Tag Archive for: macbook

MacBookPro M4 Pro Display performance nano texture

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The new MacBookPro M4 Pro: It’s gorgeous

I was 100% happy with my MacbookPro M1 Pro. (see my review here) 
It was lighting fast and even when screencapturing Photoshop I didn’t see any hiccups.
But when Apple showed the new screens I was already looking for my laptop to order a new one.
The biggest frustration with the MacbookPro for me was the very annoying  glare on the screen, it could drive me nuts when travelling, if you need a mirror…..

The nice thing about Apple is that you often don’t have to wait too long and indeed today I got the new MacBookPro M4 Pro with Nano Texture  14″, 1 TB, and wanted to share the first experiences with it, mainly focussing on the screen.

And the screen is indeed absolutely gorgeous and kills the reflections better than expected. It’s something you have to see to believe case 😀
I also opted for the space black color and also here I can say I’m glad I did, I love the normal color of the MacBookPro but the space black is my new favourite.

Ok till now it’s been more like an unboxing, and as you know I’m not really the person for that kind of posts 😀
So let’s dive into the interesting stuff.

Shine a light on me

Let’s do a quick test

the MacBookPro M4 Pro

Left is the….really?
As you can see there is a huge difference. On the previous screen you can clearly see the reflection of our led lights, on the new screen there is nothing visible. And remember the reflection of the previous screen was even worse in some older generations. I’m really glad with this outcome because the screen was my main reason to upgrade.

Now when you see this we want to see something more extreme of course.
So we used the flashlight of the iPhone on full power.

On the previous screen you can clearly see the light and its a pretty large circle and you can see the light actually breaking down in RGB.

Now on the new screen it might seem that the circle is also large but thats probably not what you’re seeing.
This is an extreme example, shining a very bright flashlight right on the screen from 20cm distance.
The little circle in the middle is what you also see in the image above but a lot smaller and much less intens.
The “glow” around the circle is probably the Nano texture doing it’s anti light reflective work, when the lightsource is less extreme this would mean it totally takes out the reflections, as you can see in the first example.

In other words, wow.

Performance of the MacBookPro M4 Pro with Nano Texture

As creators we of course demand the absolute best from our screens.
Of course it’s always better to use a dedicated monitor. For example the BenQ monitors I use have a hardware calibration option and are tracking very close to the AdobeRGB colorspace. (and they have a great anti glare coating :D) but does that mean that you can’t use your laptop screen for editing ?

Well decide for yourself, I will post the validation of the screen in a moment.
It really depends on how color critical your work is, but in all honesty when I look at the results I would not hesitate to edit my work on the MacBookPro, as long as I’m able to check it on the BenQ before it goes to the client.

the MacBookPro M4 Pro

Calibration

The first thing I do when I get a new laptop is make a 1:1 copy from my old laptop (I love the way the Mac does this).
This mostly takes an hour or slightly longer, in that time I keep my screen on at my preference light output.
When my whole system is up and running, this often means the screen has been on for a few hours.
Now it’s a good time to do the first calibration (and repeat this after a few days).

Do make sure you use the proper analyser for the XRD screens.
We highly recommend the Calibrite HL series due to the high luminance output of the screens.
On the photo you still see an older analyser which was handy for the moment, calibration should be done with the HL series by preference.

With MacOs you do have to make sure that you check your display settings and disable the two settings you can see in this image, these settings can really mess up your calibrations.

the MacBookPro M4 Pro

After the calibration is done it’s possible to run a validation of your screen.
I’ve setup the screen to the brightness I normally use in a bright room, this is brighter than my BenQ which is in a controlled environment.
I highly recommend calibrating at the brightness you use the most. You can always go up or down 1 click.

 

As you can see the performance of the screen is actually pretty good 😀
I’ve been working on the MBP for a few hours now and coming from the M1 Pro I can say that especially plugins like Luminar Neo and BorisFX are running a lot faster. That doesn’t mean that the M1 Pro was slow. But the M4 Pro is clearly a lot faster.

Conclusion, should you buy the MacBookPro M4 Pro with Nano Texture screen?

There will be a lot of reviews about the speed of the new MacBooks, for me it was already clear I would get more speed than I would probably ever really need. However the screen is one of the most important things on a laptop for me. We travel a lot and having a screen that functions like a mirror is insanely annoying. To be honest the screen alone was worth the upgrade. But a good screen should also be able to show proper shadow detail, don’t clip the whites and have a proper performance for color “critical” work. So in this short review I focussed on the screen and wanted to share the validation of the new MacBookPro 14″ Nano structure screen.

