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Gamma on PC and MAC Monitors


E

Erik

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CORRECTED VERSION:

Thanks a lot to Deke McLelland for this one.

When you're on a MAC

Open the Levels dialog.
the central slider is normally set at 1
0.8 gives you an idea what your image looks like on a PC
to get the exact brightness for PC users, set to 1.2

When you're on a PC

Do the same as above, but the opposite:
1.2 gives you an idea what the image will look like on a Mac,
to get the exact brightness for Mac users, set at 0.8 and save


MAC: set levels at 1.2 for PC PC: set levels at 0.8 for MAC
 
WAHOOO

WAHOOO


Thanks Erik that saves me having to make a custom Windows gamma profile :D



I knew there must have been a way to do it like that somehow .



Excellent that means all I have to do to my Quicktime anis is add an adjustment layer in After effects :D



I was thinking I would have to make a profile with a gamma of 2 with Windows being 2.2 and Mac 1.8 :)


You have made my day bud thanks



Stu.
 
In fact I just shared something that wasn't mine, but Deke McLelland's, writer of the Photoshop Bible and author of the totaltraining movies. The honour is completely his, but WE ARE OUT OF OUR MISERY.

One saying of Deke: Make my day at the Atomic caf?.

Like that very much.
Cheers
 
Extending off of Erik's excellent tip:

Another method to soft proof the different working spaces of Windows and Mac is to access the Macintosh/Windows settings of the Proof Setup Command, which can be found under View > Proof Setup > Macintosh RGB and/or Windows RGB.

If your workflow is predicated on your images being viewed cross-platform, then soft proofing the different working spaces is something one needs to be cognizant of.

Soft Proof - Hard Proof
In print, a hard proof is printed to determine how color will be reproduced on a specific output device.

A soft proof is a screen preview of how your image will look under a different working space and/or how your image will look on a specific output device.

For example, I have an Epson Stylus Photo 1280 that I use to hard proof my images. Additionally, before I hard proof anything - I soft proof it in Photoshop: View > Proof Setup > Custom > Profile > Epson Stylus Photo 1280.

In addition, to get an accurate representation of the different working spaces (especially when doing color important work) - it's imperative that your monitor be calibrated and characterized on a regular basis. I usually calibrate twice a month, some people I know calibrate once a week, while others - less frequent. The frequency is determined by things such as monitor color shifting (every monitor shifts over an extended period), etc...

I calibrate my white point color temperature to 6500 Kelvin, and since I'm using Windows - I set my gamma to 2.2.

As for making modifications to one's gamma settings, Bruce Fraser suggests using your native monitor gamma as one will lose fewer levels in one's video card's lookup table.

Adobe Gamma vs. a Colorimeter/Hardware approach
Too many variables exist that could throw off your calibration and characterization of your monitor using Adobe Gamma (Adobe Gamma being good, and definitely preferable to nothing) so I use a colorimeter (ColorVision) that attaches to my monitor and measures colorimetric values to both calibrate and characterize/profile. Additionally, I use Profiler RGB to calibrate my printer so I can attain accurate color output.

Additionally, I use View > New View to soft proof my images. This is great as it allows me to compare and contrast the soft proof with the original as a frame of reference.

I hope this helps!
:)

Rick Miller
 
It does indeed Master Yoda!

In fact: I think that if I have some questions, I'll post them here too.

You write my language!
Thanks

:D The Baroness: Oh, Mr. Groucho, I'm speechless...
[:I Stay like that!
 
Erik said:
CORRECTED VERSION:

Thanks a lot to Deke McLelland for this one.

When you're on a MAC

Open the Levels dialog.
the central slider is normally set at 1
0.8 gives you an idea what your image looks like on a PC
to get the exact brightness for PC users, set to 1.2

When you're on a PC

Do the same as above, but the opposite:
1.2 gives you an idea what the image will look like on a Mac,
to get the exact brightness for Mac users, set at 0.8 and save


MAC: set levels at 1.2 for PC PC: set levels at 0.8 for MAC
Click to expand...

I'm on a Mac and made a CD of a photo without any "PC gamma correction" and when we brought it up on the printer person's PC it was too bright. Shouldn't it have looked darker? ..RC [doh] [confused]
 
Shouldn't it have looked darker?
Click to expand...

No, the lower gamma of the mac causes images that show up on pc to appear lighter and images made on pc to appear darker on the mac.

I'm curious, maybe I'm missing something, what advantage does the levels method give you over just using the soft proofing built into photoshop? I'm probably just not seeing what you're talking about...must be time for another pot of coffee. :)
 
Thanks MindBender. I doubt if it's the lack of coffee.......I'm probably not being very clear here. I just read Rick Miller?s post about soft proof etc. and I have to admit that I don?t understand it. I?d like to learn more about it and would appreciate any guidance toward more info on the subject.

I?m still confused about the gamma/levels thing. here it says when you?re on a Mac to:

?Open the Levels dialog.
the central slider is normally set at 1
0.8 gives you an idea what your image looks like on a PC
to get the exact brightness for PC users, set to 1.2 ?

When I set it to 0.8 the image gets darker.I understand the above to say that that means it will look darker on a PC.....?
I send my photos (via CD) to a lab that uses PC?s and I?d like to know that they?re seeing the same thing that I see on my machine. Should I set the gamma to 1.2 for the CD I burn for them? I like to send them a guide print but now my printer won?t give me the right blues......... you can see my question about that at
http://www.photoshopgurus.info/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4587

so....I?ve got 2 questions here I guess....RC [confused]
 
Although there aren't many chords in them, playin' the blues is not easy.

This said, blue is always a difficult thing as you only have agreenish blue (CYAN) ink and you have to create all other blues from mixtures with the other three inks (Yellow, Magenta, being a deep purplish red, and Black, which is never black but always a tad showing the paper underneath and therefore sometimes is passed twice through the press if "real" black is used.
It's a complicated subject.

Best is (in my opinion) to save as PDF which is independant of either mac or PC.

Yes, softproofing is at least as good, but it is mainly used for printing.
Although it's been a long time since I psoted this, I suppose it was mainly meant as an easy trick to upload images to the web that can be seen on the monitor of the other system as intended.
Kiwi's images were a tad dark when seen on PC. With this trick, you simple change the gamma, and the image is seen as intended. On the other system that is.
In other words: a quick and dirty trick, not a real methodic approach. But it works...
 
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