How do you judge color?
That’s the simple question that your color toolbox should be equipped to answer. But the content of your color toolbox isn’t as simple as the question.
Color Is More Than In The Eye Of The Beholder
If your primary answer to how you judge color was with your eyes, you’re not alone. After all, our eyes are often our first and final decision makers when we determine what is and isn’t good color quality.
But how much can we trust the naked eye when it comes to color? It’s actually hard to say because we, as humans, all see color differently depending on our individual character traits and our environment.
The Factors Of Color Consideration
Our color perception depends upon many factors. Here are just a few:
- Lighting / viewing environment
- Gender
- Age
But with some more advanced tools in your color toolbox, you can overcome these obstacles.
The Contents Of The Color Toolbox
Our CEO Jim Raffel recently wrote a white paper for SGIA (Specialty Graphic Imaging Association) about the appropriate contents for a color toolbox for color management.
And while our eyes is a factor, there are other – less subjective – tools with which we can judge color quality.
- Spectrophotometers are instruments used to measure color mathematically and display color differences and similarities visually.
- A properly controlled viewing environment is essential for judging color. This can be achieved by viewing prints in a light booth and in a neutrally colored room. If you don’t have a light booth, take your prints outside and view them in the shade. Even wearing black or gray colored clothing can help control your viewing environment.
- By color calibrating your computer monitor(s), you will be setting yourself up for success from the beginning of your color management workflow.
- If you use the software and color profile tools included with your RIP, you will be able to create color profiles that should help you achieve consistent color quality.
- Once you achieve that consistent color quality, verification software can help make sure your prints continue to live up to your expectations.
Read The White Paper
The white paper about the color toolbox hasn’t been published yet but if click the button below and complete the form we’ll send it to you ahead of publication!
And if you’re interested in learning how to use these tools firsthand, consider attending one of our Color Management Boot Camps.
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