 

If you are in the market for a great monitor, make sure to check out the BenQ series.
I’ve been using them for years and they always deliver a great price/performance.
For the European customers we have a few 10% discount coupons we are allowed to give away. (Email)

Check this link for more info about BenQ SW monitors

 

 

 

Check out my YouTube video about retouching on the iPad 

That setting that drives you nuts during the calibration process on Mac (and windows)

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Calibration is important

I think most of us will agree on this. If you want proper colors and happy customers (depending on the assignment of course) it’s very smart to calibrate your monitor at least once a month, but preferably before every important retouching job. But what are the important settings during calibration?

Calibrating your monitor is super easy.

I’ve been using Calibrite (X-rite) products for years. They are easy to use and compatible with the hardware calibration options inside my BenQ monitor. This is a big plus because although the software from Calibrite is great, hardware solutions are always better, of course. Most professional and semi-professional monitors support hardware calibration.

By the way, if you are in the market for a new monitor and you live in the EU drop me an email, I have a few 10% discount codes from BenQ
They have been supporting my work with Digital Classroom for years and love to give you guys a nice discount.

Anyway back to the story.
Even with easy software, it’s sometimes easy to get an error that… well you can’t fix.
You checked everything, and although you know your brand new monitor should really be perfect, it’s far from.
Or maybe you don’t know how to read the rapports and just wonder why there is so much fuzz about professional monitors.

Step 1

This one is for all systems.
When you are using the HDMI connection make sure your monitor is set for 0-255 or FULL RGB.
If it’s set up for 16-235 (video) you will get all kinds of weird behaviors, very noticeable in the dark and bright areas, but in essence, your whole image looks way off.

When you are using USBc, TB, or Display port you don’t have to check this.
Those connections automatically select the right output.

So is HDMI bad… absolutely not, it’s just as perfect for what we do as USBc and Displayport, you just have to check that one setting.

Step 2

And that’s the nasty one.
In the Mac, there is one setting that will almost certainly have you scratching your head and probably a little bit in panic mode.

If whatever you do, you can’t pass the final certification from your calibration and the errors are constantly changing per calibration, there is probably one setting you forgot the turn off. You can find it under “Displays” in Mac OS.

important setting during calibration

This one will give you A LOT of issues when you want a stable and trusted display.
So turn it OFF.
This goes for all settings with labels like “auto”, “Enhancement”, “Super”, “Real”, “natural” etc.

Just turn everything off and run the calibration software.
You will see that you will pass the certification without any problems now 😀

Don’t forget this important setting during calibration!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below, or reach out via our social media.

Read more about colors in this blog about Working with Colors 

 

Adding more storage to your MacBook Pro (or other laptops) and what to look out for

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Apple is great but some things are insanely expensive

I’ve never been a huge Apple fan, but I do love their products.
Let me explain.
They just work, and they work great together. For me this is vital because I work mostly on my phone but want a fast and seamless integration with my laptop when needed, I also love to edit my images in Photoshop with the iPad Pro in extended screen mode. In other words especially the last few years, Apple found their way back to the creatives after releasing some horrible horrible laptops.

The M series changed it all for me.
My first M product was my iPad Pro, and in all honesty I still use the M1 12.9 iPad Pro.
It’s great for editing, reading comics and magazines, watching movies, browsing and of course connecting a controller and have some fun with Call of dutch mobile 😀

The M series in the iPad Pro actually made it possible for me to edit video better and faster than on my Dell XPS i9 windows laptop, which in essence blew me away, I never expected a tablet to hands down beat my super expensive laptop that was fully specked out.

At the moment I’m running a M1 Pro 14″ MacBookPro which will be replaced as soon as the M4 pro is released, not because I really need it, but I do find that when screen recording heavily AI driven software I do start to experience the limits of my laptop 😀
For normal use I would not know why to upgrade to be honest.

Although I feel that the MacBookPro’s at the moment give the best bang for the buck, there is one thing that is incredibly expensive when upgrading, and that’s internal storage. My photos and videos are all stored on 2 synology NAS systems but when working on several video projects, music recording etc. the internal drive is even with 1TB a “bit” on the small side. But upgrading is in my opinion way to expensive, so I was looking for a great solution.

Most solutions are based on the SD card slot which doesn’t make sense for me due to the speed hit and also the lack of really large storage. I need at least 4TB extra and also an option to work from that drive, or use it as a scratch drive.

