Digital Photography
Monitor Calibration & Raw Processing Software

• Monitor Calibration
  If you want to have some confidence that what you see on your screen will resemble your printed photos then monitor calibration is essential. Previously this would have meant purchasing some expensive hardware and doing some reading up on the subject to understand what's going on. Well, the reading up part is still recommended but the expensive hardware is now optional as a new device has recently become available which brings monitor calibration within the price range of any digital photography enthusiast. The device in question is the Pantone Huey, full details of which can be found in the Products, Color Control section of the Pantone website. The Huey does a great job for a sensible price - it's currently (Dec 2007) approximately 90 US Dollars or 75 GB Pounds. It not only allows you to calibrate your monitor but it also can be set to compensate for changes in your room lighting. I do however have a few suggestions as regards setting it up as the Huey instructions were originally rather brief.
  
  1. Make sure any other monitor profiling/calibration software you may have previously been using eg. Adobe Gamma or PowerStrip is disabled.
  2. Adjust your monitor's colour temperature, brightness and contrast first.
     Set the colour temperature to 6500K and display the SMPTE test card (see below) at full size.
     Adjust the brightness and contrast so all the greyscale steps and the 5% plus 95% squares can be distinguished.
     Alternatively use the excellent Photo Friday calibration tool to adjust your brightness and contrast.
  3. Make sure you have the latest version of the Huey software which can be downloaded from the Huey section of the Pantone website.
  4. Install the software, reboot your computer and then connect your Huey. If using Windows, once the new hardware wizard has finished registering the Huey, run the software and follow the on-screen instructions. Make sure the Huey is stable on your monitor's face before starting the measurement phase. At the end of the calibration, choose the Web Browsing and Photo Editing setting which will give you a calibrated 6500K colour temperature with a 2.20 gamma curve. More information on the Huey settings can be found on the Pantone Support website.
     

• Raw Photo Processing Software
  If you are looking for a quick and simple raw to JPEG or TIFF converter that runs on Windows PCs and makes an excellent  job of the conversion using it's auto white balance and default sharpening settings you should try the batch mode of the Stepok Raw Importer. It is currently a free download and supports raw files from a wide range of digital cameras. Mac OS X users are recommended to initially try iPhoto which is included with the operating system and provides the basic tools needed for raw file conversion.
  
  For a more comprehensive raw conversion program that runs on both Windows and Mac OS X I've recently downloaded the trial version of Capture One 4 and find it to be way ahead of any other raw processing programs I've used both in terms of final image quality and ease of use. You can download a trial copy and view some excellent tutorials on the Capture One 4 website.
  
  For those shots taken at higher ISO settings where noise is prevalent in your shots Noise Ninja provides a useful reduction in the noise present without destroying all the fine details. Noise Ninja runs on both Windows and Mac OS X. More details can be found on the Picture Code website. Picture Code provide ready made noise profiles for many cameras alternatively the software gives you the option of producing a profile for your own camera.