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Picking a Monitor
When working with digital photography, there are a few very important decisions that you need to make early on. What camera, what computer, and what monitor. The camera's largely personal preference, and the computer is easy--a Mac with Aperture. The monitor, however, is a bit harder because it is incredibly important. It's what you use to view, edit, sort, and see your photographs.
There's a lot of technobabble around monitor specifications. The areas that matter to photographers are pixel pitch (the distance between pixels, and a smaller pitch means a sharper image), contrast ratio (the difference between the brightest bright and darkest dark the monitor can display), brightness, gamut (what range of colors can the monitor display), and viewing angle (as you move your head to the side, does the image look the same or lose contrast?).
An average monitor will cover the sRGB gamut and be capable of displaying 8 bits per red, green, and blue channel. That means that it can display 255 possible values for red, 255 possible values for blue, etc., giving you a total of about 16 million colors. However, some monitors, like the ones built into most laptops, only display 6 bits per channel, providing only 260,000 possible colors. Many people won't notice the difference, but photographers will. If you're working on a MacBook (Pro), it's important to buy an external monitor.
Higher-end monitors like the Eizo ColorEdge series and the NEC LCD2690WUXi typically cover over 90% of the AdobeRGB gamut (which is larger than sRGB) and provide a higher contrast ratio to boot because they use a better LCD panel. For example, the NEC SpectraView 2690 has specifications of a 178° viewing angle, both horizontally and vertically (meaning the image will look great edge to edge), 400 cd/m^2 brightness (that's quite bright), 800:1 contrast ratio (that's quite respectable), and 95% AdobeRGB coverage. Despite being older, the Apple Cinema displays actually hold up quite well, with the 23" cinema display having a 178° viewing angle, 400 cd/m^2 brightness, and 700:1 contrast ratio.
If you see a cheap (under $300) LCD of comparable size claiming to have specifications far beyond this (e.g. some monitors at Best Buy claim to have contrast ratios of 3000:1), be suspicious. Typically, these numbers are skewed because the monitor has what's called "dynamic contrast." What this means is that the display will actually adjust the brightness, without your knowing it, to try to present a higher-contrast image. If you are calibrating your monitor and trying to have accurate colors, you should turn dynamic contrast off. But once you turn it off, the cheap monitor shows you its true colors (or lack thereof) and why it was so cheap.
Speaking of color, as you all know, calibrating your monitor is critical, using a tool like the Spyder 3. Otherwise, the colors on your screen are really just a semi-educated guess, and there's no way your print will look like what's on your screen. When we calibrate a monitor, we are just adjusting a lookup table (LUT) on your computer's graphics card. What this means is that if Aperture says "I want to see a pixel with the value (128, 0, 0)--a value of 128 for red, 0 for green, and 0 for blue," the graphics card looks up what value it needs to send to the monitor (maybe (129, 1, 0)) to produce that color. Think of it as Aperture speaks French, your monitor speaks Elmer Fudd, and your graphics card has a French to Elmer Fudd dictionary (the LUT). When you calibrate your screen, you are actually adjusting the graphics card's dictionary to handle your monitor's specific quirks and idioms.
In addition to the LUT on your graphics card, your monitor also has an internal LUT. When you say "display (128, 0, 0)," that value actually gets modified twice (at least) before you see it. On higher end monitors, like the Eizos and NECs, you can bypass the graphics card and instead calibrate the monitor itself. That reduces the number of conversions that a color goes through, before being displayed, making your color more accurate. Even better is that on these high-end monitors, the LUTs are often 12-bits per channel, meaning that they can distinguish between roughly 68 billion possible values, giving you very accurate color.
You might have heard of newer LCDs using "LED backlights." A backlight is the light source that's illuminating the LCD panel. On non-LED displays, you'll sometimes notice dark and light bands across the monitor (especially on cheaper and older monitors). Those are the backlights. You'll also often notice that an image looks different right after you turn the monitor on and 10 minutes later. That's because it takes a little bit of time for the backlights to power up. With LEDs, this isn't the case. There is no startup time. The only potential downside to an LED backlit LCD is that LEDs produce a higher-temperature light than the normal fluorescent tubes (it's a whiter light), and this causes some people to perceive the image as slightly more washed out. But in truth, the more even illumination with no startup time makes up for that potential downside.
Hopefully this post has cleared up a few things about picking a monitor and helped you understand why it's worth spending money for a good monitor!
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"If you're working on a MacBook (Pro), it's important to buy an external monitor."
My MacBook Pro says its 'Color LCD' has 'Depth: 32-bit Color'.