On Amazon or your favourite supplier you can get pouches you can put on the back of your laptop.
I found that they are large enough to hold a small harddrive.
So I bought a 4TB small SSD and that’s where the troubles started.

Watch out and beware

Of course we all know (I hope) that there are different kinds of cables.
There are cables that are just for charging and cables that support USB3/C or ThunderBolt connections.
The USBC connector has many faces so to say.
And the problem is that often we don’t really notice it unless you start testing.

First of all
Don’t ever buy cheap cables.
Most of the cheaper cables will downgrade the speed of your external SSD to a very slow USB2 speed. Which means you think it works but copying files is incredibly slow. These cables are often only meant for charging your phone or tablet. But they do recognise the drive, which will often confuse the user.

Another thing is the shielding.
My first cable I tried was of a good shielded quality, but still my wifi was very unstable, losing connecting all the time and the speed was horrendous, all was great when I disconnected the cable.

At that point I almost gave up, but decided to order an even better shielded cable and finally, no more unstable wifi, no more slow transfer speeds, it just works like a charm 😀

When you order a cable make sure you order a very high quality USBc or TB cable.
Especially make sure the shielding is top notch.
I also highly recommend angled connectors. It’s always better to transport the laptop with the cable disconnected but it happens regularly that we don’t and with the angled connectors it never gave any problems, but to be sure, just take it out of the port.

Now because images say more than words, I made a small video for you.

 

Dear Apple…….

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I’ve been thinking long and hard about writing this because in all honesty I don’t want to be one of the many sites/guys complaining but because I’m always giving tips and I think pretty pro Apple…. I do have to write this.

 

The day before yesterday we saw Microsoft releasing some really cool products.
In all honesty I’ve tried several Surface Pro incarnations and never was convinced enough to switch, main problem was the OS experience on the screen and the way the stylus responded, it just didn’t felt…. done, it was like “ohhhhhhh almost”.

 
This is something that Apple did great.
Granted in the past Apple was first, with the rest following, slowly others tried to be first with sometime disastrous results (I think it will take a long time for Samsung to recover), but Apple always followed with an answer in the trend of “Ok you tried it, thank you but this is how you do it right”, and let’s be clear they released the Apple Pencil and iPad pro and OMG that’s a product that’s awesome, ok it runs iOS but I’ve done some drawings on it that are absolutely on par with what I can do with a full OS running machine, I’ve always said “if the apps are there there should be no limit for the creative process, IF the hardware is good, and….. that’s where Apple shines”.

 

So yesterday I was ready, Annewiek an me on the coach ready for our new MacBooks, my MBP is still in new condition but it’s a MBP that’s already 2 1/2 years old and I wanted some really cool kickass technology in my MacBook, and it started great…… yeah of course you have released the best iPhone yet (would be weird if it was less), of course 99% of the people are on the newest iOS (it’s Apple so it works so why n0t), of course you have the best OS yet Sierra, again never heard someone say… “well this OS sucks, but the next one…..” so yeah yeah yeah come on Tim give my goodies.

 

So….. 25 years ago the first portable device from Apple and they changed the world…. and yep that was true.
We see the trackpad, oh yeah….. I know where this is going….. it’s going to be awesome, I was now on the edge of my seat for my new creative master power house that will literally obliterate all those people claiming Microsoft was great….wait and see you guys…… this is gonna revolutionize the world, and indeed Tim said the same thing…… the popcorn wasn’t touched and we were both holding sweaty hands on the coach with our eyes focussed on the screen and we didn’t blink a moment….. this was history in the making….. oh my oh my……

 

And …… there it was…….. isn’t it awesome wow wow wow, this is it, LOOK at the trackpad, this is it Annewiek this is gonna change the way we work (wait for it, I’m gonna explain later why we thought that), and that touch strip…… yep even better that we expected, in all honesty this is REALLY a smart move and something that will literally change the way you work, so far so good…… final cut pro demo, great and there we go Adobe on stage…. go Adobe show the world the revolution……….

 

Yep…. and there it all went downwards.
Wait a minute, why is she using her fingers on a trackpad for selections, ah wait they are teasing us….. it must be…… ok love the colors, well done, loads of humor and indeed a nice way to photoshop a new background…. and Adobe leaves the stage….. mmmmmmm of course there will be more…. and indeed…. some music by a Dj, yep again great that new strip, awesome (and I REALLY mean that, it’s not sarcasm). And then the moment…….. well actually not…. where is the “Oh and one more thing…..” no the screen went black and we were left with the feeling….. WTF (sorry) just happened….

