On 10/02/2011 04:50 PM, Invisible wrote:

> You're obviously drastically richer than almost everybody I've ever met
> in my life then. :-P

Actually, as coincidence would have it, I recently had another one of 
those questionnaires from my university. They ask you all kinds of 
stuff. (I don't think I'll be putting anything in the "success stories" 
section. :-P ) One of the things they ask is how much you're earning.

It still amuses me that 6 months after graduating, I got this 
questionnaire, and there's a box for "more than £300,000/year". Let's 
think about this. How many graduates earn that kind of cash less than a 
year after graduating? :-P (Obviously it's simply a standard form that 
they send to everybody...)

The other interesting thing is that although there's about half a dozen 
boxes, there's only one single box for "less than £25,000/year". That's 
all one option; they don't even bother to split it out further - despite 
the fact that this is presumably the option that the majority of people 
will pick. (People who are temping while they look for the first "real" 
job, etc.)

I can't remember what the other categories are off the top of my head.

Then again, I suppose it depends on what they want the data *for*...

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On 11/02/2011 11:56 AM, Invisible wrote:
>>>> It is your job. Your employers sound as if they are running the UK side
>>>> of your company like an outsourced third world project.
>>>
>>> No no, they run the *entire* company like this.
>>
>> Get out before you are a statistic.
>
> No kidding...
>

The good folks here are not trying to put you down but are trying to 
help you. It can be frustrating at times when you display such a small 
town attitude but for your situation to change you will have to get out 
of your comfort zone and start to trust yourself.

>> Of course there are lots of poorly paid people. That does not meen that
>> you have to be one of them.
>
> Sure. That wasn't my point.
>

But it was mine.
*Your* sights are set too low if you think £1000 is out of you reach.

>>
>> Yes, but they were buggers to work for.
>
> Ah well, say "la V".

No! I said "goodbye".

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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On 11/02/2011 11:51 AM, Invisible wrote:

>
> By that analysis, I don't know *anybody* with "a decent job".

Shame on you.

> (Or perhaps I just don't go around measuring everybody...)
>

A commendable attitude if you want to continue the way you are.

>> The lowest paid "System Admin" job I can see in Jobserve is £250/day the
>> average is about £400/day.
>
> Ah, Jobserve. If only these jobs actually existed. I loose track of how
> many of them I've applied for. :-/
>

You should keep track of them. Before I hit my current run of employment 
I had a database of all the jobs I had applied for.


> Damn. I had no idea I was in the company of such giants! o_O

You weren't in the company of anyone better than yourself. It is just 
some people take the opportunities available.

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> On 11/02/2011 10:41 AM, Bill Pragnell wrote:
>
> > And you don't even need to go that far. Double your salary, and you've probably
> > got at least 4x as much disposable income.
>
> That's an interesting statistic. I like that.

Well, it's only a very rough guess based on my situation. It will vary wildly
depending on your actual income and outgoings :)

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>>> Get out before you are a statistic.
>>
>> No kidding...
>
> The good folks here are not trying to put you down but are trying to
> help you. It can be frustrating at times when you display such a small
> town attitude but for your situation to change you will have to get out
> of your comfort zone and start to trust yourself.

I'm not sure what you mean by "small town attitude", but anyway... It's 
a well-known fact that I'm under-paid, and that I have had exactly no 
success trying to get hired by anybody else. We've had this debate.

Actually, I was having this conversation with my girlfriend just the 
other day. Perhaps with her assistance I can get somewhere. (Let's face 
it, she's had more jobs that I've had hot dinners...)

>> Sure. That wasn't my point.
>
> But it was mine.
> *Your* sights are set too low if you think £1000 is out of you reach.

I *know* that £1k is out of my reach today. There's no thinking about 
it. ;-) What will be in reach if I ever get a real job... well, I 
wouldn't know.

>>> Yes, but they were buggers to work for.
>>
>> Ah well, say "la V".
>
> No! I said "goodbye".

Win.

Post a reply to this message

> (It's not a lot of money, but there must be lots of other people doing
> unskilled temp work too, which is presumably why it's the 30th and not
> the 3rd.)

There's a sheet for only full-time workers, which is probably more what 
you're looking for.

