Review: Datacolor Spyder 3 Elite Monitor Calibration System

I'm a keen amateur photographer who prints a great many photographs both at home and using on-line printing laboratories. Like many of my kind experience, it is sometimes a struggle to deliver prints that match what my eyes see on my computer display. The art of Colour Management which ultimately enables the photographer to deliver prints where the colours match the subject that he actually photographed is a "Black Art" indeed. It is often a tortuous route that the photographer takes in order to preserve accurate colours throughout his processing workflow - I dont intend to write an in depth guide to Colour Management - in fact I'll do no more than recommend a book to you if you really want to delve deeply into the subject - Real World Colour Management by Bruce Fraser. Monitor Calibration however is fundamental to the Colour Management process and without a properly calibrated monitor there is little chance of you matching what goes before (in terms of image capture and post processing) with what comes after the display (printing)...this is where products like the Spyder 3 Elite come in.

Firstly...what do we actually mean by Monitor Calibration/Profiling??

Well...in laymans terms calibration is a two step process...firstly you need to measure WHAT your monitor is currently doing in terms of its current colour balance and brightness output. Secondly you have to adjust your graphics card output based on the measurement so that your monitor delivers colours and brightness to a predetermined "standard". How do you adjust your graphics card output??? Well, the measurement part of the calibration process will build what is known as a Monitor Profile, basically a description of how the monitor performs at its default settings along with an "instruction set" that the graphics card uses to modify its behaviour to produce the desired "standard" output.

Products like the Spyder 3 Elite basically provide the tools to complete the measurement process and the software to build the profile. So...how does it work? Indeed....does it work?

For your money you get a Colorimiter...its a measurement device that you place over your computer screen (LCD, CRT, Laptop or you can use it with a projector) during the measurement process and connects to your PC via USB. Oh yes...you also get some software as well. A cleaning cloth is also provided to help you clean your screen before starting the process.

The first step is to install the software....its a pain free process that is completed in less than a minute. You can then plug in your colorimter into your USB port and when you get the message that it has been detected then you can fire up the software and begin calibrating. After entering product keys and registering online (optional) you will be asked a few questions about the monitor device you are profiling (the software can autodetect the monitor(s) that you have connected to your PC) and what controls it has available for colour/brightness/contrast adjustment. After requesting that you set your brightness and contrast controls to the factory default the software shows a pic on screen of where to place the colorimiter. You can either hang the counterweighted cable over the back of your screen and let the colorimiter hang naturally (it helps to tilt the screen back so the colorimeter sits flat and snug against the screen) or use the supplied suction cup to attach the device to the screen.

The software then begins to do its stuff...it displays reg, green and blue patches of varying intensity which the colorimeter measures, followed by various shades of grey. This process takes maybe 5-7 minutes the first time you do it...my understanding is that subsequent reprofiling of the same monitor will take less time. Basically the system is measuring how your screen displays certain colours and shades of grey so it can build up an understanding of how the monitor/graphics card combination is delivering colours to your eyes. The software will then build a profile and assign it to your monitor. Finally the software allows you to compare the before/after affects of profiling.

All in all a very simple system to set up and to run. But did it make any difference?

Unequivocably yes.

My default monitor settings resulted in an overly bright display that caused some colours to appear somewhat washed out. Applying the calibrated profile delivered far richer more intense colours and also delivered greater detail in greyscale images. I'm sure that a proportion of the benefits came from simply reducing the overall brightness of the display but there has definitely been an improvement of the overall colour balance as well. Whites are now...well...Persil white...whereas before they had a yellow colour cast to them. Now....you only really become aware of this change in a direct before/after comparison and previously I'd allways though my whites were pretty white (I am sounding like the housewife in the adverts now!!)...it just goes to show how amazing your brain is at automatically compensating for what it sees and tricking you into seeing something different.

So...the Spyder 3 is easy to use and it works. Is it value for money???

In terms of its absolute value, for around £120-£160 (depending on where you buy) you dont seem to get a lot in the box....the colorimiter itself seems reasonably well made but, when all is said and done, it is just a light sensor in a fancily designed case. The software is on a CD rom and other than a stand for the colorimiter thats all you get. However....if youve ever gone through the process of trying to adjust your display settings to get a nice neutrally balanced colour output, which enables you to match your printer output with your screen display, and all the associated wasted printer ink and paper from numerous test prints, you might just consider this to be superb value for money.

The Spyder 3 Elite will not gaurantee that you get prints matching your screen display, but it will help eradicate a key fundamental variable in the process and move you a whole lot closer to that holy grail.

OK....I've mentioned the good....what about the bad....surely there must be some??? Yep...the documentation is pretty average...the printed stuff just guides you through how to install the software. There is nothing on the CD in the way of a user guide. The only help you get is from the help system within the software itself...however when you launch the software for the first time it jumps straight in to the calibration process leaving any questions or doubts the user might have about what settings to input unanswered. The topics covered in the in-system help are geared very much to describing each specific function of the software rather than actually providing guidance as to what to do when things go wrong and wont help you with a question such as...."I've profiled my monitor and now my screen has gone a horrible shade of green what might have gone wrong??" for example.

I wouldnt therefore say that this software is aimed at total beginners in the art of monitor profiling - I feel it is perhaps better suited to a more intermediate level of user. However for anyone who has a basic understanding of Colour Management and the place of monitor profiling in the overall process I would recommend this software very highly indeed.