Need help with Dell U2711 and Macbook Pro Calibration

[TJ_Thorne]

So I have something weird going on and I'm going to try my best to explain it:

I am using an early 2011 15" MBP.

I have a (new to me) Dell U2711. It is set to 1920x1080 until I get the Thunderbolt>Dual DVI convertor. Right now I think it's a single DVI convertor.

I am using an X-rite Colormunki calibrater. Latest software is running.

I have calibrated both monitors in the same ambient light. BUT.. they are different. The MBP seems more 'correct' and all of my previous photos have been calibrated on it correctly.. or so I assume because my critique group has been commenting on the images as I feel I am seeing them.. and I feel I am seeing everyone's images as they intend. This has also been verified with printing.

I edited my first image on this monitor and everyone is telling me that my shadows are too bright. This caused me to think that something is up with the monitor because I've never gotten that comment and the shadows on the edited image look sweet. So I open it on the MBP and sure enough.. it looks like crap. So I start investigating.

Basically.. I can take the image from the Dell and drag it to the MBP. When the image is half on one monitor and half on the other monitor the image will change ON BOTH MONITORS. Does that make sense?

Let me try again: I have the image on the dell. Shadows look fine. When I drag it towards the MBP at some point.. the image will show as it shows on the MBP (shadows too bright) but it will show that way on both the Dell and the MBP. When I drag it towards the Dell.. it switched back to the Dell profile on BOTH the Dell and the MBP.

I, for the life of me, can't figure out why it would do this. Does anyone have insight?

[digitaldog]

See: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=86133.new#new

[TJ_Thorne]

Thanks for the reply. That was posted after mine and I'll be following it.

It's not so much that I need the monitors to match exactly.. but the Dell is way off. I have seperate profiles saved for each one and I feel I've tried every combination in the books when calibrating them.

Currently waiting for support from X-rite as well.

I'll read through that thread when I get home from work. Some of it seems to be over my head with the use of third party programs to manage my color. So I guess I'll have to learn about all of that in order to get this calibration system to work.

Frustrating.

[D Fosse]

I can take the image from the Dell and drag it to the MBP. When the image is half on one monitor and half on the other monitor the image will change ON BOTH MONITORS. Does that make sense?

I can answer that. It is in fact the normal and expected behavior with fully color managed software like Photoshop. When the center of the image frame passes the boundary from one display to the other, Photoshop switches the applied monitor profile from profile A to profile B. In other words, the whole image window is color managed as one piece. That's the way it has to work.

Calibration and profiling are separate processes. Photoshop doesn't care about the calibration, it just converts to the monitor profile, which is a description of the display in its current (calibrated or not) state. So it can't split the window - at least not without elaborate extra code which there's really no point in.

[digitaldog]

It's not so much that I need the monitors to match exactly.. but the Dell is way off. I have seperate profiles saved for each one and I feel I've tried every combination in the books when calibrating them.

It's all about the calibration aim points (targets), the profile is the result of that for use in color managed applications. It's good you don't expect an exact match, you'll probably not get it. Depending on the software and it's options, you should get 'close'. But that means the possibility of quite differing calibration settings to produce the same visual match.
Good luck with that X-rite support and let us know what they say. Might be useful, might be good for a laugh too.

[TJ_Thorne]

Thanks, peeps.

I emailed them the profiles to take a peek at.

It makes sense about how it has to play with only one monitor profile at a time on the window. But the fact that it was waay oversaturated and that the contrast was way off is what bugs me. How am I supposed to edit my images on a monitor when it's not an accurate representation of what it actually is? If the MBP can get a correct profile then what's keeping the Dell from getting it?

After playing around a little more it seems as though I have my colors close. But the shadows are still crushed. Too dark to show detail I had in there.

I've just been trying everything under the moon.

[D Fosse]

Reading your first post again it does indeed sound like the same monitor profile is applied for both monitors, but which one of the two depends on where the image is.

So that's obviously wrong, but not being a Mac user I wouldn't know how to fix it. The ColorMunki supports dual displays, so this must be something happening at OS level.

[TJ_Thorne]

Here is the response from Xrite:

"Thanks very much for sending us those profiles.
I've reviewed both of them and neither of them are giving us what we could consider to be accurate monitor views.

You are working on a MacBook Pro and those laptops are excellent computers, but sometimes the on-board USB ports don't deliver sufficient power to our devices.

We've found that connecting your measurement device to a powered USB hub, and then connecting that powered hub to the MacBook Pro will often result in considerably better measurements.

Given that you are seeing incorrect color on both of your monitors, we'd recommend you try the powered USB hub and see if your two monitors end up looking much more normal. We've found that Belkin makes excellent, yet inexpensive powered USB hubs."

[digitaldog]

Odd. Well give it a try, let us know. In the past, when there wasn't insufficient power via USB, a dialog/error would pop.

[TJ_Thorne]

Here's the response from Xrite.

JOY.

In an effort to resolve your support Case, the following comment has been added.  Please review this comment, and respond as indicated.

 

Comment:



We've done some additional research into this matter, and it would appear that you are possibly experiencing an issue with Mac/Dell differences in how the display information is being delivered.

Here's a comment we've received from Dell.


We are well aware of this issue. It is a required feature for monitor EDID to specify support of both RGB and YPbPr. This is especially true in HDMI where it can be connected to DVD players/game consoles etc. But the Mac OS somehow default to YPbPr color space when it read the monitor EDID. In general YPbPr is for movie and not text, therefore there is a lot more color/sharpness enhancement(like a TV). When viewing text in such mode, the text will have some degree of overshoot/shadow and color might be over-saturate.
The only way on monitor side to overcome this is to remove the YPbPr support in monitor EDID. This is not feasible at least in HDMI. We may do so in DP but may cause other problem with professional graphic designers. So having the patch to “overwrite” the EDID is the way around it for now. Apple as you see is aware of this, whether they want to “help” the industry and do the right thing, we are not sure.

So, to make a long story short, this seems to be something that both Dell and Apple are aware of, but there's no resolution currently for this situation.

 

Thank you, 


 

Bruce Wright

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