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On 11/02/2011 12:47 PM, scott wrote:
>> (It's not a lot of money, but there must be lots of other people doing
>> unskilled temp work too, which is presumably why it's the 30th and not
>> the 3rd.)
>
> There's a sheet for only full-time workers, which is probably more what
> you're looking for.

I'm loving how there's about a 50% difference in the average figures for 
men and women. Nothing sexist about that at all! ;-)

If you look at the male/full time stats, then the mean becomes a 
jaw-dropping £35k, and even the median becomes £28k. Oddly enough, £30k 
is now about the 60th percentile (rather than 75th or so). And, 
amusingly [or not?], my wage drops to around the 10th percentile...

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On 11/02/2011 12:30 PM, Invisible wrote:

> I'm not sure what you mean by "small town attitude", but anyway...

With luck, it'll will change. :-)

>
> Actually, I was having this conversation with my girlfriend just the
> other day. Perhaps with her assistance I can get somewhere. (Let's face
> it, she's had more jobs that I've had hot dinners...)
>

That sounds good, very good.

>>> Sure. That wasn't my point.
>>
>> But it was mine.
>> *Your* sights are set too low if you think £1000 is out of you reach.
>
> I *know* that £1k is out of my reach today. There's no thinking about
> it. ;-) What will be in reach if I ever get a real job... well, I
> wouldn't know.
>

But you will. Things change.
Do you remember one of our first conversations where I thought that you 
were gay because you said that you would never have a girlfriend?

>>>> Yes, but they were buggers to work for.
>>>
>>> Ah well, say "la V".
>>
>> No! I said "goodbye".
>
> Win.

It sounds good but I was full of doubts changing jobs where I had to 
take a bus 17 miles to Glasgow then 10 miles to East Kilbride.

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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On 11/02/2011 10:43 AM, scott wrote:
>> According to Wolfram, my employer lost almost 1 million USD last
>> financial year. Consequently, there is a spending freeze on *everything*.
>
> Don't worry, my employer lost 53 million USD last year :-)

Down the back of the sofa?

Seriously, that's a crapload of money. I've always wondered how you can 
lose that much money and not be shut down...

(Apparently *a lot* of companies lose millions of dollars and yet 
continue trading. But I have no idea how that's possible.)

Post a reply to this message

>> Don't worry, my employer lost 53 million USD last year :-)
>
> Down the back of the sofa?

I assume because not as many people bought stuff as they anticipated.

> Seriously, that's a crapload of money.

But you need to compare it to the revenue and value of the company.  A 
company that loses $50m but is only worth $150m is in trouble, but one 
worth $30000m probably doesn't need to worry about losing $50m in a bad 
year.

 > I've always wondered how you can
> lose that much money and not be shut down...

Because the shareholders believe you have a plan to make profit at some 
point...

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>> Seriously, that's a crapload of money.
>
> But you need to compare it to the revenue and value of the company. A
> company that loses $50m but is only worth $150m is in trouble, but one
> worth $30000m probably doesn't need to worry about losing $50m in a bad
> year.

How do you determine what some company is "worth"?

>> I've always wondered how you can
>> lose that much money and not be shut down...
>
> Because the shareholders believe you have a plan to make profit at some
> point...

So it's a question of making people *believe* that you will make money 
some day?

Suddenly the dot-com bubble makes *so* much more sense...

Post a reply to this message

> How do you determine what some company is "worth"?

Just like anything else, whatever people are willing to pay for it. 
Multiply the share price by the number of shares.

> So it's a question of making people *believe* that you will make money
> some day?

Exactly, and having a good track record of good profit, good management 
and a lot of assets (like factories) helps to convince them you're a 
good investment.  If a company makes an announcement of bad news, the 
share price will usually drop, as people won't judge it to be worth as 
much any more.

> Suddenly the dot-com bubble makes *so* much more sense...

Yeh, if you have no physical assets it's very easy for your "worth" to 
go to zero overnight (eg if you only have one software product, and then 
Microsoft decides to buy one of your competitors and release their 
software for free, you're stuffed).

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On Fri, 11 Feb 2011 13:33:45 +0000, Stephen wrote:

>>>>> Yes, but they were buggers to work for.
>>>>
>>>> Ah well, say "la V".
>>>
>>> No! I said "goodbye".
>>
>> Win.
> 
> It sounds good but I was full of doubts changing jobs where I had to
> take a bus 17 miles to Glasgow then 10 miles to East Kilbride.

