The Best Graphics Cards for Photo Editing (but there's a catch)

Wondering what sort of graphics card to buy for photo editing? The good news is that it does not involve anything close to the sort of 2D or 3D polygonal rendering horsepower (among other things) needed to properly display and run 90% of the video games on the market. You don't need a $500 gaming card.

ATI/AMD, nVidia and Matrox make mid-priced chip sets and video cards which will do an admirable job of sending more colors to your monitor than it can display. If you run two monitors, buy a mid-range card with 256MB of on-board DDR (or faster) RAM. If you run one monitor (even a 30" monster) a mid-range card with 128MB of RAM will usually do just fine.

There are some interesting technical issues in play which really (and surprisingly for most people) make your monitor the technical 'bottleneck' in the photo editing display equation. Here's how it works:

1. Take a photo with your digital camera which will, depending on whether its a decent compact or a more advanced prosumer or digital SLR, capture between 8-bits of data per RGB color channel up to 14-bits per channel.
   
2. Transfer the photo to your computer. Your mid-priced video card is capable of putting out anything up to about 16-bits per channel (depending on the card model).
   
3. Load the photo into your favorite photo editing software (ACDSee, Photoshop Elements, Corel PaintShop Pro, etc.) and your monitor will display the photo in a maximum of 8-bits of data per RGB color channel.
   

That's right. Standard LCD color monitors have significant limits. So-called enhanced displays are better, but still don't offer the same amount of color data per channel boasted by the best digital camera sensors and the good quality, mid-range graphics cards. On top of that limitation, color is transmitted to your eye by a monitor, not reflected to your eye (or to your camera sensor) as it was originally seen and captured. The difference? Most importantly, transmitted color is limited by the varying capabilities of the electronics and materials used to do the transmitting, while reflected color is affected by the type of light available to do the reflecting (direct sunlight, overcast/diffused sunlight, incandescent, metal halide, sodium, fluorescent, etc.). That's partly why the subject you originally observed before taking a photo seems different (usually better) than the photo displayed on your monitor.

So what's the best graphics/video card for photo editing? As of this writing, literally anything in the $175-$225 price range manufactured in the last five years by ATI, ATI/AMD, nVidia or Matrox with 128MB-256MB of on-board DDR (or faster) RAM will do perfectly well. We're not kidding. Graphics card makers such at Matrox, which specialize in cards strictly for digital photo, video and CAD/CAM work, may be the very best choice as long as the computer is not going to be used for serious gaming. Dedicated photo, video and CAD/CAM graphics cards such as the ATI/AMD FireGL, nVidia Quadro and Matrox Parhelia cards are also superb, but cost a lot more than a perfectly good $200 consumer card.

Don't buy a Matrox Parhelia, ATI/AMD FireGL or nVidia Quadro card unless you're also going to spend $1,500 or more on a dedicated graphics monitor capable of 12-bit per RGB channel display.

So what's the catch? The answer is something which escapes a lot of photographers: MONITOR CALIBRATION!

If you ever thought for one moment that the color being displayed on your monitor was accurate, you'd be dead wrong. There isn't a monitor working anywhere in the world right now which is out of adjustment by any less than 10% (unless it has been regularly calibrated). Most monitors being used to edit photos at home are out by a lot more than 10%. You can get used to some awfully poor color display quite easily because your eyes/brain adjust to accommodate what they usually initially recognize as inaccurate. The solution is something called a Monitor Calibrator. ColorVision, X-Rite and GretagMacBeth make excellent, automatic monitor calibrators starting at about US$90. They're easy to use:

1. Install the utility software supplied with the calibrator.
   
2. Plug the calibration device into a USB port and run the software.
   
3. Turn off the lights in the room, then hang the device over top of the monitor so that the device sensor is resting against the screen in the middle of the display.
   

After that, the software takes over, displays colors, makes adjustments according to what the sensor picks up, then creates a custom monitor color profile which is then used as the default every time you start your computer.

The whole calibration process takes about 5 minutes. Because all monitors drift, repeat the process once a month. You'll get the most out of your photos, and you'll be much happier. Once you've done your first monitor calibration, load some photos you haven't displayed in a while. You may be surprised at how much better they look! You will for sure be surprised at how much better your monitor and graphics card combo work.

All of the following graphics cards work very well for photo editing and almost everything else you do on your computer except serious or intensive 3D, high resolution gaming. Several models are also air-cooled, which also makes them completely silent:

• nVidia: Any GeForce card with a 7600, 8400 or 8500 chip set and 128MB or more of on-board RAM
  
• ATI/AMD: Any Radeon card with an X1650 Pro, X1800, X1900 or X2600 chip set and 128MB or more of on-board RAM
  
• Matrox: Any Millennium P-series card with 128MB of on-board RAM
  

Happy editing.

Too Much Choice - Recent Tech Books Confuse Rather Than Educate

We received a well written comment from Paul Rochford of Techspertise about our August 2007 review of The Principles of Beautiful Web Design. Paul stated quite correctly that Sitepoint tends to publish somewhat subject-specific, or at least more sharply focused books, rather than huge and definitively comprehensive reference titles. Our review is definitely complimentary about new author Jason Beaird's focus on typography, layout and color. Since those three items are all the book is supposed to be about, you might think our complaint contradicts the compliment. There's a deeper problem though, and it involves more than just the book's inaccurate title.

I think that Sitepoint and a couple of other publishing marques periodically get a little too cute with their merchandising. To get everything you need from Sitepoint to get started in effective web site development, it's possible to spend well over US$200 by purchasing all of the individual, tightly focused books needed. Shop more extensively however and you can find several different books, each of which contains all of the comprehensive and authoritative information on all of the disciplines (design, content, graphics, SEO, database, security, testing, hosting) needed to develop effective business web sites - for US$60 or thereabouts. Carefully choose one of those titles and be guaranteed of getting a large volume full of authoritative advice and guidance. In the case of The Principles of Beautiful Web Design, Sitepoint offers advice and guidance from Beaird, someone who is arguably quite junior and inexperienced—talented though he may be.

Tech book publishers agonize about why they can only sell a few thousands copies of any of these titles. I think the problem is a direct result of the fact that they publish far too many titles which simply don't stand up under careful scrutiny. Offering perceptible value and strong marketplace presence through great variety is a policy that has many adherents, but there aren't enough authoritative and comprehensively skilled web developers available to write great books. My feeling is that too many titles are written by well meaning and dedicated people who unfortunately lack the 'chops' and comprehensive subject knowledge to effectively guide the rest of us.

Business consumers need better quality choices. Competing through variety rather than quality results in mundane products. That sort of competition rarely leads to great profitability or consumer confidence, and it doesn't provide value to business consumers. As a business consumer, I want to browse Amazon or walk into Barnes & Noble, Chapters, Coles, Waterstone's or Foyles and choose from a small variety of good quality technical titles. I do not want to browse or walk into those stores only to be confronted with the problem of deciding which of an overwhelming variety of titles is actually authoritative and comprehensively covers my needs. I shouldn't have to make that costly decision. I want a smaller set of choices to all be worthwhile, allowing me to make a purchasing decision based on how well an author's style, approach or subjective emphasis suits my personal preferences, relying on the publisher's integrity and its choice of authoritative authors and editors to protect the efficacy of whatever choice I make. If publishers can't provide that security of quality and choice, I might as well just search Wikipedia for the information I need for free.

If Sitepoint decides to reissue the book under the title "Typography, Layout and Color for Web Site Design" I can almost guarantee it will get a better review.