iMac 2013 vs Eizo Coloredge for print?

[mixart]

I cant really desire, if I should go for the new Imac 27" or a Mac Mini with an Eizo Coloredge monitor.

My plan is to start on an education about graphic design in 2014, where the Imac will be fine, but I'm starting to interest me in fine art prints on canvas created in Photoshop/Illustrator and I want to make money from it. My closest photo dealer has the Canon imagePROGRAF iPF8400, which I will be using.

So my question is, can the Imac 2013 be calibrated to show the same color (or very close), that I will be seeing on professionel prints or do I really need a proff monitor like the Eizo Coloredge?

I just dont want to be surprised by the difference in colors when the work is printed.

 

[crows]

I cant really desire, if I should go for the new Imac 27" or a Mac Mini with an Eizo Coloredge monitor.

My plan is to start on an education about graphic design in 2014, where the Imac will be fine, but I'm starting to interest me in fine art prints on canvas created in Photoshop/Illustrator and I want to make money from it. My closest photo dealer has the Canon imagePROGRAF iPF8400, which I will be using.

So my question is, can the Imac 2013 be calibrated to show the same color (or very close), that I will be seeing on professionel prints or do I really need a proff monitor like the Eizo Coloredge?

I just dont want to be surprised by the difference in colors when the work is printed.

this is my 2 cents my dad used to own a printing business and this stuff is a problem, getting the displays and printing equipment on the same page color wise, I would suggest if your are going to do this professionally then buy professional level equipment, if you really don't need a discrete graphics card go ahead with the Mac Mini and the Eizo, you will need a calibration tool, although I've never seen an Eizo in person the factory calibration might be good honestly I don't know, the iMac can work but the display is not at the Eizo level by far.

IMHO wait for the supposed update to the Mac Pro's that seems to be coming this year according to Tim Cook

 

[mixart]

this is my 2 cents my dad used to own a printing business and this stuff is a problem, getting the displays and printing equipment on the same page color wise, I would suggest if your are going to do this professionally then buy professional level equipment, if you really don't need a discrete graphics card go ahead with the Mac Mini and the Eizo, you will need a calibration tool, although I've never seen an Eizo in person the factory calibration might be good honestly I don't know, the iMac can work but the display is not at the Eizo level by far.

IMHO wait for the supposed update to the Mac Pro's that seems to be coming this year according to Tim Cook

If I go for an Eizo ColorEdge monitor, I dont need a calibration tool, because I'm considering Eizo ColorEdge CG275W or CG276W with built-In SelfCalibration Sensor.

 

[HenryDJP]

If the software you're using isn't terribly power hungry or if you don't need super fast processing with dedicated graphics then for the work you're doing a Mac Mini and Eizo monitor are much better than an iMac.

 

[mixart]

If the software you're using isn't terribly power hungry or if you don't need super fast processing with dedicated graphics then for the work you're doing a Mac Mini and Eizo monitor are much better than an iMac.

I will be using most of the time Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and Dreamweaver for web design, logo, business cards, packaging design and posters etc. I have no plan for video editing for now.

 

[crows]

I will be using most of the time Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and Dreamweaver for web design, logo, business cards, packaging design and posters etc. I have no plan for video editing for now.

then honestly in your position I would go for the Mac Mini and the Eizo I know it s pretty expensive but I think it will be worth it, I have the 2012 27" iMac and the display is not calibrated well from factory, I would get the 799 Mac Mini and upgrade RAM and the hard drive my self if necessary, later on you can upgrade to a Mac Pro if it gets refreshed.

 

[Apple fanboy]

If I go for an Eizo ColorEdge monitor, I dont need a calibration tool, because I'm considering Eizo ColorEdge CG275W or CG276W with built-In SelfCalibration Sensor.

The built in calibration tool is not a true colorimeter. I would go for the Xrite i1 pro and a any of the CG range. However we use Eizo & NEC monitors at work and if you know how to set them up properly you won't have any problems. The same can be said for an iMac though. Most people buy it, leave it all with the factory settings and then wonder why their prints are so dark.

 

[mixart]

The built in calibration tool is not a true colorimeter. I would go for the Xrite i1 pro and a any of the CG range. However we use Eizo & NEC monitors at work and if you know how to set them up properly you won't have any problems. The same can be said for an iMac though. Most people buy it, leave it all with the factory settings and then wonder why their prints are so dark.

What about an iMac and the Xrite i1 Pro? Would that give a good result, if you have any experiment with those two?

