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Color Accuracy?

grinch2901grinch2901 Posts: 1,247
edited February 2017 in The Commons

I just got a new souped up laptop with a good GPU, hooray. But I notice that looking at my old renders on it, they seem a little yellow in the skin. They didn't on my old laptop. Obviously this one sees color somewhat differently than the other.  Of course this means whatever I render will look different to most everyone else, perhaps the tint I'm choosing which looks awesome on MY scrren looks god awful on YOUR screen.  But how can I know?

I can play around with the settings but I never know if they are "right".  For example, I did a google search on "faces" and the images came back many with a similar yellow tint so I adjust the settings in the NVIDIA control panel to  make them look more natural. Great, then I looked at a picture of a Miami Dolphins player and he had on light blue pants instead of aqua.  So I definitely didn't get it right.  Makes me wonder if there a way to use some sort of color reference to get adjust the colors on a laptop.  

What do people do to calibrate their monitors, without spending money on a special peice of test equipment?

Post edited by grinch2901 on

Comments

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,704

    My laptop monitor is off too. What I do is email myself the image and check

    it out on my iPad. I find my iPad is a truer representation of color and brightness 

  • AllenArtAllenArt Posts: 7,175

    You could try this. It's an interactive monitor calibration/tester.

    Laurie

  • grinch2901grinch2901 Posts: 1,247

    I was considering taking a photo of three objects with specific colors, then trying to get the screen to match them as closely as possible while looking at the real objects as reference. Say a yellow rubber duck, a bright blue book, and a red jacket. If they all look just right on the screen I suppose it's as good as I can get.  The alternative you mention Serene Night of always checking on another screen is good too, I did something similar by using my iPhone as a reference to try to match the colors on the DAZ forum homepage (the ornange banner, the blue menu bar at the top) but they always are a little off. But for each render to have to do that seems like it would be a real time sink.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,704

    A persons perception and or visual response to color can also be different. I tend to like things quite colorful and frequently have to tone down my colors to reflect more realistic values. 

  • grinch2901grinch2901 Posts: 1,247

    Color brightness is an artistic choice you make as the artist and you may make a concession to the audience to adjust it if you wish. If you think something is blue and everyone else thinks it's green then they aren't seeing what you intended and digital art is unique in this regard. To display our works we rely on media that is different for each observer.  I think if other people's monitors are off, my stuff will look weird to those few. But if mine is off, it will look weird to everone else and not by my choice but rather a limitation of the tech. But it seems it's hard to have it be otherwise.

  • LeatherGryphonLeatherGryphon Posts: 12,100
    edited February 2017

    Proper monitor calibration can be very technical and expensive but there are some free tools, images, and advice on the Internet.  Color is not a simple subject and can also be very subjective depending on image background color, room lighting, limitations of the monitor, limitations of your eyes, etc.  The only way to get precise measured & calibrated color is to let sensitive instruments do it.  But for most people many of the numerous manual online color calibration tools will be sufficient.  

    Now, with the quick answer out of the way, there are of course optical illusions to confuse the situation. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/02/27/12-fascinating-optical-illusions-show-how-color-can-trick-the-eye/?utm_term=.dc2aef3b7dac

    Beyond the technical, color is only a mental concept.  Color, as such, is not a physical property of matter.  Frequencies and intensities of light can be measured and compared but "color" itself is only a collective perception (an agreed upon illusion).  The majority of us with three "normal" RGB cone receptors in our eyes can get a committee to agree if something is "red" or "blue" or "green" or 'brown" or "mauve", or "cerulian" or "pink", etc. but none of us know exactly what the other guy is actually seeing, and there are many people who don't have 3 normal cone receptor types and can't distinquish as many colors as "normals" can.  And there are even some people who have 4 cone receptor types and they see millions more shades of color than "normals" can even imagine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrachromacy

    http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2015/02/what-like-see-a-hundred-million-colors.html

    Post edited by LeatherGryphon on
  • nonesuch00nonesuch00 Posts: 18,729

    I have a 2011 HP laptop and a 2005 Acer monitor and the 2011 HP laptop is definately 'cool K' colors, like 5000K or higher and the old monitor is still 'warm K' like 2700K or there abouts. Even looking at white the Acer monitor looks muddy on whites compared to the HP laptop. 

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