Blackmagic Forum

Any experiences and recommendations for low cost color grading monitors?

Minimal requirements:
- 10-bit video processing
- SDI input

My tips (has anyone better tip?):

http://eu.jvc.com/pro/monitors/studio-monitors/DT-G21E/
http://www.bon.co.kr/eng/products/model ... =bsm213n3g

Take a look at FSI Flanders.
You won't be disappointed.

Hi Daniel,

I find a low cost monitor for my "personal using".
Flanders or Sony OLED monitors I know from my job and they are great but expensive.

Some of the monitors from LG or Samsung are not so bad these days, if you find the right settings buried in their menus.

Uli,

I am not sure LG or Samsung have SDI input.

Vit Reiter wrote:I am not sure LG or Samsung have SDI input.

I think putting "low cost" and "reference monitor" in the same sentence don't really work.

If you can scale your expectations down, the Grade 2 displays from LG, like the 7- or 8-series OLEDs, can work very well with the HDMI input. There are ways of converting HD-SDI signals to HDMI fairly painlessly these days. The key is getting the displays calibrated.

Second that.

Uli Plank wrote:Second that.

Really? Can You tell me why do you prefer the second from these two?

Huh? The expression "I second that" usually means that I'm of the same opinion.

Take a look at the BenQ PD2710QC. It's a 27-inch display with 2,560 x 1,440-pixel resolution, and it supports calibration for accurate colors. (I use a Spyder5 calibration device.) The PD2710QC costs around $600 from Amazon, which may be a little more than "low cost," but it is really nice. BenQ loaned me one to review and I had it for six months... sweet. You can see the review I did at .

Edit: I see the BenQ display does not have an SDI input as requested by the OP. You can get an SDI-to-HDMI adapter from Blackmagic Design for $60 or so.

Bob Kovacs

Hey Vit
For HD, 709 work. I can recommend you the relatively inexpensive Eizo CG247x.

I've installed a few, and when connected properly and well calibrated, it gives excellent results for its price. (the factory calibration is a mess... I had best results with resent updates of the CalMan Ultimate tool.)
That model by Eizo accepts calibration presets injected to it pretty nicely for its price.

Additionally. I have tested and it does display a proper 10 bit signal (when correctly connected and set up) and up to 4:4:4 signals (again, depending on settings and card model)

No SDI isn't really a limitation here if you connect your HDMI correctly to the right BMD card.

Again, so its clear... Its not worth much for grading video without professional calibration (which should be checked and re-calibrated periodically). Its internal color probe has little to do with that and can't replace pro work.

I feel that in many aspects the next step after it is double the price - Flanders DM240

Uli Plank wrote:Huh? The expression "I second that" usually means that I'm of the same opinion.

Sorry about my English