MONITOR ADJUSTING
Disclaimer
This isn't a page which substitutes dedicated color calibration or display management tools, nor does it want to be a calibration tool for persons who work professionally with color (and I include web-site designers in this catagory). Those persons should have their displays always perfectly calibrated according to the hard- and software they use.If your computer has already display management software installed, then use that software instead of this page!
This is a non-technical page aimed at the WWW user who wants to have a correct adjusted monitor.
If you like to know more about display management then you should have a look at Michael Shaffers's Display Management Page, Poynton's Color Technology Page and CGSD - Gamma Correction Explained.
What you need
All you need is a display able to show at least 256 colors (8-bits), which was switched on at least 15 minutes before you start adjusting it.Be sure that ambient lighting is sufficient and that there are no strong light sources interfering with your view on the screen.
CLEAN YOUR SCREEN!
Your desktop
If all the walls and furniture of your studio/house are covered with fancy Escher drawings, fluorescent gradients, nuclear reactor walls or happy teddy bears, then you probably don't have any problems with a 'cool computer desktop'. Your desktop however should have a neutral background, with not too many folders and files scattered over it.A small display (eg. 640 x 480) should be filled totally with your active window and only the essential toolbars should be displayed. (Netscape has good keyboard shortcuts.)
Arranging your desktop this way doesn't influence the color reproduction on your screen, but has a strong influence on your color perception. (the inside of an art museum is always neutral and without 'noise')
Adjusting brightness and contrast
The brightness and contrast controls are generally indicated by the following symbols:
First adjust the brightness.
Set the contrast midpoint and start adjusting the brightness until the black rectangle of the greyscale below is as black as possible (take as a reference the black border around your monitor screen). Do not exaggerate; the black has to be just at the limit between black and just not black.
Try to adjust in such a way that the white in the grey-scale above becomes white and that you can distinguish 16 separate fields from black to white. Where the white has to be a pleasant white. It doesn't have to illuminate your room. Be sure to see a grey-step above every dotted line.
If this operation made your black grey then adjust it again with the brightness control.
On a 256 color monitor you should be able to see 16 shades of grey. If you see less shades then control if your monitor is set to 256 colors. In the case you're running Netscape for Windows, select images in the general preferences menu and set the Choosing Colors setting to substitute colors and restart Netscape.
The greys also shouldn't have any dithering with Netscape on a 256 color monitor (if you look from a short distance at the grey fields they have to be solid and not covered with darker or lighter grey pixels). If they are dithered then click the greyscale above to have it (probably) non-dithered and full-screen; click again and you will come back here.
Gamma correctionAt this point you can use the figure on the left to fine-tune your contrast.
In theory you should be able to let vanish the chessboard pattern.
But it is unlikely that you manage to do this without dedicated gamma-correction software.
Colors
The colorpatches below should have the described tints, and each field should be clearly distinguisable from its neighbour, or from the black and white fields.
Greys
Greys are more difficult to judge.It's not likely that the greys on your monitor are neutral greys, but on the other hand this will not be of great influence on the graphics of the WWW.
The following figure shows slightly tinted grays, but with Netscape running at 256 colors you don't see the differences (or the greys are dithered and you see colored pixels on a neutral grey background).
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last update 16 february 1996 (Theo van Boxel)