Product Review: Datacolor Spyder X Elite

Hey, what's up guys. Professional landscape photographer David Johnson here, and look, outdoor photography is totally different than any other genre of photography and that's what makes it so great. It's the exploration of finding the best light and the best color that we can possibly go out and shoot. And that requires a lot of testing, a lot of field work and a lot of scouting locations, and being sure that we're in the exact spot that we need to be in to capture that amazing alpenglow shot in Colorado. But let's say you take that shot and you really love it and you love the color that's going on and you have reds and greens interacting together and complimentary colors. But what if you sent that file off only to receive the print back to realize these colors aren't what I shot in the field. They're not what I saw with my eyes. And they're also not what I post-process on my monitor. Well, if that's the case, it could mean that your monitor is representing colors incorrectly and your monitor needs to be calibrated. Now, the last few years I've been using a monitor calibrator from Datacolor called the Spyder. And I was using the Spyder5ELITE. They just came out with the SpyderX Elite and just in the couple of weeks of actually getting on it and using it I've been noticing that the color representation in my outdoor photography has significantly improved. It represents what I saw in the field better which is in turn, going to produce better print. It's going to produce better files online even if you're a hobbyist and you're not a professional photographer sharing those images on social media requires perfect colors. And this is gonna help you get the best colors possible. And you may be thinking like what's the difference in all of their models, like the Spyder5 versus the SpyderX. And it really has to do with the Datacolor SpyderX technology that's now built in to this calibrator. They're now using lens technology in their calibration which is number one going to give you faster calibration on your monitor and number two more accurate color representation on all of your photographs, which is in turn what we want because we've spent that time in the field producing great images. We want the color to be exactly right whether or not you're making money off of this or you just love it for photography sake. And you may be thinking, "Great this is just another piece "of gear I have to get and learn how to use." And I actually thought the same thing when I received it in the mail and started going through the process of getting it out of the box and seeing what was in it. The setup is actually extremely easy. You take it out of the box. You go to the website that it wants you to go to and you just click install for the software. Then the software will lead you through all the steps you need to know on how to calibrate your monitor with the SpyderX Elite. Then it's gonna ask you to plug in the USB to the USB port on the monitor that you're using to post-process your outdoor photography images and then place the SpyderX where it wants you to on the screen next, you just hit go. And the SpyderX does the rest of the work for you. It runs through different colors to be sure and grade them on an accurate scale of what color tones are represented on your monitor. In turn, when that's done you're gonna see a difference in the color representation from before and after images that you are actually using. Even if it is the slightest bit possible that's going to be a huge improvement for your outdoor photography and the photos that you're going out to shoot and spending all that work on capturing.