Monitor for art help

[Chamberzezz]

Hope someone can help me on this matter, as its been an issue of mine for a while and have only just decided to do something about it.

I'm a digital illustrator and work on both a mac (at my bosses studio sometimes) and my pc at home. The problem is with my monitor at home, the colours change depending on how i sit at my desk. The higher up I go the lighter and muted the colours are and the lower I go, the colour appear darker. I don't know the first thing about monitors so forgive my ignorance. Most monitors I've seen do this. Trouble with this is that it makes the colour unreliable to look at and as an illustrator, I need to be able to see the colour as it should be.... Thing is, the Mac monitors aren't like this and have a screen that doesn't change when i duck down or sit up. its the same all over. Ideal for what i want.

My question is, What pc monitor can I get that has the same kind of screen as a mac. OR at least doesn't change when I move.

Hope someone can help

Many thanks

 

[Oussebon]

These are called viewing angles - the amount you can sit off-centre to a monitor before the image doesn't look right.

There are lots of different specifications for monitors such as resolution, refresh rate, and the kind of panel - most commonly either TN or IPS. In short, what you're looking for is a monitor with an IPS panel, or something similar. IPS gives wider viewing angles and better colour reproduction than an equivalent TN panel.

Macs are well known for their Retina displays, which as far as I know are high resolution IPS panels.

This website explains the difference between various panel types, and includes videos demonstrating TN and IPS viewing angles. https://pcmonitors.info/articles/lcd-panel-types-explored/

It also has reviews of quite a few monitors, generally including videos of viewing angles and lots of technical information about the monitor's performance with regards to colour accuracy and the kinds of things that might be germane to digital art, photo editing, etc.

There's also the question of resolution i.e. how many pixels the monitor has - the higher the resolution, the more pixels, and for a given size the higher the pixel density and thus the sharper the image. Common resolutions are:
1920x1080 also known as 1080p or Full HD
2560 x 1440 (1440p, QHD)
3840 x 2160 (4k, UHD)

What monitor you might consider depends on your budget. If you have a few hundred £, then a 4k IPS panel is probably worth looking into. If it's more like £100+, you can get 1080p IPS panels that are decent enough for the price at around ~£120. You'll probably want to make sure that you know what resolution your current monitors are so you don't buy something that's much lower res than what you're already working with.

 

[Chamberzezz]

You are a star thank you. I happy to spend a bit of money on it as, in a way it's an investment. Its my job. At the threat of sounding lazy ( considering you've been more than helpful) please can you post a link to one so I can have a look. 1080p IPS panel sound good :/ thanks again...

 

[Oussebon]

A decent budget IPS 1080p monitor would be the AOC i2369vm for ~£120 - there's a review of it on PCmonitors, and other websites. But it was realised in 2013 iirc, so there may be newer ones that are a bit better for all I know.

PCS sell the AOC i2369vm but only as part of systems or to clients who already own a PCS system. That said, 2 seconds on google or Amazon will open up alternative places to shop. As the forums belong to PC Specialist who bold and sell computers and laptops, it's not generally the done thing to post links on the forums to alternative vendors who are selling the same product that PCS do.

As above, make sure to check the resolution of the monitors you already are working with. If it's a high resolution screen, moving to a lower res may not feel like much of an upgrade even if it is IPS.

Also note that the cheaper monitors tend just to have a bit of tilt adjustment on the stand. If you find yourself being off-centre of the screen a lot you may want to get something that is height adjustable etc.