 

Ok we needed new notebooks anyway so I decided to order, every day we edit video and photos and our MacBooks are a vital part of our workflow with digital classroom so EVERY single piece of extra speed we REALLY need, so I ordered a 15″ for me and a 13″ for Annewiek, I looked at the price and almost fainted… 5900.00 EUROS and I already did it pretty careful, 16GB in both machines and the slowest CPU but 512SSD, oomph, but ok just breath and press order….oh wait….. crap it’s all USB-C so let’s get the convertors…… let’s see we need.

 

2x USB-C to Thunderbolt for the black magics (Digital classroom)
2x USB-C to USB3 for our wacom and of course a card reader (WHY APPLE WHY)
1x USB-C to HDMI for when I teach…
And here it all stopped…… my common sense kicked in one could say.

 

Rewind.
I’m paying over 4000.00 for my 15″ machine and I get a boat load of convertors and what do I gain… some speed (which in reality is always much less than on paper) and a touch strip……. we ended up ordering only a 13″ for Annewiek and we are going to try some third party convertors first because that saves us over 200.00 for what we need.

 

Ok so what could have happened and SHOULD have happened…. are you listening Apple (Yeah who am I kidding, CLEARLY Apple doesn’t listen).
This could have been a revolution.

 

  1. The trackpad
    Did you see the size of that thing?
    This is what got my heart pumping, imaging having an Apple Pencil and being able to draw on that trackpad, for retouching on the road that would have been absolutely awesome…..

 

And well…. there is actually not an option 2.
Apple delivers a great product, but for the first time (for me) I’m left wondering…. wtf.

 

We’re talking about a company that claims to be a trendsetter instead of a trend follower, it claims to be awesome, terrific, great and the best of the best…. but what it this time delivered is a mess. Let’s see what’s wrong.

 

  1. USB-C
    Don’t get me wrong I think we should all move to USB-C as soon as possible, but don’t take away all USB ports, leave at least 1. I don’t want to drag around convertors for tethering, every single extra connection makes it more prone to errors.
  2. Magsafe
    WHAT ARE YOU THINKING APPLE…..
    Do they not know that when you go to a trade show 99% of the people speaking and demoing are using MacBooks?
    Do you know how many times the magsafe adapter saved my laptop?
    A LOT of time, when someone is standing on my cable it just came loose, now with USB-C I wonder how many MBP’s will actually end up on the floor in pieces.
  3. No Cardreader
    OH MY OH MY, for a company that claims to be in sync with the creative force that build their name HOW could they imagine we didn’t need a card reader anymore?
  4. That trackpad
    Why SO big when you don’t use the Apple pencil, I really wonder how many people will have accidental double clicks, right mouse clicks or weird moves because their hands are on the trackpad…. time will tell. Unless they now want 10 finger gestures the original trackpad was big enough.
  5. No more lit up Apple logo…..
    Ok that’s not a biggy but I would miss that.

 

Maybe Apple doesn’t understand what the pro’s need.
We don’t need a 4mm less thick notebook, we don’t care that it’s a little bit lighter (you know how much gear we drag around), we need a system that works and works everywhere, go somewhere and connect HDMI, if we’re at an event we want to put the card in the machine, download images and send them away, if we want to copy something fast we need a USB stick in the USB port. Now we need to carry around fricking convertors for EVERYTHING we need to do on a daily basis, what if the convertor gets lost…. for a consumer no problem… for a pro it means…. well no demo, no workshop, no etc….. because with only USB-C the machine is useless, there are no projectors in event spaces with USB-C, there are …. well you get the idea.

 

IF Apple would have made the trackpad compatible with the Apple pencil I would have hated the idea of convertors…. but I would have ordered. I for one would feel sick in my whole body for the price but as a pro I want the best and in all honesty where PC notebooks have let me down MANY times due to extreme heat (in the desert), high humidity in Florida, or a little bit of rain in the Netherlands…. my MacBook pro’s have NEVER let me down, the OS is rock solid and the system still likes new after many miles travelled and being used every day while my PC notebook (also a very expensive one) after 2 years looks like it’s 2-3 years old (and that one is used maybe once or twice a week).

 

So what now…. Will I leave Apple…..
No of course not, on the desktop I still think my MacPro rocks, its incredibly fast and I can edit multicam 4K without any problem so it works, the OS in my opinion is the best on the market for stability, integration with iPhones and iPads etc. Apple TV is a great learning tool, we use two in our studio (mostly one) to project my desktop on two big screen TV’s and in 99% of the cases it works flawless so absolutely no reason to switch.
For mobile….. sorry to say but I think for me it’s bye bye Apple.
I’m gonna miss final Cut pro on the road for our video editing but Adobe Premiere is an AWESOME alternative, I used that before FCPx was actually mature enough to start using it, it took some time but I believe FCPx at the moment is one hell of a program.

