Mac Colour profile

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Duncan_P

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Duncan
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Hi, I've just bought a new Macbook pro for uni and for editing in photoshop, how far off is the default colour profile compared to when it is calibrated with a spyder or similar? When I look under Display in system preferences there are about 8 or 9 different profiles and wondered if they were any better than the default. I do have a spyder at home but I wont be back for a while and wondered if I can get away with editing as it is, and whether one of the other profiles gives a better colour.

Thanks guys!!
 
The other 8 or 9 different profiles are working spaces and not display profiles i.e. they are used by editing software and can be embedded in JPEGs and TIFFs. You'll be way off if you use AdobeRGB, sRGB, ProPhotoRGB and the like as a display profile.

You can calibrate your display without the Spyder using your MacBook's System Preferences - Choose "Displays" and then the "Colour" tab (which is where you see your list of other profiles) and there's a "Calibrate..." button on the right. Start from the native LCD profile.

Click the "Calibrate..." button, choose "Expert Mode" and follow the instructions. You'll basically be matching squares of colour and brightness - it's reasonably idiot-proof and you'll find it easier if you can slightly blur the targets e.g. by squinting slightly. I'm moderately myopic so I just take my specs off.

The final steps will be to set Gamma and White point. These days, the advice is to choose a Gamma of 2.2 and the D65 white point because most of our images end up on the interwebs rather than as prints.

HTH
 
If the MBP is a retina option then the screen is fairly close to that of a standard sRGB profile straight out of the box ( well at least mine was). Comparing the default LCD ( which it was set to ) and the calibrated and profiled profile they were very close. However the screen brightness was too bright and had to be tamed.
 
The trouble with using sRGB as your display profile is that it has a narrow colour gamut and whilst all of your colour-managed applications may show images that look identical with regards to colours, it may be that they're identically wrong. And when they're seen on someone else's properly calibrated display, they may look pretty awful.

Display performance (its luminance and colour characteristics) drifts with time and so at least monthly, recalibration is required. Using an unchanged sRGB profile as your monitor profile would obviously not work in those circumstances.

Five minutes to calibrate your display every month is no big deal and is easy to do. Why not do it properly?

Obviously, using a colorimeter like the Spyder or ColorMunki is the gold standard but if you don't have such a device available, the built-in calibration process is an acceptable substitute.
 
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Thanks for the responses guys, once I can get home I will do it properly, just trying to make the best of my current situation for now. It is the new retina model.
 
Russell

I think you misunderstood me. I didn't suggest that you use sRGB as a profile for the rMBP, I stated that the display was very close to that of the sRGB colour space when correctly calibrated and profiled . The default colour LCD profile was also very close to both the sRGB colour space and the resultant profile.Which for an out of the box machine is quite impressive.

Also the LED display is very stable and shows little shift over many months. However correct calibration is essential if you want good repeatable results
 
Chappers said:
Russell

I think you misunderstood me. I didn't suggest that you use sRGB as a profile for the rMBP, I stated that the display was very close to that of the sRGB colour space when correctly calibrated and profiled . The default colour LCD profile was also very close to both the sRGB colour space and the resultant profile.Which for an out of the box machine is quite impressive.

Also the LED display is very stable and shows little shift over many months. However correct calibration is essential if you want good repeatable results
Click to expand...

Thanks for the clarification John. My apologies for the misunderstanding.
 
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