[SkaredShtles]

I know I should do a search, but does anyone have input whether this is a good LCD monitor:

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=203277712&adid=17653&dcaid=17653

My wife will be using it mainly for photo editing...

 

[narlus]

i bought a similar one, though it was the VG (video graphics) series:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16824116060

i'm very happy with it. i needed to get another video card as well, so be sure that your current card can handle the additional resolution this monitor offers.

another bit of advice, if she's mainly using it for photo work. get one of these:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824999036

it's invaluable.

 

[stinkyboy]

If color correction is important, at least go with the Graphics Series.

I have 2 of these and I am very happy.

 

[SkaredShtles]

i bought a similar one, though it was the VG (video graphics) series:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16824116060

i'm very happy with it. i needed to get another video card as well, so be sure that your current card can handle the additional resolution this monitor offers.

She's going to be getting a whole new computer system. The ol' 900Mhz PIII is getting long in the tooth.

another bit of advice, if she's mainly using it for photo work. get one of these:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824999036

it's invaluable.

Yeah... I think I'll spring for one of those too.

 

[SkaredShtles]

If color correction is important, at least go with the Graphics Series.

I have 2 of these and I am very happy.

Does the monitor calibration software make this unnecessary?

 

[narlus]

Does the monitor calibration software make this unnecessary?

no idea....i could never really tell the difference between the VG and VX series. viewsonic's site wasn't helpful.

 

[stinkyboy]

Does the monitor calibration software make this unnecessary?

If these images are getting printed, getting a Spyder is the best way to go, but it it's just for random intarweb stuff, you should be fine.

 

[narlus]

i don't agree...contrast is important as well. i had my monitor calibrated via the adobe gamma thingie in windows, and i guess i botched it a bit, because photos which looked good on my monitor were too dark on others.

 

[SkaredShtles]

If these images are getting printed, getting a Spyder is the best way to go, but it it's just for random intarweb stuff, you should be fine.

This will be primarily for photos that she is printing (she prints primarily at an online print shop, so it won't be on our local printer). Is this "spyder" thing you speak of the thing that Narlus mentioned?

 

[narlus]

yeah, that is the same thing.

i know zilch about color management and the such, but can i assume she's got the printer output profile so she can match monitor results w/ print results? what colorspace is she using?

 

[stinkyboy]

Online printers print fast and cheap, but they do gang runs so quality can be questionable. Having a local printer do it and being there for the press run is ideal as you can have the pressman tweak the color.

Narlus, do you tweak the color, etc. in your digital images. I'm sure there are still purists out there in the photog world.

 

[narlus]

yeah, i do a fair bit. i shoot RAW, so any in-camera processing which is done for jpg (saturation, sharpening, contrast, etc) i have to do manually. i usually don't do much for saturation, but do white balance adjustments and shadows/midlevels/highlight tweaks all the time.

 

[Kornphlake]

I guess I could be considered a purist, I've got a DSLR but I don't have any photo editing software other than a program called Photostudio 2000, I got it bundled with a scanner I bought 7 years ago. I had a bootleg version of PhotoShop but didn't have the motivation to learn how to use it.

My wife was part of a test group for Capture NX, we had a temporary license that expired several months ago, my wife liked it, I thought it was fun to play with but I always went a little too far and made photos look unnatural. I prefer shooting jpegs and printing them as they are seen through the viewfinder, if there's something I don't like I'll tinker around with the exposure, that's why I went digital in the first place.

So yeah, either I'm too lazy or I'm a purist.

 

[narlus]

i wouldn't characterize shooting RAW and then doing post-process work as being a non-purist, i just see it as having more control over the final output, rather than relying on a camera's algorithm to do it.

 

[Kornphlake]

Sorry to bastardize the thread...

I guess it depends on your definition of being a purist. I've seen a lot of people adjust color so much that a red shirt appears orange or green eyes are blue, that's much more than post processing and color balancing, that's downright trickery. I suppose it's not much different than using a colored filter in front of the lens to turn a pale sky deep blue or a graduated neutral density filter to photograph a sunset.

I guess I'm just lazy, not a purist because I'd screw a filter onto my lens without a second thought.