Time To Upgrade With Datacolor

The first time a horse kicks you in the shin you notice it. If it goes on long enough you get used to it and dodge as best you can and then just tend to limp about. But the thing still rankles - and eventually you tire of the sport - generally before the gee does. At this point some citizens haul out a large betsey and old Dobbin is consigned to the glue factory.

So it is with electronic gear. The first glitch is frightening and causes concern but after you discover that you can "cure" it by turning the thing off and on again or banging the side of he box, you tend to just carry on and let it happen.

So it was with my old Datacolor Spyder 2 Express program in the iMac and Macbook Pro. It worked fine for 5 years and then occasionally it would hang up at the last part of the calibrations sequence - the screen would go sort of pinkish and I would have to run it again to get it to go straight through. One day the second run did not cure it and I needed a third one...kick, kick, kick...

Out with the electronic roscoe. Removed the Spyder 2 Express and installed a Spyder 4 Express in its place. All has become better. The new program works efficiently and already recognises what it must do without having to be repeatedly told.

One can only assume that there is a finite life to software, as there is to horses.

I Pressed The Print Button, But Why Does It Look Like That?

It looks like that for any number of reasons:

a. It is an autochrome. Made up of dyed grains of starch bound onto a glass plate. With an autochrome any image is a good image and if it has survived the last 100 years without cracking or fungus you have a museum piece.

b. Your print heads are clogged. Run a nozzle check on your epson printer. if the little pattern of checking squares has missing segments, run a head clean cycle. Check again and repeat if necessary. Eventually you will have a full checking pattern and a clean print.

c. You have got a massive imbalance between what you see on your computer screen and what your printer is being instructed to do. Have you calibrated the monitor screen lately? if not, try one of the Datacolor Spyder range of monitor calibrators. Do it regularly.

d. Is your printer confused as to who is in control? Have you given it double instructions with your image programming fighting with the in-built printer control. Choose one. Turn the other off.

e. Is your printer aware what sort of paper you've dropped in it?  You could probably print on sultana bread toast if you set the printer head high enough, but would it make a baby portrait look good? Be sensible with your paper choice and load the appropriate profile into the printer before you start. If in doubt, stick to the manufacturer's own paper.

f. It's your eyes. Visine in each one and a night's sleep. If your image in the mirror in the morning looks as bad as the print, see your opthalmic specialist. If he looks as bad as the print, you may have to be content with life as it is.

Cube Of No Colour - Eat Your Heart Out Rubik

The littlest things can often be the most important. If you are searching for a way to increase the colour and exposure accuracy of your photos, Datacolor have a neat solution to start doing this in the field or studio.

Lots of people start their shooting sessions with a shot of a grey card. This may not sound as much fun as starting them with a shot of rye whiskey, but in the end it delivers a better result. They carry the image of that grey card through the entire capture and computer stage and then look at it on the screen. When they can manage to see the same colour on the screen as in their hand they are on target. If they can carry that through to a finished file or print they are home safe.

I am afraid that this is an over simplification, but it is better than just setting the camera to Auto white balance and hoping for the best. Hope delivers sometimes but never when you are home to sign for it...

Datacolor have made a small cube that has black, white, and grey panels on all six sides. It has a tripod socket on the bottom and a cord to hang it from a Christmas tree on the top. You capture it in your first picture and then look at it in the final computer image, just like the flat grey card - but in this case it is bathed in the scene light from 6 different angles.

There are two extra features that are unique - a silver ball on the top that will capture and display the brightest of the specular highlights that the lighting affords. You'll know what your white-out point is.

Like a Highlander on guard duty, you will also know where the black-out point is - there is a hole on one face of the cube that allows light in but never lets it out again. Like the ATO and your tax money...

In store right now, and the best bet for quick post-production time that I know.

Is It Just Me Or Does It Seem Purple In Here?

The Macbook Pro that this blog is written on has a program inside it from the Datacolor people to help it keep the colours accurate. Every month it pops up a little window to tell me that it is time to reset the laptop. If I ignore it, it keeps reminding me - every time I turn on the laptop. It is like the still small voice of conscience. As we have been busy at home I have not bothered...

Looking at the heading image, I am starting to think I might make time...

For those of you who suspect that you might be in the same boat - you know; the one with the water coming over the gunwales and the sharks gnawing at the stern - perhaps you should come in and get a Datacolor Spyder for yourselves.

They do three models and they are not expensive - the top models calibrate all sorts of computers and monitors in all sorts of situations.