard for sRGB, Adobe RGB, idiot box and video.

Macintoshes used to exist set to 1.8. I gear up my Macs to 2.ii so I run into what matches the rest of the world's sRGB monitors. ii.2 will look darker than you're used to on Mac.

Contrary to mutual fear, this is least important for PhotoShop. PhotoShop actually corrects for any monitor gamma you choose, so setting 1.six or 2.4 nevertheless looks the same in Photoshop! Simply try it. Of course these will look wildly unlike in your web browser or anything else.

If you take to ask, just use 2.2 for Mac and PC.

White Point Preferences for LCDs

When information technology asks y'all for your preferences, tell it white point = Native if yous're on a laptop. Don't click that yous take any monitor settings to tweak. Plow your brightness all the way up and savour. Native means that information technology doesn't endeavour to change the white point; it leaves information technology exactly where the backlight of the LCD already is.

I suggest Native over half dozen,500º Kelvin because the profile will have to reduce the brightness of the whites of the LCD to correct the LCD's color. This is considering an LCD is really a clear screen with variable transmission placed over a fluorescent background. To change the whites the transparency of the screen is reduced in one color or another instead of existence clear.

It would be fine to set 6,500º K on a very high quality desktop monitor that has a 170º viewing angle both horizontally and vertically similar the Apple Cinema Displays. Of course the Apple Movie theatre Displays only happen to have native white points at well-nigh exactly 6,500K anyway. On near monitors and laptops the LCDs change color and effulgence as yous look at them from above or below. The whites always await white, just other colors tend to look lighter from above and darker from below. If yous set the calibrator to adjust the white indicate you volition now see a variation of the white point from the superlative to the bottom of your screen on most monitors! This looks awful when you work on text or other white fields . Play with this if you lot similar, or save yourself the trouble and choose Native for white indicate with an LCD unless you take 1 of the $3,000 Apple Movie theatre Displays.

Go ahead and effort setting 6500K for your LCD if you want. You won't hurt anything.

Colorimeter Manner

The fancier versions of this calibrator will measure and tell yous your LCD's native white betoken. My iBook'due south native white point is 4,780K, delta uv 0.3 and luminance is 23.4 fL equally of December 2005.

My Kaiser light table measures 800 fL and four,870K with a delta uv of 0.03. This is another huge advantage of slide film: a light tabular array has ten times the brightness of a computer monitor!

I don't run into conversion ability in the photometer, however one pes-Lambert (fL) is three.426 Candelas per meter squared (Cd/m^2) if you demand to convert. The changed is 0.2919.

White Indicate Preferences for CRTs

For traditional CRTs choose white indicate = 6500º Kelvin and Gamma = ii.2. This is the standard for both sRGB, Adobe RGB, television and DVDs.

People who worry too much worry themselves sick over this; Photoshop cancels out whatever weird settings anyway. Just similar gamma, PhotoShop is stupid-resistant and really corrects so no mater what white indicate you selection, Photoshop displays the same thing. Try it! The biggest difference will be seen in regular applications like your web browser and electronic mail. It'southward not that important since heart tends to compensate for white point regardless of what you lot cull.

If yous know where the RGB manual adjustments are, cheque the boxes to let you to set them. Setting the RGB and brightness and contrast on the monitor before making a profile will let you go the very all-time quality. This is the precalibration feature of the Spyder: information technology looks at the screen and tells yous where to movement the settings. This is because, unlike an LCD, the CRT is totally analog and makes whatever colors it does based on how many electrons shoot out of the gun at the back of the monitor. It'due south best to adjust these first so the computer then has complete control over the entire range.

Consumer TVs and out-of-the-box CRT monitors tend to be prepare at 9,300º One thousand. This was started past the Japanese to give an unfair look of brighter, whiter white when set beside other TVs on the sales floor. The Hollywood SMPTE standard for tv set and monitors and sRGB, etc. is the warmer half dozen,500º K setting. Of class we in Hollywood express joy that we colour right all the DVDs and TV shows on 6500K monitors which are and so viewed at domicile on 9300K monitors. It'south not a big bargain; your heart compensates automatically.

Some people in print supposedly like 5,400º Chiliad. This looks way too orange for me.

Sensor Placement

For LCDs just stick information technology in the eye as I show to a higher place.

CRTs vary across the screen. That'southward one of the reasons nosotros pay $30,000 for the CRT monitors we use for making DVD telecine masters in Hollywood: they are consistent from left to correct. Even on these $30,000 monitors nosotros go different readings at different points on the screen. My 23" Viewsonic PF-815 is libation in the middle and warmer around the edges, then I tend to stick the calibrator about i/3 of the way out to the edge. Y'all can fiddle with this if you please, or ignore information technology and leave it in the center.

Measurement Time

Software Version i.five took well-nigh 15 minutes to scan. Each colour patch pops upwards for almost xv seconds. This lets it make the well-nigh precise possible reading.

Software version 2.0, which is a free upgrade that came out in 2005, improves this to 7 minutes.

Accurateness and Repeatability

It looks cracking! It was dead on the first time I tried, and matched every other time I ran it. I didn't have to fiddle around to get a adept profile.

