What's the real color pink?

Our brains are so amazing!  We can look at a pink flower outside in the sun, or in the shade or even in a dim gymnasium lit with old florescent lights and see that it’s pink.  Our brains somehow, amazingly know what the “right” color is under all sorts of lighting conditions.  Now, I’ll make some exceptions to that for people who are color blind or for optical illusions that are designed to mess with our sense of color:)  

When it comes to electronics though, we have to tell them what colors are correct.  Take a look at these two screens.  They are showing the exact same photo from the exact same digital file.  Which one is correct?  Clearly the one on the computer is a warmer hue and the one on the phone is a cooler hue.  Making sure that the photos I create show true colors is a very important part of what I do.  When I’m editing my work, I am relying on my memory of how I perceived the colors as well as my subjective judgement of how I want the colors to look artistically.  If you pay attention to the color tones of images in advertisements or even the color tones in movies you’ll start to notice that sometimes people create images with a stylized color filter to fit a mood or a certain look. I like my photos to be pretty true to life in how they look, with a very subtle, little extra bit of warmth added.  So, it’s important that when I’m working on my clients’ photos, that the computer screen I am looking at shows the colors correctly.  It’s like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, I don’t want the colors in my computer screen to be too warm or too cold.  I want the colors to be just right.  

The way I ensure that the colors I’m working with on the computer screen are correct is by calibrating my screen regularly.  I use software and tools that were designed for this single, important task.  Calibrating my screen allows me to know for sure that the prints I produce will match what I see on my screen. To produce my prints I partner with professional print labs that I can trust to have calibrated printers.  The printers and my computer screen will agree on what “red” should look like so I can ensure that the prints, albums and canvases I create for my clients are perfectly colored. No one wants a photo in which they look green or blue!

So, if you were ever wondering, “What do photographers do when they aren’t looking through a lens?” There’s one answer for ya!