Can't afford a pro-LCD: get a Sony CRT?

[zarusoba]

I'm using my humble iMac to do some fine art prints to watercolor paper. I've calibrated the monitor but it's hard to do accurate color work.

I can't afford something like the high-end NEC, so I'm wondering if it's worth getting a second-hand CRT, like a Sony Trinitron.

Or what about a second-hand Apple Cinema Display?

I've also noticed that the prints I made to watecolor paper look far less saturated than those I've made to ordinary paper on laser printers. Is this variation inevitable?

 

[semicharmed]

Can't help you with the monitors, but watercolor paper isn't designed to be printed on.
I'm guessing it looks less saturated because the paper is absorbing the majority of the ink; watercolor paper is designed to be absorbent — the water absorbs but the pigment doesn't, leaving you with saturated colors when using water-soluble paint. I'll assume you're using an inkjet, and inkjet ink is a very fine spray of droplets with even tinier drops of pigments. And the whole thing is probably adsorbed by the paper quite easily, decreasing your saturation.
You'd probably be much better off with a textured heavyweight paper designed to be run through an ink-jet printer.

 

[stainlessliquid]

Is it a 24"? If so then its fine, the 24" panel is good but the 20" panel is crap. 24" Dell Ultrasharps are fine as well and not very expensive. You can also get an older used Ultrasharp on ebay for less than 200 bucks.

CRT's suck, their reputation is based on first generation LCD's. I had a aperturegrille/trinitron before replacing it with a Dell Ultrasharp 2005FPW, the Dell clobbered the crt.

 

[LeviG]

I've also noticed that the prints I made to watecolor paper look far less saturated than those I've made to ordinary paper on laser printers. Is this variation inevitable?

yes, watercolour paper and ordinary paper are completely different. Watercolour paper is made so that they can get very wet while maintaining integrity while normal paper would basically shrink and tear for the same use.
Combined with various other aspects, bleaching for white levels, chemicals used to bring out colours then it would be expected (atleast in my view) that the colours on certain papers would be less intense.

 

[zarusoba]

Can't help you with the monitors, but watercolor paper isn't designed to be printed on.
I'm guessing it looks less saturated because the paper is absorbing the majority of the ink; watercolor paper is designed to be absorbent — the water absorbs but the pigment doesn't, leaving you with saturated colors when using water-soluble paint. I'll assume you're using an inkjet, and inkjet ink is a very fine spray of droplets with even tinier drops of pigments. And the whole thing is probably adsorbed by the paper quite easily, decreasing your saturation.
You'd probably be much better off with a textured heavyweight paper designed to be run through an ink-jet printer.

Thanks for the tip. I'm getting it done at a print shop. They're using a high end printer that I don't know much about. I'll find out what other papers are available.

Is it a 24"? If so then its fine, the 24" panel is good but the 20" panel is crap. 24" Dell Ultrasharps are fine as well and not very expensive. You can also get an older used Ultrasharp on ebay for less than 200 bucks.

CRT's suck, their reputation is based on first generation LCD's. I had a aperturegrille/trinitron before replacing it with a Dell Ultrasharp 2005FPW, the Dell clobbered the crt.

Do you mean the 20in cinema displays are crap, or the 20in iMac displays?

Checked out the Dell ultrasharp displays and they look affordable. Thanks.

How about calibrators such as the Datacolor Spyders? How do they work?

I take it that even if I had one the iMac display wouldn't be really accurate.

Is the Spyder2express too low end?

 

[11800506]

They are saying that the panel in the 20" iMac is a crappy panel. It's a TN panel, which aren't very color accurate. However, the panel in the 24" iMac is an IPS display which are color accurate.

A Dell Ultrasharp or a second hand Cinema Display would both be good options. Both of them have IPS panels, so when looking for other displays, avoid those with TN panels.

 

[LeviG]

They are saying that the panel in the 20" iMac is a crappy panel. It's a TN panel, which aren't very color accurate. However, the panel in the 24" iMac is an IPS display which are color accurate.

A Dell Ultrasharp or a second hand Cinema Display would both be good options. Both of them have IPS panels, so when looking for other displays, avoid those with TN panels.

Last time I checked newer tn panels could be calibrated pretty well too, although obviously not upto the level of a ips but the difference isn't as much as people make out.

The panels in the displays originally are very rarely colour accurate to begin with, it doesn't matter who they're from.

 

[Kwill]

Can you afford a LaCie 700 series?

http://www.lacie.com/us/products/product.htm?pid=11091

• Ground-breaking RGB LED backlighting technology
• Wide gamut: 116% NTSC & 114% Adobe RGB (CIE 1976)
• 14-bit gamma correction for smooth gradients
• LaCie blue eye pro Proof Edition software including UGRA certification

 

[zarusoba]

Last time I checked newer tn panels could be calibrated pretty well too, although obviously not upto the level of a ips but the difference isn't as much as people make out.

The panels in the displays originally are very rarely colour accurate to begin with, it doesn't matter who they're from.

Thanks for the info. Just wondering what the performance demands for a twin monitor setup would be.

I have a 2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo iMac with 4 GB RAM. Will the addition of an extra monitor place a lot of demands on my system, ie. slow it down?

Can you afford a LaCie 700 series?

http://www.lacie.com/us/products/product.htm?pid=11091

• Ground-breaking RGB LED backlighting technology
• Wide gamut: 116% NTSC & 114% Adobe RGB (CIE 1976)
• 14-bit gamma correction for smooth gradients
• LaCie blue eye pro Proof Edition software including UGRA certification

Thanks for the suggestion, but it looks a bit pricey, especially in Australia!