The simply footling I did was to attempt different settings out of curiosity. Trust me, employ the standard settings I advise above and you'll be fine.

The instructions caution to calibrate in a dark room at midnight nether a new moon. Curiosity got the best of me as usual and I likewise made a profile in the twenty-four hour period with all the lights on. The profiles matched exactly! Therefore I don't worry about the lighting when calibrating. I just ensure that there isn't any direct sunlight. This was on my LCD; I doubtable y'all will have a problem with a CRT since the glass is and so much thicker and can permit room lite to sneak in.

I'm also impressed that the side by side time I ran a profile that it also matched exactly. There is no need to fiddle around to get a skilful profile: the first try was perfect, so was every other. Even from month to month I become the aforementioned results, which likewise goes to evidence that my Apple iBook laptop doesn't vary. I doubtable with whatsoever quality LCD that you could infringe a friend's calibrator and be set for quite a while, like until you become a new laptop.

I used to work for Tektronix in 1996 who at that time fabricated a $3,000 monitor calibrator. The designer of that tester was adamant nigh how information technology was more accurate than some other testers that price many times more. It turns out the Tektronix tester used narrower-band Scott drinking glass filters which gave it more accuracy than the $10,000 testers, although the narrow filters limited its sensitivity at dark levels.

The designer could go on and on well-nigh how the other $iii,000 - $10,000 testers weren't equally skillful, and he knew his stuff.

Afterward I asked him how adept these footling USB based $300 testers could maybe be. Surprisingly he said they could exist fine, then long as you lot didn't leave them out in the light which could crusade their gel filters to fade. I was amazed! When I asked how these inexpensive probes could possibly exist whatsoever good the answer simply was that the USB probes are designed to work over a much smaller range of light and color, thus they tin can price much less. These $300 testers are likewise slower: one reading every 10 seconds, every bit opposed to the lab meters, which requite several readings each second. The $10,000 lab testers are designed to work over broad ranges of illumination and temperatures etc; the USB testers simply exercise home and function monitors. It nonetheless seems too good to be true, but in any case I'm very happy with the results regardless of my skepticism.

Compared to Monaco

The Monaco system does a similar job, but faster. On the downside y'all take to brand a black reference measurement confronting your desk which you don't take to do with the Spyder. I think I get more consistent results with the Spyder.

The Monaco is meliorate if you want to calibrate scanners and printers, too, which this Spyder doesn't do.

I prefer the results of this ColorVision Spyder for calibrating monitors. I use the Monaco for my scanners. A report is forthcoming on that, too.

Mac or Windows

The Spyder runs on both Mac and Windows.

I use Mac; I haven't tried it on Windows. ColorVision says information technology will piece of work equivalently, give or have Windows Bone limitations.The Spyder also works on Widows. I haven't tried it. ColorVision says it will piece of work equivalently, give or take i or two windows OS limitations. God bless yous if you nonetheless use windows. I can't suggest what to do or where to relieve your profiles. Good luck. Check the fine print for exactly which Windows versions are compatible.

If you're on Windows and critical enough to worry this much almost color you lot'd exist well brash to upgrade to Mac. I have a page on Why Pros Use Mac.

Apple Macintosh

I'one thousand on OS 10.4.3. I use Apple tree's cheapest 12" iBook laptop because I prefer the portability, durability and bombardment life over the more expensive PowerBooks. Yep, today I do my about serious piece of work on this little kiddie laptop, even with big film scans! I merely got too lazy to transfer work betwixt my desktop dual G4 system and my laptop as I came and went, so I merely do everything on my laptop. My dual G4 will be for sale soon.

When I use the Spyder to calibrate my machine everything is calibrated. End of story.

Usage Details

Most midtone grays are blueish as iBooks come calibrated from the manufacturing plant. After calibration they go more yellowish and more right.

This looked weird to me for most the first week, since I was used to the older blue await. Afterwards a calendar week went by I got used to the right screen and now but love it.

My iBook native white point measures about 5500 Thou, not 6500 Grand. Therefore my whole screen is calibrated to about 5500 K since I calibrate LCDs to Native white point.. I adopt this to trying to calibrate to 6500 K which makes the whites expect weird and dimmer at unlike angles. Forcing the calibration to 6500 Grand from the native 5500 K will make white screens of text await awful, since the white will expect unlike from one function of the screen to the side by side by virtue of most LCDs' imperfect off-angle color.

The Apple Cinema Displays apparently are native at 6500 One thousand, another reason to chose them for photography.

RECOMMENDATIONS

I have one of the fancy Spyders and honey it. I was happy with my LCD at first and had no idea how blue it was until after I calibrated it.

The funny affair is, every bit I expected, that since I was happy to begin with that the calibrated screen looked really weird for a few days. One time I got used to information technology the uncalibrated screen now looks crappy past comparison. My uncalibrated iBook was very bluish right at the lightest colors just earlier white.

Be careful how your applications apply color management. In one case I calibrated my screen I turned off Color Sync in iView since it seemed as if the profile was existence applied twice. I'chiliad not very smart here; I merely tweak things until they work.

Information technology transformed the screen of my iBook from a soft, whimpy blue to solid, warm, delicious and accurate colour.