It does - I know I've told the story here about walking away from an 
intolerable job with no option, and while it's liberating to just quit, 
one does tend to have doubts, that's true.

But for me, it did work out regardless, and for the better.

Jim

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On Fri, 11 Feb 2011 10:29:48 +0000, Invisible wrote:

>> I think you'd be surprised what level of work goes into making even a
>> low circulation full-colour magazine.
> 
> OK. As I say, I don't work in the print business personally. It just
> surprises me that anyone would shell out such a huge amount of money for
> something unless it was absolutely critical to have it.

Who says it isn't absolutely critical to have a monitor like this in the 
fields it's designed for?

Jim

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On Fri, 11 Feb 2011 11:51:15 +0000, Invisible wrote:

>> Interesting how you see it. I thought that it was about how a few
>> thousand pounds was not out of the price range of someone with a decent
>> job.
> 
> By that analysis, I don't know *anybody* with "a decent job". (Or
> perhaps I just don't go around measuring everybody...)

You know me.  I like to think I have a decent job.

Those of us offering to help you don't have jobs that suck, you know.  I 
would guess that all of us make decent money and have jobs we like.  
These offers of help aren't "the blind leading the blind" - but you've 
got to be willing to work for it.

Have you done the assignment that Darren gave you to improve your writing 
and writing organizational skills, for example?  You do know that I've 
written and so has Darren, we might just know a thing or two about how to 
do these things you've declared "impossible", and if you let us, we can 
help you improve your skills.  But it doesn't come by you saying "I don't 
have the time.".  If it's important to you, make the time.

Jim

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On 11/02/2011 6:26 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> It does - I know I've told the story here about walking away from an
> intolerable job with no option, and while it's liberating to just quit,
> one does tend to have doubts, that's true.
>
Oh, the job wasn’t intolerable although I made my boss’s life pretty 
tough. I’ve put up with lots worse than that. It was the worry about 
being able to do it with no qualifications or relevant experience.

> But for me, it did work out regardless, and for the better.

It did for me too until I moved on to a better job.

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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On Fri, 11 Feb 2011 18:41:28 +0000, Stephen wrote:

> On 11/02/2011 6:26 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> It does - I know I've told the story here about walking away from an
>> intolerable job with no option, and while it's liberating to just quit,
>> one does tend to have doubts, that's true.
>>
> Oh, the job wasn’t intolerable although I made my boss’s life pretty
> tough. I’ve put up with lots worse than that. It was the worry about
> being able to do it with no qualifications or relevant experience.

Well, yes, it was kinda like that for me, too - the work itself was OK, 
but between my coworkers and my boss at that job, it wasn't easy for me, 
and I'm sure (in retrospect) that I didn't make it easy for them, either.

>> But for me, it did work out regardless, and for the better.
> 
> It did for me too until I moved on to a better job.

Yep, that's the way it works. :-)

Jim

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scott wrote:
> the artists and designers who choose 
> colours get very annoyed when the final product looks a totally 
> different shade to what they designed.

My brother (in advertising) tells of a time when the boss sent out some 
valentine calendar or some such for a test print. An hour later the printer 
comes back with a sample.

Boss: "No. This is awful. It's supposed to be pink. Does this rose look pink 
to you? No! It's orange. It's not even close. Go fix it."

An hour later, the printer comes back with another sample.

Boss: "Ah, this is much better. Now it's pink. *This* is what you should 
have brought me in the first place."  Then he hands the calendar back and 
says "Now go fix it."

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
  "How did he die?"   "He got shot in the hand."
     "That was fatal?"
          "He was holding a live grenade at the time."

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Invisible wrote:
> I'm loving how there's about a 50% difference in the average figures for 
> men and women. Nothing sexist about that at all! ;-)

There are lots of reasons this sort of thing happens in addition to sexism.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
  "How did he die?"   "He got shot in the hand."
     "That was fatal?"
          "He was holding a live grenade at the time."

Post a reply to this message

>> How do you determine what some company is "worth"?
>
> Just like anything else, whatever people are willing to pay for it.
> Multiply the share price by the number of shares.

