[cdnscg]

Is there any good calibration software, like Chroma Pure, for use with a MacBook Air, without running Windows?

 

[Dominic Chan]

Is there any good calibration software, like Chroma Pure, for use with a MacBook Air, without running Windows?

Are you trying to calibrate a tv using the MacBook Air, or to calibrate the MacBook Air screen?

In the first case, there really isn't anything comparable to ChromaPure running on Mac OS X. You need to run Boot Camp or equivalent.

In the latter case, most meters do come with software for both Windows and Mac.

 

[cdnscg]

Are you trying to calibrate a tv using the MacBook Air, or to calibrate the MacBook Air screen?

In the first case, there really isn't anything comparable to ChromaPure running on Mac OS X. You need to run Boot Camp or equivalent.

In the latter case, most meters do come with software for both Windows and Mac.

The first. Calibrate a TV and PJ. Possibly an ignorant question, but will Boot Camp over ride my existing Apple software, or run separately in the back ground. I'm concerned about letting windows into my laptop.

 

[Dominic Chan]

The first. Calibrate a TV and PJ. Possibly an ignorant question, but will Boot Camp over ride my existing Apple software, or run separately in the back ground. I'm concerned about letting windows into my laptop.

Boot Camp does not run in the background. You literally have to reboot the MacBook to run Windows instead of Mac OS.

 

[Bloodwound]

I'm not sure if it's a good idea to use the HDMI output from a Mac running OSX to calibrate. In fact, I'm 99.99% sure it's a bad idea if you're not using a hardware pattern generator.

But running Windows natively (or what you call Bootcamp) will work fine.

 

[pezley]

The first. Calibrate a TV and PJ. Possibly an ignorant question, but will Boot Camp over ride my existing Apple software, or run separately in the back ground. I'm concerned about letting windows into my laptop.

Windows these daya is a lot more secure then ever. There isn't a great deal to worry about. That said, look into Parallels for Mac, it runs windows in an isolated Virtual machine and does it very very well. That way you can run any windows software you need and with out having to reboot your Mac, if you dont want Windows any more you just delete the virtual machine file.

 

[cdnscg]

Windows these daya is a lot more secure then ever. There isn't a great deal to worry about. That said, look into Parallels for Mac, it runs windows in an isolated Virtual machine and does it very very well. That way you can run any windows software you need and with out having to reboot your Mac, if you dont want Windows any more you just delete the virtual machine file.

Thanks

 

[gwgill]

Is there any good calibration software, like Chroma Pure, for use with a MacBook Air, without running Windows?

ArgyllCMS & DispCAL run on OS X, so you can ICC profile your display, and/or create a Video 3dLut.

 

[Dominic Chan]

ArgyllCMS & DispCAL run on OS X, so you can ICC profile your display, and/or create a Video 3dLut.

The OP wants to calibrate TVs and Projectors by running software on OS X.

 

[jsteinme]

I'm not sure if it's a good idea to use the HDMI output from a Mac running OSX to calibrate. In fact, I'm 99.99% sure it's a bad idea if you're not using a hardware pattern generator.

I have been experimenting with calibration and have been running into problems with proper pattern generation. I have CalMan 5 running in VMWare and I have been using MobileForge over AirPlay to an AppleTV. The problem I am seeing is that the gamma curve appears to be completely wrong so I am thinking there is some kind of video processing going on in the chain that is messing things up. I had been thinking of trying the HDMI output of my MacBook Pro and using the CalMan pattern window while mirroring or the CalMan Client 3 on the Mac as a pattern generator.

Are you saying the HDMI output is not adequate for calibration? Could you explain further?

Thanks

 

[Bloodwound]

1. Mac OSX (technically it's the GPU) converts Full Range RGB to YCbCr when it detects a HDTV. Which means a double scaling/conversion takes place and loosing precision, BtB and WtW. I don't know how you can override this.

2. Also you cannot turn off color managment, which unlike Windows, is pretty much system wide. In the display settings, you can set the color profile to both rec.709 or sRGB (among other things). I don't know if either one is right to use (in regards to "bit perfectness"), but my gut feeling is that both might be inaccurate.*

3. And then running Windows inside an emulator might or might not give inaccurate results.

*I have not tried DisplayCal natively OSX, but I suspect it is able to turn off color managment when it displays and measures patterns. But a program running inside a VM can't do this on the host computer itself.

So at least 3 unknown factors, where #1 and #2 is pretty much given and very problematic, whereas I'd say it's 50/50 at #3 being a factor (not that it matters since #1 and #2 combined is pretty much doomsday anyways).

 

[gwgill]

*I have not tried DisplayCal natively OSX, but I suspect it is able to turn off color managment when it displays and measures patterns. But a program running inside a VM can't do this on the host computer itself.

Yes, ArgyllCMS goes to some trouble to make sure native device values get displayed rather than color managed ones.