 

[WilliamG]

What about an iMac and the Xrite i1 Pro? Would that give a good result, if you have any experiment with those two?

I can answer. I have both those things. The difference is astronomical, with and without. I really don't think most users realize what they're missing when they turn on their new 2012 iMacs. I've owned numerous iMacs and Cinema Displays, and the 2012 iMac is the worst calibrated from the factory that I've seen.

With an i1, though, it cleans right up.

(I do professional photography, so color accuracy = important!)

 

[Apple fanboy]

I second that.

 

[thekev]

I will be using most of the time Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and Dreamweaver for web design, logo, business cards, packaging design and posters etc. I have no plan for video editing for now.

Eizos are really nice. I'd mention that no display is immortal. By the time you're out of college, you'll be looking at a new display either way. My experience with NEC hasn't been as good, but they're also miles ahead of Apple. These are companies with a lot of experience making displays for specialized use cases. In either case, it may take a little work to get a match. You have to remember one is reflected light and the other is emitted. Ambient light hits everything, so the print should look in context under a variety of lighting, but differences between ambient and emitted light can cause a visual mismatch there depending upon how picky you are. Shops that do a lot of printing have things like viewing tables to correct for this. You don't have to go that far. Typically just calibrating to a D65 and a brightness level that produces a visual match to your prints under typical lighting is enough for most people.

I'm not sure what to say about imacs. Some people do use them successfully. The older ones annoyed me. At lower brightness levels the details became much more difficult to distinguish when compared to NEC or Eizo. The uniformity wasn't as good. It's a matter of how picky as none of these are 100% perfect. If you go the imac route and end up with a bad one, return it immediately. Calibrating/profiling won't improve things like uniformity issues, and imacs have limited capacity for calibration. The mini is a good option if you don't deal with CUDA. This means After Effects or Premiere. It can help for those, and unfortunately the mini lacks dedicated graphics to address such things.

I'd also ensure you have a wacom tablet. I prefer the large ones. The oversized variants are difficult to situate on a desk comfortably. The small and medium ones are annoying to me in that the mapping is too loose. A medium is the smallest you should go, and this should definitely be included in your budget for school.

 

[i-Rich]

Does anyone know the colour gamut of the new 27 inch please?

 

[mixart]

I can answer. I have both those things. The difference is astronomical, with and without. I really don't think most users realize what they're missing when they turn on their new 2012 iMacs. I've owned numerous iMacs and Cinema Displays, and the 2012 iMac is the worst calibrated from the factory that I've seen.

With an i1, though, it cleans right up.

(I do professional photography, so color accuracy = important!)

Thanks a lot I will consider an iMac with the Xrite i1 Pro now.

Eizos are really nice. I'd mention that no display is immortal. By the time you're out of college, you'll be looking at a new display either way. My experience with NEC hasn't been as good, but they're also miles ahead of Apple. These are companies with a lot of experience making displays for specialized use cases. In either case, it may take a little work to get a match. You have to remember one is reflected light and the other is emitted. Ambient light hits everything, so the print should look in context under a variety of lighting, but differences between ambient and emitted light can cause a visual mismatch there depending upon how picky you are. Shops that do a lot of printing have things like viewing tables to correct for this. You don't have to go that far. Typically just calibrating to a D65 and a brightness level that produces a visual match to your prints under typical lighting is enough for most people.

I'm not sure what to say about imacs. Some people do use them successfully. The older ones annoyed me. At lower brightness levels the details became much more difficult to distinguish when compared to NEC or Eizo. The uniformity wasn't as good. It's a matter of how picky as none of these are 100% perfect. If you go the imac route and end up with a bad one, return it immediately. Calibrating/profiling won't improve things like uniformity issues, and imacs have limited capacity for calibration. The mini is a good option if you don't deal with CUDA. This means After Effects or Premiere. It can help for those, and unfortunately the mini lacks dedicated graphics to address such things.

I'd also ensure you have a wacom tablet. I prefer the large ones. The oversized variants are difficult to situate on a desk comfortably. The small and medium ones are annoying to me in that the mapping is too loose. A medium is the smallest you should go, and this should definitely be included in your budget for school.

Yes I use the Wacom Intuos3 Medium for now and thinking about the Wacom Intuos5 Touch, because I want to go wireless with everything. Won't go futher than Medium.

