All the Spyders… I’ve been fortunate enough to review every Spyder model produced, right from the first (far left). All these still work, but only the most recent ones will give optimal results for a wide gamut screen like the BenQ monitor here. To do each, Datacolor requires that you connect the Datacolor SpyderX Elite to your computer and go through a process where it gathers information about your display. Then during the calibration itself, it will ask you to adjust certain things like the brightness of the display. To do a calibration, your brightness will need to be at what Datacolor deems to be an ideal level. Then it will calibrate and you’ll be able to see what the Datacolor SpyderX Elite did by doing a switch between the uncalibrated and calibrated versions. Each time I did it, I saw different things. Sometimes Datacolor made my display warmer and more green. Other times it was warmer with more purple. Rarely did it ever try to make the display cooler. Recalibration makes use of the software’s previous measurements from this monitor to reduce calibration time. The uncalibrated screen is as you can see, well off from a neutral grey. The calibrated version (below) is a lot better.

In my own tests, the SpyderX produced color profiles that were virtually indistinguishable from the X-Rite products, either using their respective bundled software or the free DisplayCAL software, which supports most devices on the market and offers more advanced calibration capabilities. This technical superiority and unmatched confidence gives photographers control over their work, allowing them to feel they can achieve their ultimate goal – the true expression of their creative vision.If you’ve installed the Spyder X Elite software, an option lets you soft proof images for print and several pad devices. The software comes with some sample profiles, but the general idea is that you’d use it with printer profiles you already have.

Based on years of research and development, the SpyderX provides significantly increased precision, color accuracy and low light capabilities. In Step 7, a step-by-step walkthrough for calibration of a single display can be selected with an interface tailored to matching various monitors or the expert console. Note that the position of this weight on the wire can be adjusted for proper balance for the setup being calibrated. It's also a more complicated and less user friendly software for less technical users, while the Datacolor bundled software uses a step-by-step wizard that hides complex decisions in the name of ease of use. It provides much more advanced and flexible options than the bundled software and can be used in a variety of use cases from the most common calibration targets to complex video 3D LUTs or calibration targets specific for video and color grading. The possibilities are almost endless.

ColorReader EZ

Ignore the guidance that suggests what brightness you should calibrate your screen to. It causes more trouble than good. Calibrate it instead so that it matches the brightness of your own editing environment. The same with colour temperature. It is good not to stray too far from the standard D65 screen colour temperature, but only if that provides a good visual match with the colour temperature of the ambient lighting you are editing in. I need to tell the software what sort of display I want to work with, since they tend to adjust different parameters. As with previous Spyder products, Spyder X2 is also capable of advanced display analysis, allowing you to measure the performance of your monitor, including aspects such as color gamut coverage, brightness, contrast, screen uniformity, and the Delta-E deviance from ideal color accuracy. Build & handling Tom Huffman, creator of the ChromaPure video calibration software, reviewed the SpyderX and measured raw sensor performance using high-end devices costing thousands of dollars. He concluded that the SpyderX has excellent overall accuracy and repeatability between measurements, although absolute low-light sensitivity still trails behind the X-Rite models. I’ll start off looking at the basic monitor calibration process, using the Spyder X on my oldish MacBook Pro