And here I was thinking that the share price is just an arbitrary 
plucked out of thin air and fluctuating at random...

>> So it's a question of making people *believe* that you will make money
>> some day?
>
> Exactly, and having a good track record of good profit, good management
> and a lot of assets (like factories) helps to convince them you're a
> good investment. If a company makes an announcement of bad news, the
> share price will usually drop, as people won't judge it to be worth as
> much any more.

So, like, if you own several million dollars worth of assets that you 
might potentially be able to sell, people aren't worried if you make a 
few thousand in losses? (Or rather, not *as* worried as if your assets 
were, say, £200...)

>> Suddenly the dot-com bubble makes *so* much more sense...
>
> Yeh, if you have no physical assets it's very easy for your "worth" to
> go to zero overnight (eg if you only have one software product, and then
> Microsoft decides to buy one of your competitors and release their
> software for free, you're stuffed).

It makes it look like all you have to do is *convince* people that if 
they invest enough money, "one day" you will start making a huge profit. 
Of course, talking people into things is significantly easier than, say, 
ACTUALLY MAKING A PROFIT.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On 11/02/2011 7:24 PM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> It makes it look like all you have to do is *convince* people that if
> they invest enough money, "one day" you will start making a huge profit.
> Of course, talking people into things is significantly easier than, say,
> ACTUALLY MAKING A PROFIT.

Look up Ponzi scheme

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Of course, talking people into things is significantly easier than, say, 
> ACTUALLY MAKING A PROFIT.

Which is exactly why about four out of five start-ups fail in the first 
three years or so.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
  "How did he die?"   "He got shot in the hand."
     "That was fatal?"
          "He was holding a live grenade at the time."

Post a reply to this message

On 11/02/2011 6:43 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:

>
> Well, yes, it was kinda like that for me, too - the work itself was OK,
> but between my coworkers and my boss at that job, it wasn't easy for me,
> and I'm sure (in retrospect) that I didn't make it easy for them, either.
>

LOL That's what happens when you're too smart for your own good '-)

>>
>> It did for me too until I moved on to a better job.
>
> Yep, that's the way it works. :-)
>

I did a count a couple of months ago and I've had 41 paying jobs. Most 
of them in the last 15 years, since I've been contracting.

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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On Sat, 12 Feb 2011 17:43:45 +0000, Stephen wrote:

> On 11/02/2011 6:43 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> 
> 
>> Well, yes, it was kinda like that for me, too - the work itself was OK,
>> but between my coworkers and my boss at that job, it wasn't easy for
>> me, and I'm sure (in retrospect) that I didn't make it easy for them,
>> either.
>>
>>
> LOL That's what happens when you're too smart for your own good '-)

Indeed. :-)

>>> It did for me too until I moved on to a better job.
>>
>> Yep, that's the way it works. :-)
>>
>>
> I did a count a couple of months ago and I've had 41 paying jobs. Most
> of them in the last 15 years, since I've been contracting.

I remembered you had done something like that - I guess contracting/
consulting would lead to that - lots of interesting experiences if you 
can find the work, that's for sure. :-)

Jim

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On 12/02/2011 7:28 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> I remembered you had done something like that - I guess contracting/
> consulting would lead to that -

Yes it has been very interesting finding out how lots of companies work. 
Recently I've worked

 > lots of interesting experiences if you
 > can find the work, that's for sure.:-)

Yes it has been very interesting finding out how lots of companies work. 
Recently I've worked in a Shipyard, the Nuclear Industry, Coca Cola, a 
Wind Turbine company, Water Utilities, Rolls-Royce, Our National Lottery 
and so on. I’ve also worked in a few countries too. Very mind expanding.

Finding work can be stressful but that is where PovRay helps. :-D

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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> And here I was thinking that the share price is just an arbitrary
> plucked out of thin air and fluctuating at random...

Err, no.  Imagine something like ebay for selling company shares on 
(remember there are a HUGE number of shares changing hand every second), 
the share price is simply the price that the shares are being sold for 
at that instant.

> So, like, if you own several million dollars worth of assets that you
> might potentially be able to sell, people aren't worried if you make a
> few thousand in losses? (Or rather, not *as* worried as if your assets
> were, say, £200...)

Exactly.

