Christopher Dodds
What seems like a very long time ago, I purchased a very expensive and high end color scanner to digitize my 35mm slide archives. At that time, a friend who was a photographer and sales executive in the photographic industry told me about the then GretagMacbeth Eye-One Photo, its place in the digital workflow and it's importance to ensure Color accuracy across the digital workflow. A lot has changed since 2000; I, like many, have switched to 100% digital photography from capture to print and X-Rite purchased GretagMacBeth and took the very best color management tools and made them even better.
I never quite get excited about my favorite images until I get my hands on the final print; it's a very intimate and tactile experience to see the finished product. Ensuring that colors are consistent from capture to my computer screen and my final prints is paramount. It is always amazing to me to stop and think about how easy it is to make prints of the same file month apart and see just how perfectly the colors match.
I really don't know if it my history with the chemical darkroom process, my attention to detail, or my need to control the whole print making process, but I simply can't make a print without first calibrating my monitor, creating a custom paper profile and ensuring that I make the very best and realistic print possible; A print that accurately represents the scene and colors I saw while capturing it.
To think how much money many photographers spend on the very best and latest digital cameras without ever calibrating their monitors is ridiculous to me. The relatively small investment in something like the ColorMunki or i1 Display will make the world of difference; much more than a new camera body!