| WorldWorksGames http://www.worldworksgames.com/forum/ |
|
| Spyder2express review http://www.worldworksgames.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=73&t=4562 |
Page 1 of 1 |
| Author: | Slymoon [ 06-12-2007, 08:11 PM ] |
| Post subject: | Spyder2express review |
First and Foremost I am *not* a proper authority to review any hardware and my written skills are not stellar. However, I will impart some of my observations. Product reviewed: A little about my work: I partially run a small residential architecture firm, as part of our services we also offer architectural rendering services. Our clients often times do not know much of anything about textures, rendering, modeling or any of those processes. They are however interested in seeing an accurate representation of their building/ residence/ water park/ development. Often times the materials/ textures we have selected lose that 'real' quailty when rendered, the bricks look too grey too brown too... something. During these times we must tweak texture hues in Photoshop. I often times tweak the colors myself before sending them off to one of the production staff to do the work, however when my monitor and his monitor show vastly different colors, that is a huge problem. Enter the solution: The is the baseline monitor calibration device offered by ColorVision costing $79 plus shipping. The packaging was extensive, really extensive. It included, a glossy printed display box, with rear lift flap. The interior glossy box revealed under the display lift flap included nifty images, that I paid little attention too. Removing this box from the display box revealed a clear plastic display cover. Removing both the plastic and the interior box revealed yet another box. This white corrugated cardboard box hid the software, documentation and end of the USB cable inside. I can not help but wonder what percentage of cost this packaging incurred. Once open the device was quite small 4-5" in diameter with a 6' USB cable attached. A small movable counterweight device is on the cable. Removal of the lens bracket allows use on CRTs or LCDs. I installed the software on my personal monitor (old 21" Nokia 445Xav CRT graciously provided by ) and went through the calibration procedure, adjusting the brightness and contrast as directed. Then removing the lens cover and attaching the device to the face of my CRTs. (it attaches via suction cups). The process was rather painless, the onscreen instructions were quite clear. The written documentation, though coming in a multitude of languages was near worthless. The end result was that I was used to running a cool monitor a little more blue than true color. It also informed me that I now had a profile that could be used by Photoshop or other image software for printing calibration. The colors do seem quite nice now. On to the office machines: All office machines run dual monitor set ups off dual monitor capable video cards. We have three setups in the office: 2 CRTs, 1 CRT + 1 LCD and 2 LCDs. First thing to note: The is not made for dual monitor setups. We only found this out after purchasing, due partially to lack of research. Second thing to note: The which does support dual monitors is $249 + tax. However, what is not clearly stated is that each monitor must have a dedicated video card. IE: a single dual monitor capable card will not be sufficient to calibrate both monitors. (I had to read quite a bit to find this little bit of information out. As I am a techie by hobby and not profession, I am not able to answer why this is so.) I ran the calibration on each of the first two types of setups. For the most part every machine was running on the cool side, save for two machines that had both a cool and a warm monitor and one machine that had its primary monitor near perfect. For those of you that may feel squeamish about suction cups on the LCD, worry not. Recall that counterweight and lens bracket. The counterweight allows the device to hang over your LCD and the lens bracket also covers the suction cups as well has having some quite soft non-abrasive pads. Toward the end I was not exactly sure if the device actually performed as it indicated or it was a bit of psychology that made me feel like it worked. So, lastly I went to the dual LCD setup, 1 week old matched 22” widescreen LCDs. The images on the screens were both very clean, very bright and beautiful. Running the device on the primary screen was just as easy as the CRTs (though a few different instructions) at the end of the process, the comparison was simple amazing. Even on these beauties I had not realized how much the colors were off, again very cool. (it’s a theme in the office it seems). It did however, take me some time to manually adjust the second LCD to match (near match) the calibrated LCD. Not an easy task but definitely doable. Printing: The does not come with any print specific calibration software, however my test print of Mayhem Rail Graffiti was close to the screen display. I can honestly say, I feel the main difference is due to type of media: Emitted light (CRT) vs. Reflected light (print on cardstock). ColorVision does offer “ColorVision PrintFIX PLUS Software” however it is only included in the $169 + tax and Conclusion: Overall, I am pleased with the product, for graphic work it is well worth the cost. I would recommend this to anyone that deals with on screen graphics and is required to have accurate colors for client presentation or any other shared imagery. |
|
| Author: | Fl0ydski [ 06-13-2007, 03:41 AM ] |
| Post subject: | |
| Page 1 of 1 | All times are UTC - 8 hours |
| Powered by phpBB © 2000, 2002, 2005, 2007 phpBB Group http://www.phpbb.com/ |
|