Best way for a beginner to calibrate monitor

[Rumrunner 24]

I was looking for a fairly simple way to get the best picture out of my VIZIO M470VSE-4.I'm comfortable doing more advanced calibration if there aren't any good options for beginners.I saw that article on the main page today and that's how I got the idea.I don't have a hundreds or thousands of dollars to spend for it though.I do have a few Disney and other Blu-Ray disc's but I don't see that calibration software Ive read about on the back of the case.Is there any free software that's decent ? I just don't know if its worth it to spend the money if may not see any improvement.

 

[Phillip Corcoran]

Rough and ready software-only solutions may be sufficient for some, but since they rely solely on visual adjustments they won't give you a "standard" setup which remains constant across all monitors regardless of who is viewing it, but if you'd like to try it, one such utility is the free"Calibrize": http://www.calibrize.com/

But for solutions which combine software with hardware to eliminate the guesswork, one of the most popular is the Datacolor Spyder which I use myself. This type of monitor profiling is essential to anyone who is serious about producing accurate colour data on a monitor (eg someone who prints photographs): http://spyder.datacolor.com/display-calibration/

 

[Rumrunner 24]

Rough and ready software-only solutions may be sufficient for some, but since they rely solely on visual adjustments they won't give you a "standard" setup which remains constant across all monitors regardless of who is viewing it, but if you'd like to try it, one such utility is the free"Calibrize": http://www.calibrize.com/

But for solutions which combine software with hardware to eliminate the guesswork, one of the most popular is the Datacolor Spyder which I use myself. This type of monitor profiling is essential to anyone who is serious about producing accurate colour data on a monitor (eg someone who prints photographs): http://spyder.datacolor.com/display-calibration/

Thanks for the reply.I tried the Calibrize program but when I get to the gamma screen I cant figure out how to set it.The instructions are simple enough but they dont make sense to me.No matter how I adjust the sliders I cant get the colors to blend

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I think I did the contrast and brightness right but the gamma seems off.

 

[Rumrunner 24]

I downloaded the cALMAN trial or whatever it is.It seems like you have to work at NASA to figure out the damn thing.I'm very lost here but like I said Im pretty tech savy so dont give up on me yet.I just got a GEforce GTX 700 so I really want to get the best settings out of this if possible Otherwise I feel like theres no point in having a 400$ graphics card.

 

[Phillip Corcoran]

I found visual adjustment of gamma difficult to achieve too with software-only solutions, so I gave up and bought the Spyder colorimeter. Even that can do only so much if it's a cheap monitor, or if the existing monitor hardware colour settings (using the monitor setup menu) are way off prior to calibration.

Many people tend to have brightness set too high in the monitor hardware settings, which can put it beyond the gamma adjustment range of the software.

 

[Phillip Corcoran]

If you don't do any serious photo editing or printing, and spend most of your computer time gaming, there really is no point in trying to get to grips with monitor calibration.

"I really want to get the best settings out of this if possible Otherwise I feel like theres no point in having a 400$ graphics card".

You're paying for the GPU's rendering and processing power for playing the latest games. That's the whole point of spending top-dollar on one, whether you bother calibrating the monitor or you don't. Me, on the other hand -- I have just a standard, cheap Radeon card because I'm not a gamer, but because of my work, correct monitor colour setup is vital.

Have a look in your monitor's built-in settings menu. There should a choice of preset colour temperatures you can choose, as well as brightness and contrast.