 

When I see the Microsoft Surface book I just know it’s not gonna work for me, I tried a surface pro 4 and had major issues with it for battery life and the fact that it couldn’t be charged with anything else that their own power supply which meant I had to carry a LARGE block and couldn’t use for example our hyperjuice which will keep my MBP running for 8 hours straight even when using PS. And that was the other problem… when I buy a Surface I want to Photoshop and edit video… and when the battery dies within 90 minutes (it was actually much less but I don’t want a flame war) for me that just doesn’t work, also compared to the Wacom I’m using or the iPad pro the stylus wasn’t up to par… for a consumer it’s great but not for me.

 

But there is another device.
Wacom just released the Mobile studio 16″
A 4K 16″ screen with 94% adobe RGB, a Wacom stylus (so you know it’s good) and all the connectivity I need (not just one USB port like the Surface), with the 4K screen I know PS and Manga studio and Lightroom will leave me plenty of real estate instead of covering a 1920×1080 screen with menus and leaving just a very small space to retouch or draw and I think 16″ is just enough screen and still small enough to use on location… remember I’m a pro user not someone for a MacBook air, it’s a WORKhorse.

 

And indeed I’m willing to use convertors for a device like this, because it also saves me A LOT.
Now I travel with a MBP and a wacom tablet, and that was the norm, but in a day and age where touch screens are the norm I think that the travel wacom tablet would be replaced. With the mobile studio 16 I can travel and use it as a Cintiq when I’m connected to a PC or Mac, and when disconnected it can run on it’s own… there are still some concerns…. does it charge via “USB-C” via the Hyperjuice, how long is the battery life really etc.
And in all honesty I’m a bit worried about going to Windows……
I know my way around windows and I’m pretty technical so no problems there.
But Windows also means that when I change device or hardware there is HUGE change I have to reinstall everything which takes me about half a day to get it up and running the way I want, it also means that we have to start using virus scanners, registries that fill up, weekly or daily updates for the OS, hardware drivers etc. etc. As a former PC user this was one of things I LOVED about macs, worry about what I do and not all about the OS or drivers etc.

 

Will it be worth it?
We will see, but I’m afraid it will be (for Apple).
Imagine having a 4K display that is touch sensitive, a wacom stylus so you can draw and control your software without the need for anything else (I know it doesn’t work that way), just connect a wireless keyboard and you have a laptop, connect it via a dongle to your mac and pc and you have a cintiq… it all sounds almost to good to be true….. if it would run MacOS I would run to the store and buy one, now I will probably just slowly and with a little bit of a sad feeling walk to the store and get me a Wacom…… nothing against Wacom by the way, but switching to Windows is just something I thought I wouldn’t do anymore. I’m however VERY much looking forward to the experience of the mobile studio 16 and who knows if it works great……. no I don’t want to think about that.

 

How could Apple REALLY revolutionize the laptop market
Almost impossible with the surface pro laptops, but they could do it IF they do this.
Imagine having a MacBook pro with the large touch strip and a large trackpad that you can use with the Apple pencil, but wait there is more…. if you’re done with the laptop part you can disconnect the screen and it switches to iOS and you can use it as an iPad pro including the Apple pencil. It wouldn’t be a revolution because Microsoft already has it… but at least it would run MacOs….

 

I really CAN’T imagine that Apple couldn’t pull something like this off.
Making a touchpad compatible with Apple pencil should be no problem at all, making an iPad pro connect to a MacBook body with the smart connector should be ABSOLUTELY no problem, and in fact you don’t even need a smart connector because programs like Duet also manage with just a lighting adaptor. Now leave the card reader in and one USB port and you would literally have my dream machine.

 

Years ago the MBP was my dream machine.
They server me (and Annewiek) very very well, they NEVER let me down, the NEVER crashed on me during a vital moment, when on stage or on a shoot I don’t want to think about if my hardware will keep working, I want to focus on my work and not on hardware. Today I’m afraid it’s the end of an era, the era where Apple was the best choice for the creative force. Apple is now a company that in my honest opinion is charging pro prices for consumer aimed gear, a pro machine with dongles and no card reader because it can be 4mm thinner is something NO pro in the world is waiting for….

 

Sorry Apple.
Wacom, here I come……. (I think).
Feel free to leave your options and thoughts.