Adobe 23101335 User Guide - Page 146

136 CHAPTER 4 Producing Consistent Color (Photoshop) Updating profiles The color reproduction characteristics of a color device change as it ages, so recalibrate devices periodically and generate updated profiles. Profiles should be good for approximately a month depending on the device. Some monitors automatically compensate for phosphor aging. Also, recalibrate a device when you change any of the factors that affect calibration. For example, recalibrate your monitor when you change the room lighting or the monitor brightness setting. Creating an ICC monitor profile Your monitor will display color more reliably if you use color management and accurate ICC profiles. The Adobe Gamma utility, which is automatically installed into your Control Panels folder, lets you calibrate and characterize your monitor to a standard and then save the settings as an ICC-compliant profile available to any program that uses your color management system. This calibration helps you eliminate any color cast in your monitor, make your monitor grays as neutral as possible, and standardize image display across different monitors. Although Adobe Gamma is an effective calibration and profiling utility, hardware-based utilities are more precise. If you have a hardware-based utility that can generate an ICC-compliant profile, you should use that instead of Adobe Gamma. Also, be sure to use only one calibration utility to display your profile; using multiple utilities can result in incorrect color. For more information, see "Calibrating versus characterizing a monitor," "About monitor calibration settings," "Guidelines for creating an ICC monitor profile," and "Calibrating with Adobe Gamma" in online Help.