Call me confused, but I always thought the MBP was just fine to use as photographic tool.
See what you mean - understood the issue better when I read this one:
http://blogs.oreilly.com/lightroom/2007/07/led-macbook-gamut.html
The cinema displays are indeed quite good for the money. One thing to note though is the consistency of such larger widescreen display panels; the colour / contrast / brightness on one side of the monitor can be noticeably different to another and this problem can get worse as the panel gets larger. If you create a good profile and then look at a flat colour full screen (like bright red) you can clearly see the inconsistency. So if you're after both highly accurate colour and also want a large display for Aperture, consider getting a cinema display and a CG-210N / CG-211. Cheaper than the $5K needed for a 30 inch Eizo 301! Don't get me wrong, you can get good colour from a cinema display, but you just have to be wary of its limitations (no LUT, brightness control only, inconsistency corner to corner).
You pay for what you get, but just remember that just because the monitor says Eizo or NEC on it doesn't mean it is a good display. Some models in their lines don't perform that well. What I don't see very often is anyone consistently testing and benchmarking displays for photographers and it would be great if someone would step up and offer some detailed, no nonsense analysis. Just as Josh states, just because someone claims high specifications it doesn't mean that the display will actually perform that.
I almost bought a 23 inch Apple display until I saw it next to a used CG210 for just a few hundred dollars more; even though the Eizo is smaller, the difference is night and day and ultimately that translated to me being able to match what I'm seeing on my screen with the prints that are produced from Adobe 98 files. Since I'm able to actually see 90% of the colour gamut of Adobe 98 I can almost exactly determine how my prints will look before I get them made. If I'd gone for a cheaper, but larger cinema display I'd be guessing more and guessing costs money through mistakes.
So in summary, do your homework before you go out and buy that large wide screen display; it may not actually be what you really need. There isn't much material out there to be able to make such decisions, but maybe that will change. If you're forking out several thousand dollars on a camera and lenses it pays to do it justice by getting a display that can actually show you all that marvellous colour. If you make a living from photography it is worth paying attention to this.
Colour matters to me and that's why I've invested in tools that allow me to create products that match my vision.
If you've already got an Apple cinema display (or even an iMac or Macbook Pro), use Color Eyes Display (www.integrated-color.com) - it is the only product that sets the brightness of the display automatically for you. You're still only able to set the LUT in the graphics card, but at least with the correct brightness on the display you'll get far more accurate colour. Even with my lovely ColorEdge 210 my profiles are much more accurate using this product vs the terrible software that was bundled with my DTP-94 device. One of the best things about Color Eyes Display is that it works with a variety of monitor types and calibration tools and can speak to the LUTs of most of the major monitors.
Jon, thanks for the pointer to the article, and Rob, excellent advice and tips!
I've actually been watching prices on new and used 23" ADCs lately, but many reviews and forum discussions end up saying they're not worth it for what you get. What models would you suggest in this size range for exactly the aforementioned task that get the most bang for your buck?
Photography may only be a secondarly line of income for me, but after the $k's of glass and hardware that I'm using, you're certainly right about wanting quality. And FYI, I already have a SpyderPro3 that's made my 17" PowerBook display somewhat acceptable. (See why I want the external now?)
The issues with LCDs is that there are so many specific types of panels and ways of making them. Everything effects the displays specs which effect it's color performance. The issue gets into the TN film type displays which are cheap good enough for some and have fast response times (not important for photo work, but it is a seller for many). However they can only display about 265,000 colors and they're used in every (AFAIK) laptop. They can display 16.2 million colors using software called dithering. On the Mac this is a problem because Apple's display and graphics drivers suck. They are stable but they don't perform too well. The other common type of panel is IPS or the newer S-IPS which can display the full 16.7 million colors. (note the .2m vs. .7m difference as it's a way to tell the difference between panels.) This was the issue behind that color lawsuit a while back.
However, what's really hard is that color is pretty subjective. Measuring panels is really hard to do as the calibration tool makes a difference too. Check out tftcentral.co.uk for some good info. Wikipedia also has some good articles on LCDs. I really only know a drop in the bucket of the world of color. But there is one thing to say: If you use a good colorimeter then you don't always need to spend tons of money on a display - though I would look for an S-IPS panel of a PVA/MVA panel that can display 16.7 million colors. (Note I'm currently using a Dell 19" with my MacBook and it's fine. I'm also not a pro.) But if it's calibrated your off to a good start. (Yeah that first time I did my monitor a few months ago was amazing...)