> It makes it look like all you have to do is *convince* people that if
> they invest enough money, "one day" you will start making a huge profit.

Yes, this is what happens when a company is "floated", you split 
ownership of your company up into a fixed number of shares and ask the 
public to buy them.  You obviously get money for this, but you lose 
ownership of some or all of your company.  But if subsequently the share 
price goes up, you get nothing extra (unless you are shareholder), it's 
just the shareholders making money.

The better you can convince people you're going to make a huge profit, 
the more money they will be likely to pay for a share of your company.

Post a reply to this message

> My brother (in advertising) tells of a time when the boss sent out some
> valentine calendar or some such for a test print. An hour later the
> printer comes back with a sample.
>
> Boss: "No. This is awful. It's supposed to be pink. Does this rose look
> pink to you? No! It's orange. It's not even close. Go fix it."
>
> An hour later, the printer comes back with another sample.
>
> Boss: "Ah, this is much better. Now it's pink. *This* is what you should
> have brought me in the first place." Then he hands the calendar back and
> says "Now go fix it."

Still not really seeing how having a more expensive monitor helps 
here... It's not like the quality of the monitor affects what colour the 
printer prints.

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>> And here I was thinking that the share price is just an arbitrary
>> plucked out of thin air and fluctuating at random...
>
> Err, no. Imagine something like ebay for selling company shares on
> (remember there are a HUGE number of shares changing hand every second),
> the share price is simply the price that the shares are being sold for
> at that instant.

OK. I'm still fuzzy on exactly how the shares themselves are worth 
something. The company [hopefully] makes money. What do the shares 
actually do?

>> So, like, if you own several million dollars worth of assets that you
>> might potentially be able to sell, people aren't worried if you make a
>> few thousand in losses? (Or rather, not *as* worried as if your assets
>> were, say, £200...)
>
> Exactly.

OK. Well that at least makes sense...

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>> Err, no. Imagine something like ebay for selling company shares on
>> (remember there are a HUGE number of shares changing hand every second),
>> the share price is simply the price that the shares are being sold for
>> at that instant.
>
> OK. I'm still fuzzy on exactly how the shares themselves are worth
> something. The company [hopefully] makes money. What do the shares
> actually do?

A "share" is literally owning a fixed share of the company, which you 
are free to sell on to anyone else.  Obviously if the company is 
successful the shares will become more valuable and you can make a 
profit by selling them later.  Also, because you effectively own part of 
the company, you get a (proportional) say in how the company is run, and 
get a share of the profits each year (a dividend).

Post a reply to this message

> Obviously if the company is
> successful the shares will become more valuable and you can make a
> profit by selling them later.

This is not obvious to me.

> Also, because you effectively own part of
> the company, you get a (proportional) say in how the company is run,

I can imagine some people might find that interesting, but I would think 
the majority wouldn't.

> and get a share of the profits each year (a dividend).

Now you're talking. You mean to say that you can make money simply by 
owning a share? (As opposed to trading it.)

Post a reply to this message

>> Obviously if the company is
>> successful the shares will become more valuable and you can make a
>> profit by selling them later.
>
> This is not obvious to me.

Which bit?  You own a fixed proportion of a company, if the company 
becomes hugely more successful, the value of your proportion increases.

> Now you're talking. You mean to say that you can make money simply by
> owning a share? (As opposed to trading it.)

Yes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dividend

Post a reply to this message

>> This is not obvious to me.
>
> Which bit?

The bit where a piece of paper has value because the company who's name 
is printed on it has value.

>> Now you're talking. You mean to say that you can make money simply by
>> owning a share? (As opposed to trading it.)
>
> Yes.

Right. So a share has value because you can earn money from it. And the 
value varies according to how profitable the company is because that 
money comes from the company's profits.

Post a reply to this message

On 2/9/2011 10:43 AM, Invisible wrote:
> On 09/02/2011 04:09 PM, Darren New wrote:
>> Invisible wrote:
>>>> Oh man, that's expensive! ;-)
>>
>> Hopefully you realize that each of these costs probably less than a
>> week's salary of the person using it, right? :-)
>
> ...there are people who use colour-calibrated monitors?