It's a hard choice to make, if you are saying that the iMacs have limited capacity for calibration. I really wish the iMacs are good enough for me. I don't deal with Cuda for now, because the only demanding applications I use are Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign for now. But if I go with the iMac I am also thinking about this hood for the iMac 27".

http://www.monitorhood.eu/default/machood-monitor-hood-imac-27.html

 

[thekev]

It's a hard choice to make, if you are saying that the iMacs have limited capacity for calibration. I really wish the iMacs are good enough for me. I don't deal with Cuda for now, because the only demanding applications I use are Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign for now. But if I go with the iMac I am also thinking about this hood for the iMac 27".

http://www.monitorhood.eu/default/machood-monitor-hood-imac-27.html

I've tried to explain things like this in context before. Eizo specializes in displays. They have certain features for correlation. The displays have internal LUT systems and some amount of programmed compensation for drift and uniformity. The panels are mostly the same whatever brand you buy these days, but NEC and Eizo do add their own R&D to them. With most displays they're calibrated by rewriting the display profile and altering backlight brightness. This is all you can do. It isn't as good, but it's good enough for a lot of people. They are used frequently in work. I don't think you need to invest a lot in hardware to make it through college, and a few years from now you'd end up replacing it either way. You're going to have to communicate with the place that prints your artwork either way. It's not as simple as just assuming it will be perfect even after calibrating on any of these. There really is too much bad information out there on the topic.

Considering the imac is your likely option, I'll just mention a couple things. You don't have to immediately run all of the tests mentioned on here. You are having these things printed professionally as you mentioned. You'll want to see how your display looks when you turn it down far enough to match the print in your environment. It's possible to get way more technical with viewing tables and things to match the light that illuminates the print with the emitted light from the display. You probably won't be doing that, and it's quite expensive for a good one. Just look at the print next to your display. If the display is really really bright, turn it down. Make sure the contrast doesn't look dead at that level. That's one thing about the Eizos. They look good at practically any brightness level, but if the imac display holds up sufficiently, I don't see a big deal there. It should be reasonably uniform. They aren't perfect, but if you duplicate an image and look at them side by side, they shouldn't look like two different pieces of artwork. It shouldn't have major backlight bleed or a noticeable "yellow screen" issue as some have reported. The point is if it looks bad out of the box, return it. Otherwise set it to the appropriate brightness level and calibrate it with a colorimeter. These things all shift and lose some amount of brightness (less with LED backlighting) over time, so I wouldn't suggest max brightness levels. They're too much of a moving target, and they lie to you. You'll wonder why your prints are too dark and contrasty.

 

[Overg]

With all the respect to apple products, asking which one is the best eizo or iMac screen is like asking between Ferrari and Mazda.
Eizo are the best monitors in the world period.
If you want the best of the best. They come from factory super calibrated, believe me no image rendition or idiotic bugs will ever never apper there.

 

[tredstone]

I can answer. I have both those things. The difference is astronomical, with and without. I really don't think most users realize what they're missing when they turn on their new 2012 iMacs. I've owned numerous iMacs and Cinema Displays, and the 2012 iMac is the worst calibrated from the factory that I've seen.

With an i1, though, it cleans right up.

(I do professional photography, so color accuracy = important!)

That's weird, given the 2012 models are the first where Apple boasted about calibrating them at the factory. Anandtech has also been laudatory of Apple's recent efforts at providing more color accurate displays (e.g., retina iPad, rMBP) out of the box. Curious what he'll have to say when he finally reviews the iMac.

 

[Apple fanboy]

That's weird, given the 2012 models are the first where Apple boasted about calibrating them at the factory. Anandtech has also been laudatory of Apple's recent efforts at providing more color accurate displays (e.g., retina iPad, rMBP) out of the box. Curious what he'll have to say when he finally reviews the iMac.

Even if apple do calibrate each one, you will still need to calibrate it in your own setting, and to calibrate it regularly. All monitors will experience colour shift over time. Whichever you go for just make sure you buy a calibration device to be sure your monitor (or iMac) is giving you the best it can.

----------

Does anyone know the colour gamut of the new 27 inch please?

SRGB. The Colour edge Eizo's and NEC Spectraviews have a full Adobe colour space.

 

[WilliamG]

That's weird, given the 2012 models are the first where Apple boasted about calibrating them at the factory. Anandtech has also been laudatory of Apple's recent efforts at providing more color accurate displays (e.g., retina iPad, rMBP) out of the box. Curious what he'll have to say when he finally reviews the iMac.

It is very strange. I have no idea why it was so bad, but out of the box my iMac was very yellow throughout the panel.