Exactly my point, or question, rather. Since I spent the money on an excellent colorimeter (stop-gap solution) how good of a monitor would I really be looking for at this point? As you say, the ACDs have very decent longevity, but there have been cited issues with color shift from one side of the screen to the other (yellow and magenta) not to mention smaller color gamuts. Granted, people who have issues are more likely to be vocal about them than those that are pleased, but advice is pointing away from Cinema Displays.
With that in mind, I've been looking at models from Ezio, NEC, Lacie, and others that are around the 23" and 24" range. Does anyone have experience with these or others they could evaluate them on?
Great article. I have been researching monitors for use on a Mac Pro with Aperture and Final Cut Express. I want a 30" monitor and am surprised there are so few quality contenders out there.
I don't want to spend as much as the Eizo costs, so I am considering the NEC. I believe the Apple Cinema Displays are outdated technology and won't consider them unless they get upgraded soon. Anyone have any other suggestions?
I second the notion that it would be very helpful to have some in-depth reviews of monitors for photo work. The monitor is such an important piece of the digital photo workflow and it seems to get short shrift. Finding unbiased information regarding actual performance of various monitors is almost impossible.
"Finding unbiased information regarding actual performance of various monitors is almost impossible."
Well, it's out there, but I agree that Inside Aperture would be the perfect place to evaluate the display's abilities to work with Aperture's output parameters. After a day of searching here are some that I'm looking at, and maybe they can be included in any official stories on this issue:
NEC LCD2490WUXI
NEC LCD2690WUXI
Eizo FlexScan SX2461W
Note that they're around the aforementioned 23" size. The 26 is included because of the larger coverage of the Adobe color gamut, though pixel pitch is more of an issue. I'd be curious what the larger bit display and look-up-tables do when used with Aperture in particular. There DEFINITELY isn't any info on that out there. Perhaps some knowledgeable person out there can fill us is...
Michael provided some great technical information here with regards to types of panels and some places to look for more info. I think you guys are right that a pro-oriented monitor review would be useful; I did some checking in a few places I expected to have reviews, and I didn't find very much.
From my understanding (I could be wrong), the current cinema displays are kind of at the mid-high end on the whole, and while you do hear horror stories, it's not a common problem. Currently, it's my understanding that the high-end NEC monitors are your best bet, with their 95% AdobeRGB coverage and 12-bit LUTs.
I am pretty satisfied with my Apple 23'' CD.
I would love to have a better (and bigger!) monitor but I cannot afford a pricier one.
Well Mihalis, the 24" NEC is less than $100 more than the Apple full retail price. I'd pick that over the Apple (though the panel is almost exactly the same) for the ability to rotate the panel to portrait on the stand, despite the less appealing case. Not to mention it employs technologies like a 12-bit gamma (apposed to the 10-bit in the ACD). Eizo's model goes as high as 16-bit, but costs a few hundred more right now. Both of these models have more uniform brightness, and offer sensors that can enable shifts in color to deal with changes in backlight conditions. The Eizo has an even higher % of Adobe RGB.
If you're tempted, let me add this: I've been watching 23" ACDs on eBay for the 6 months, and the current going rate for winning bids is AT LEAST $550 on average- that for a decent panel condition and so-so case. If you clean yours up, you can take that off the price tag for these...
I recently replaced a 4 year old 23" ACD (which had served me very well but had lost a lot of brightness) with a new one. After calibrating it with an i1 Display 2 and dialing the brightness way back, I'm really happy with the image and color fidelity. I'm getting really good screen to print matching after profiling my printer using an i1 Photo. Now I know all the pros are going to kill me for this, and perhaps it paints me as a bit shallow, but one of the draws of the ACD for me is it's very clean Aluminum look. It matches beautifully with my MacBook Pro which I keep (also calibrated) on an mStand for holding palettes, iCal, mail, etc. Part of the reason we use Apple products is their aesthetic appeal after all. I can't abide the look of most of the third party displays.
I definitely agree with you, KBeat, that a lot of 3rd party displays are just plain ugly compared to the ACD line!
As for Aging and Brightness
Yeah, your anecdote confirms my suspicions. These ACDs tend to grow dimmer over time. My Powerbook (not comparable to an external) has lost its luster as the panel ages. The 17" ACD my parents have has become VASTLY dimmer in the 7 years they've had it. Granted, this was one of the plastic bezel models and it's certainly been around for a while (you aficionados should realize that much by the model type and display size), but this problem showed up after about 3 years. Perhaps if they hadn't kept it in the kitchen...
In any event, I'll have to go with something that has a longer warranty to combat issues like this. Make sure to read the fine print on those warranties!