I do... Though I can't afford one with built in calibration, I use an 
external device to calibrate my monitor. It gets close, but no exact. I 
just switched from one with a fluorescent backlight to one with an LED 
backlight, and am still getting used to the color rendering of it (I'm 
not sure, but I suspect my colorimeter may be trying to compensate for 
the fluorescent green peak when set to measure an LCD.

-- 
~Mike

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On 2/10/2011 3:25 AM, Invisible wrote:

> I'm having a hard time believing that just because somebody is a
> "professional photographer" they can afford to blow £1k on a monitor.
> And let's face it, it isn't actually going to help them take better photos.

An individual would probably not purchase said monitor, but a marketing 
department, advertising company, photo studio or lab would definitely 
have one on hand.

I wish I could afford such a monitor, it would be nice.

-- 
~Mike

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On 2/10/2011 10:50 AM, Invisible wrote:

> Well, hypothetically you can match them. But sure, I have to wonder how
> close the match would actually look...
>

CMYK gamut is quite a bit narrower than sRGB (what most monitors are, I 
don't know about the high-end monitors, but I imagine they are close to 
sRGB, or AdobeRGB) The tricky part is setting up your proofing 
environment to match the black and white points accurately.

-- 
~Mike

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On 2/11/2011 2:58 AM, Invisible wrote:

> Well, apparently $850 works out to about £500. That I could just about
> afford. Maybe. (At the end of a long list of other stuff I still want to
> buy...)

:D I own a Canon 7D, a 40D, a few lenses. Tam 17-50 f/2.8, Canon 70-200 
f/4, Sigma 10-20 (I forget the aperture range on this one, I want to say 
f/3.5 5.6, doesn't matter, that isn't relevant when there's so few 
designs with such a focal length range, some extender tubes, a few 
flashes, a 50mm f/1.8, and some various adapter rings and polarizing 
filter.

Actually, If I didn't spend so much on camera gear, I could probably 
afford the monitor, but built-in calibration isn't a priority, and I'm 
not doing any serious marketing work. Besides, my wife would be out for 
blood if I dropped $1500 on a monitor :D

-- 
~Mike

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Le 14/02/2011 13:12, Invisible a écrit :

>>> Now you're talking. You mean to say that you can make money simply by
>>> owning a share? (As opposed to trading it.)
>>
>> Yes.
> 
> Right. So a share has value because you can earn money from it. And the
> value varies according to how profitable the company is because that
> money comes from the company's profits.

Well, the initial value of the share is the portion of the capital it
represents: If the company has a registered capital of 10 Millions, and
the original owner want to put 40% on the market, the initial emission
of the capital stock will be valued for 4 Millions. The number of shares
simply divide that amount.
It is sometimes more efficient to make many share at 4€/$ than just a
few at 4000€/$ : the market is more receptive (the small traders cannot
afford a 4000€/$ one, whereas they can take a lot of 4$/€ ones!)

One second after the delivery of the share to the market, a share is
worth only what other traders are ready to buy it at. They usually
forget the initial price and looks only at the ratio of dividend/price.


Dividend: each year (usually), the benefit from the company get
distributed (re-invested, salary-raise and share holders). The part for
the share holder is the dividend. The dividend may be paid in cash or
with more shares! (company's choice, not share's holder unless company
decides so). Which means that no dividend is bad for the value of the
share...



Let's look at a case: Eurotunnel (tunnel under the channel)...
Introduced at about 8, IIRC, while the tunnel was not yet done.
No dividend before the tunnel could exist, but large promise of benefits
in future (including free pass...).
Price went up to 76 over a few years.
(so, if you had bought at 8 and were selling at 76... yummy! that was
about 900% benefit! Your house of 1 Million became a castle of 10
Millions (with a park!) ! Even with inflation, very yummy...).
Events happened...

Shares get bought back (or forever lost) at 0.02 !
If you bought at 8, from 1 Million only remains 2500.
If you bought at 70 (oh, lucky, get on the wagon now!), from 1 Million
only remains less than 300!

I have the 300, can I get the million please ?

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On 2/11/2011 3:14 AM, Invisible wrote:

>> If your local paper has any colour pages then surely they will, the
>> advertisers will demand it to ensure their company colours are correct.
>
> Surely you don't actually need an expensive specially calibrated monitor
> just to ensure that IBM Blue comes out as IBM Blue. Presumably there are
> standardised ways of describing specific print colours, and the
> advertisers will just tell you what colour they want according to some
> such standard.
>

No, they could give you the coordinates in CIE L*a*b, either that or you 
take a photospectrometer to a swatch they sent you, which would cost 
roughly the same as the monitor with built-in calibration.

