Thinkpads Forum

this question is directed at those who have tried to calibrate their IPS FlexView screen or have knowledge of the workings of color profiles:

so I purchased an EyeOne Display2 calibrator, and created a custom profile for my FlexView screen; comparing against some of the tests on this site, I was able to greatly improve the black level, among other things-- however, I noticed that when viewing images in PS or in Firefox with color management enabled, all shades of blue appeared to be more purple; for example, the background on MSN.com appears purple instead of cyan; interestingly, the same effect applies when using the Lenovo-supplied ICC profile for the FlexView screen; I'm curious to hear from others who have tried to calibrate their FlexView screens or worked with various profiles about their experience in color-managed applications.

I realize that this topic is better suited to a digital photography/imaging forum, however, I figured that since this particular panel is unique to the ThinkPad, I would try to collect some responses here.

Thanks for any insight.

thought I would update by adding that apparently the gamma is being set to 2.4 (not 2.2)-- both via calibration and the Lenovo-provided profile; not sure if this would explain why the blues are showing incorrectly, but I would be curious to hear of the experience of anyone who's tried to calibrate the Flexview screen and with what hardware/software

i used a spyder 2 about a year ago, borrowed a friends, so i haven't updated mine yet, but, as far as i know, when enabling firefox color management, that's normal. unless it is because of the calibration profile...

as for in photoshop, i can't say i have that kind of problem, but i do have my photoshop color settings set to desaturate monitor colors by 10%, due to realizing and reading that the flexview monitor is over saturated. i also have catalyst control center saturation at 90 instead of 100...

i'm not expert, that's just the system i've been using for myself for a while now...

having just reformated my system, i havent calibrated my flexview screen again, but i did turn on color profile recognition in ff3, and the gmail colors still get purply. so it's not caused by calibration

i'm about to recalibrate my flexview monitor, and am questioning whether or not to continue lower saturation in catalyst control center and photoshop, which i've been doing the last year or so.

i've just recalibrated with spyder 2, turned off any desaturation via catalyst control center, removed catalyst control center, updated to firefox 3.0.7, color management still enabled, and the blues in gmail and facebook aren't looking quite as purplish as before, not sure which change did that. i guess it makes sense that the calibration did it, although i've had purplish blues post calibration in the past.

I have used several good color calibrators, Blue Eye Pro, Spyder series, Eye One, etc. but I can do just as good a job on a Flexview for free, by playing around with the gamma, contrast, and brightness while clicking back and forth on the various test screens on this site -- so spend money if you want to, but you can get a Flexview as good as it can get, for free, if you have a bit of patience.

the nature of some lower cost IPS screens is to have a purple tinge to the colors, especially the blacks, if you get the other colors perfect -- so perhaps it is fruitless to worry about color profiles etc, because it will always be a compromise on a cheaper IPS screen (the Flexview is good for a laptop, but it is not a professional panel by a long stretch) - I prefer to get the black right, and the other colors seem to be pretty close with out any custom color profile besides the three variables mentioned above.

now can someone tell me how to get the 200 cd/m² of brightness I paid for, instead of the <100 we seem to get if you have the black level correct on these screens? - now that would be news!

i think a good sign that the screen is over saturated, is that they bright yellow and dull yellow in excel look nearly the same, this is after calibration, with "brightness" set at 6/7.

might have to reinstall that catalyst control center for 5 or 10% saturation reduction.

i just worry that, if i do that, i'll add saturation to photos, and then i'll have over saturated files being sent out.