Why Colour Manage your monitor?

Many of the customers we speak to feel like they should be using colour management tools. However, they are not always clear on what the main benefits are.

‘So what?’ you could say. ‘If I’m doing it, why does it matter whether I know what the key benefits are, so long as I have an accurate screen?’ In truth though, if we don’t fully buy into something, then it’s pretty unlikely that we’ll fully commit to doing it well and consistently – meaning we won’t actually get the best results.

We could probably summarise the answer to this question, with a quote from one of X-Rite’s Coloratti Masters, Adrian Weinbrecht:

“Would a concert pianist perform on a piano that wasn’t tuned? Would a F1 racer race in a car that wasn’t tuned? Would a serious photographer view a monitor that wasn’t calibrated?"

"Without Calibration how do you confidently know what you’re looking at? Calibration is tuning for your monitor. If you don’t calibrate you might as well shoot blindfolded. Good calibration shows you exactly what you’ve got. It’s even critical with Black and White, as calibration isn’t just about colour - it’s about all the tones from the lightest white to the darkest black.“

In talking with our customers, there are four key benefits that come from monitor calibration.

Confidence

This is a big one, and it starts from when we take our first shot. A basic white balance in the camera gives us confidence that we have an accurate image to work from. Better still, capturing the ColorChecker Passport before shooting gives us even more control across a full range of colour.

Once on screen, the ability to edit and adjust images, knowing that you are accurately seeing the slight adjustments you make, means you can feel free to edit (or not) as you feel. Monitor calibration tools such as the ColorMunki Smile, ColorMunki Display, and i1Display Pro provide easy to use and accurate ways of achieving excellent on-screen colour.

Finally, when you hit the print button, knowing that the printed image will mirror what you’re seeing on screen and the image you first shot is a great feeling. The ColorMunki Photo is a an ideal solution for achieving producing colour accurate prints.

More time to shoot

For most photographers, both professional and amateur, what they truly love is actually taking photographs; the creative process of composing and capturing a great shot. The editing process is also enjoyable, but only when it’s seamless and you’re getting the results you really want.

A quick, easy-to-use and colour accurate workflow streamlines that editing process, enabling many photographers to get back to what they love doing: taking photographs!

Saving money!

Producing great photos, whether that’s the time to shoot and edit, or the costs involved in ink and paper to print your images, can be an expensive exercise.

If you earn money from your photography, then editing time wasted because you’re not looking at the right colours on screen is time lost. Clients won’t pay for that time, and you can’t be doing another job if you’re sitting in front of a computer.

If you send an image to print, whether at home or through a lab, and it doesn’t come back the way you want it, each print can be pretty expensive. Good colour management prevents wasted time and repeated printing, saving ink and paper.

Consistency

When you’re putting your name to a photo, whether on screen or in print, the standards you set for that work come across. For many photographers, a colour managed workflow is about ensuring that whether it’s a piece of work produced at the beginning of the month or the end, the quality of the final result is the same. The regular calibration of your workflow ensures that the ‘drift’, which our devices suffer from, doesn’t impact our results.

Summary

By controlling the colour in our workflow, we remove the variables. We allow ourselves to focus on the craft of our photography, and we give ourselves confidence.

Why colour manage? Because colour management is like tuning for our workflow, and no one wants to be singing out of tune.

X-Rite’s range of colour management tools provide photographers with an ideal combination of unrivalled accuracy and ease of use.