> Now there's something I hadn't thought of... For most magazines, exact
> colour probably isn't critical. But how about those huge colour
> photographs that shops sometimes have on their walls? I guess you
> *might* conceivably want precise colour matching for that.

Really, any time you have a photo (or really, anything else) printed 
(even, say someone's portrait) you want to use calibrated color. Here's 
the deal: When adjusting the color balance and tone density of a photo, 
you want to be sure that 1) the picture will appear on paper without 
losing any detail in shadows or highlights, 2) [Most critical to have a 
calibrated monitor for] the color balance is correct. If you're 
adjusting color on an LCD monitor and that monitor has a green cast, 
your perception will shift, once you have the picture balanced the way 
you think it should be, and you send it to a press or lab for printing, 
or e-mail the image to a friend, you'll soon discover that on all of the 
other media, even though the picture looks fine on your screen, the 
shadows are blocked up, the midtones are too dark, and everything looks 
like it was tinted with a bit of pepto-bismol (everything's magenta). 
That is why you want a calibrated screen.



-- 
~Mike

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On 2/10/2011 10:42 AM, Darren New wrote:

>
> Compliant Standards - TUV, CCC, RoHS, CE MDD
>
> I'm guessing MDD is medical diagnostic device, for example.
>

Not only that, but for use in a medical context, every component in that 
device must be certified for medical use. This means extensive testing 
and underwriting. Lots of salaries being paid on that one, Medical has 
some extremely strict standards for reliability. Ever notice when you 
look at datasheets for electronic components, they have a disclaimer on 
most that state they are not intended for use in military and medical 
applications. Usually mil-spec has extended requirements for stability 
at different environmental and voltages, Medical, too. And in some 
cases, they'll need even tighter tolerances on output and stability.

Though, you can buy some mil-spec components they are quite a bit more 
expensive. Medical-level screening would probably be even more 
expensive. People get a little touchy when lives are at stake.

-- 
~Mike

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On 14/02/2011 01:51 PM, Le_Forgeron wrote:

> I have the 300, can I get the million please ?

Required XKCD quote: http://xkcd.com/592/
(Check out the alt text.)

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scott wrote:
> Yes, this is what happens when a company is "floated", 

In the USA, this is called "going public."  The private owners (and the 
bank) tends to make a whole lot more money than the company is actually 
worth at that moment.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
  "How did he die?"   "He got shot in the hand."
     "That was fatal?"
          "He was holding a live grenade at the time."

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Invisible wrote:
> Still not really seeing how having a more expensive monitor helps 
> here... It's not like the quality of the monitor affects what colour the 
> printer prints.

When you're creating the initial image, you need to know what it's going to 
look like when it's printed.

Say you're taking pictures of meat to put on packaging. You take the photo, 
then you color-balance it until it looks juicy and delicious. [*] Now you 
ask your software what colors are in the photo, so you can give those colors 
to the printer.

If your monitor makes pink look like orange and orange look like yellow, 
then when you tell the printer to print out what you see on the monitor, 
you're going to be disappointed.

The monitor doesn't affect what color the printer prints. It affects what 
color you think you should be telling the printer to print.




[*] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7BuQFUhsRM#t=18s

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
  "How did he die?"   "He got shot in the hand."
     "That was fatal?"
          "He was holding a live grenade at the time."

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> Say you're taking pictures of meat to put on packaging.

Another point that is quite surprising (to me it was at least) is that 
pretty much every mass produced food is manufactured or bought to strict 
colour standards.  The reason being that any "odd" coloured food tends 
to get left on the shelf and scrapped, so the big shops demand the 
colour is within a certain tolerance.  This really is no joke, I met a 
colour scientist once who worked in a bread factory, he was having 
problems with the crumbs getting into the colour measurement equipment 
(costing far more than $1000).

