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iMac Brightness

W

willie45

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 27, 2007
234
5
Hi

I have had a couple of macs and their displays have always shown images to be very bright. This has caused me problems vis a vis printing photographs, but I have heard the newest iMacs allow you to turn the brightness down to black on the systems pref tray. Is this true?

I am currently reduced to using Shades but am in the market for a new computer and if Apple could supply a solution to my problem without resort to 3rd party software of dubious reliablitliy I would be most grateful.


All help from you mad mac mullahs gratefully received.

PS my macbookpro wil turn down brightness to black with no problem. I wish my iMac would too

Cheers :)
 
confirmed, i have a brand new imac and i keep it on the lowest brightness setting because it's way too bright. even then, it's entirely too bright.
Shades and DarkAdapted will adjust the gamma for you, but i'm not sure of how to go about turning off the backlighting, which is what you are talking about doing.
 
J&JPolangin said:
...why don't you go to a store selling iMac's and try it?
Click to expand...

Well what a brilliant idea! Thank you so very much for this insightful solution. I could drive the 35 miles there and the 35 miles back but I had hoped someone here might know. Thahks for your input:D

Apocrathia, to be honest, I'm not too sure what the difference in real terms is between these two. Would you be very patient and explain for me. This is a real frustration for me when trying to match what I see on my screen to what appears in print.

Thanks

Willie
 
willie45 said:
Apocrathia, to be honest, I'm not too sure what the difference in real terms is between these two. Would you be very patient and explain for me. This is a real frustration for me when trying to match what I see on my screen to what appears in print.
Click to expand...

When you adjust the brightness on your macbook pro (same with the imac), you are actually manipulating the lighting of the lcd, not the actual image. your lcd'd image is not getting any brighter or darker when you adjust your brightness using the keyboard, it's just the lighting within the lcd to illuminate the display which is changing.
what applications like shades and darkadapted do is adjust the actual brightness (gamma) of the image on the screen. much in the way that pressing cmd+option+control+8 inverts your image, but has a lower brightness, as whites are now blacks and so on. These applications are actually pretty horrible if your a photographer or a graphic designer and color correctness is critical.
 
willie45 said:
Well what a brilliant idea! Thank you so very much for this insightful solution. I could drive the 35 miles there and the 35 miles back but I had hoped someone here might know. Thahks for your input:D

Thanks

Willie
Click to expand...

...glad I could be of some help in your delima :D

Everyone wants the easy way out these days... what if someone on the board tells you the wrong answer and you make a purchase decision based on that with out finding out for your self?

...then you come back here all PO'd saying apple this... macrumors that... blah, blah, blah...

Good luck getting the info you want.
 
Sorry if I seemed a bit abrupt. :eek:

I will just find it difficult to get there and hoped someone might have been able to tell me. I wouldn't buy without checking but just asked the question.

Thanks to all for their input

Willie
 
Apocrathia said:
When you adjust the brightness on your macbook pro (same with the imac), you are actually manipulating the lighting of the lcd, not the actual image. your lcd'd image is not getting any brighter or darker when you adjust your brightness using the keyboard, it's just the lighting within the lcd to illuminate the display which is changing.
what applications like shades and darkadapted do is adjust the actual brightness (gamma) of the image on the screen. much in the way that pressing cmd+option+control+8 inverts your image, but has a lower brightness, as whites are now blacks and so on. These applications are actually pretty horrible if your a photographer or a graphic designer and color correctness is critical.
Click to expand...

Thanks for this information. So does this mean that I should look to another manufacturers screen?

Willie
 
No, to be honest, one of the reasons that the macbooks get so dark (and even have the backlit keyboard) and the imac/acds don't, is because you expectedly have an element of control over the environmental lighting when your using a desktop system, whereas you might not always have that luxury with a laptop.
my suggestion would be just to turn on a light and let your eyes adjust to the light rather than go screwing with your image and ruining your color correctness.
 
Yes but the problem comes when trying to print what is on the screen. This seems to be a common problem with iMacs; they are just too bright. Photography forums are full of this issue. I have also discussed with a very respected dealer here in the UK and he confirmed this was the case. The solution he put forward was to connect a screen which could be better calibrated. No he is not anti -mac ( far from it in fact ) and I know him well enough to know he wouldn't give me the bull for a sale.

I intend to give Color Eyes a go and if that doesn't solve the problem go for an Eizo screen

Thanks to all again

Willie
 
No. It will not darken down enough to match the print. In chatting to the dealer he reckoned that the iMac screen will only go down to around 230c/cd2 and you really need around 100-110 to get a decent match.

The only way to do what you suggest is to use Shades a freeware product to do it but then the colour balance becomes suspect and the calibration you have performed is undone

Willie
 
J&JPolangin said:
...glad I could be of some help in your delima :D

Everyone wants the easy way out these days... what if someone on the board tells you the wrong answer and you make a purchase decision based on that with out finding out for your self?

...then you come back here all PO'd saying apple this... macrumors that... blah, blah, blah...

Good luck getting the info you want.
Click to expand...

My god, this must be one of the best comments I've read in a while. God forbid someone asks a question on a forum and gets the wrong answer. Might as well get rid of forums forever. I say, bury forums with Ted Kennedy and ObamaCare :p
 
I've found since upgrading to Snow Leopard that my March 2009 20" iMac is far too bright when the brightness setting is at full, and I often have to run my iMac on 5 "squares" (using the brightness up/down buttons on the Apple keyboard).

To take the edge off the brightness further I tend to tilt my iMac back as far as the "foot" will allow, which given the screen's colour gradient darkens it a little further.

I've not delved into the ColorSync app and played around with the settings since I'm happier with Snow Leopard's 2.2 default compared to Leopards 1.8.
 
Well its been a while since this post, but I have found a solution of sorts. There is no doubt Apple make their screens too bright for serious photographic use nowadays. This is very sad gven their previous eminience in the field but is due to their populist approach to hawking low quality goods to make a quick buck.

Anyway, the answer I have used is to load the free software "Shades " and use this to help get rid of the unwelcome overbrightness of Apple screens. True , it is not as good a solution as most screens can offer and it is slightly insulting to have to pay a premium for a crappy screen, while many other options are better for less cost but that is where Apple is at these days. They are turning a profit at the expense of quality. Odd for a company that pretends to charge a premium for quality.

It is as has been explained above not a great solution but it comes closest to what I can manage to get some reasonable result.

Thanks again to everyone for their help.

Willie
 
@willie45: yes indeed, the built-in brightness adjustment on the 2009 +- imac is very bad; given that the screen uses most of the energy consumed by a computer it is a catastrophe that apple should address and make s/w available to turn the brightness way down. I enjoy and make good sensible use of that possibility on my macbook pro a lot. Why they () did not implement the same in the imac os s/w is and will remain a mystery to me.
[automerge]1569188125[/automerge]
@sepandee – hey what’s wrong with a decent sensible and affordable healthcare system?
 
@willie45: You can get Brightness Control 1.0.4. It’s a real star.

But remember, like @Apocrathia explained, this will only adjust the brightness of the screen. if that is what you need to match the appearance of your image on the screen to the printed one, fine.

If, on the other hand, you want to change the actual brightness and or colour values IN your image, then best use photoshop (or something similarily pro).

get B/C here:

Download Brightness Control 1.1

www.macupdate.com www.macupdate.com
 
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