Post a reply to this message

On 15/02/2011 08:52 AM, scott wrote:
>> Say you're taking pictures of meat to put on packaging.
>
> Another point that is quite surprising (to me it was at least) is that
> pretty much every mass produced food is manufactured or bought to strict
> colour standards. The reason being that any "odd" coloured food tends to
> get left on the shelf and scrapped, so the big shops demand the colour
> is within a certain tolerance. This really is no joke, I met a colour
> scientist once who worked in a bread factory, he was having problems
> with the crumbs getting into the colour measurement equipment (costing
> far more than $1000).

What a crumby job that was!

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On 2/14/2011 10:31 AM, Darren New wrote:
> Invisible wrote:
>> Still not really seeing how having a more expensive monitor helps
>> here... It's not like the quality of the monitor affects what colour
>> the printer prints.
>
> When you're creating the initial image, you need to know what it's going
> to look like when it's printed.
>
Course, in principle, most systems can now use a "profile" for the 
printer and display, so that, in theory, as long as you can also get 
data from the display on what tweaks you have made to it, what you see 
in the screen is "translated" through the profiles, to match what you 
see to what has been printed.

This sort of works, some times. lol Usually, its just better to have a 
display that is accurate, and printer that is, and thus, again, in 
principle, have the two properly match colors properly. Usually that 
meant a real high end printer, and a screen that supported "way" more 
colors than a standard display, and had been "pre-tuned" to exact 
specifications. Now.. most of them are pretty close to start with, and 
most printers do a pretty fair job of producing similar output, so its a 
bit less critical, except when it isn't.

-- 
void main () {
   If Schrödingers_cat is alive or version > 98 {
     if version = "Vista" {
       call slow_by_half();
       call DRM_everything();
     }
     call functional_code();
   }
   else
     call crash_windows();
}

<A HREF='http://www.daz3d.com/index.php?refid=16130551'>Get 3D Models, 
3D Content, and 3D Software at DAZ3D!</A>

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Patrick Elliott wrote:
> data from the display on what tweaks you have made to it,

I'm not sure how this would differ from a calibrated monitor. Of course, 
monitors and printers are going to have their own profiles, to translate 
from the standard calibration into whatever they need themselves for their 
own individual inks or electronics.

> have the two properly match colors properly. 

That's the calibration.

> a standard display, and had been "pre-tuned" to exact 
> specifications. 

That's the calibration, yes?

> most printers do a pretty fair job of producing similar output, so its a 
> bit less critical, except when it isn't.

They do now that people have decided on a calibration.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
  "How did he die?"   "He got shot in the hand."
     "That was fatal?"
          "He was holding a live grenade at the time."

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>> have the two properly match colors properly.
>
> That's the calibration.

I would have said that "calibration" implies that they measured not what 
the average product does, but what the particular one you purchased 
does. (I.e., it's set up per-device.)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On 15/02/2011 7:00 PM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>>> have the two properly match colors properly.
>>
>> That's the calibration.
>
> I would have said that "calibration" implies that they measured not what
> the average product does, but what the particular one you purchased
> does. (I.e., it's set up per-device.)
>

Then you would be wrong.
Calibration is done to individual items. You cannot present a 
calibration certificate to an inspector for a group of items.

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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Stephen wrote:
> On 15/02/2011 7:00 PM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>>>> have the two properly match colors properly.
>>>
>>> That's the calibration.
>>
>> I would have said that "calibration" implies that they measured not what
>> the average product does, but what the particular one you purchased
>> does. (I.e., it's set up per-device.)
>>
> 
> Then you would be wrong.
> Calibration is done to individual items. You cannot present a 
> calibration certificate to an inspector for a group of items.

I think that's what he said. And yes, I wasn't talking about the "average" 
set-up. Of course everyone tries to get their "average" displays looking right.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
  "How did he die?"   "He got shot in the hand."
     "That was fatal?"
          "He was holding a live grenade at the time."

Post a reply to this message

On 15/02/2011 8:58 PM, Darren New wrote:
> Stephen wrote:

>> Then you would be wrong.
>> Calibration is done to individual items. You cannot present a
>> calibration certificate to an inspector for a group of items.
>
> I think that's what he said. And yes, I wasn't talking about the
> "average" set-up. Of course everyone tries to get their "average"
> displays looking right.
>

Excuse me, I have a cold.

Ooops! Tired eyes. Will I ever be forgiven? :-)


-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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