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- matejaI've wanted a ColorChecker as a nice-to-have for a while, but real ones are kind of expensive (understandably so) for me.As it turns out, paint samples that you can get at the hardware store for free are made with remarkably accurate colors. Although there are many like it, I found this nice video[1] about how to DIY a color checker. He lists the names of the colors in the description. But at least he confirms that even a near match works well!However, I found that the paint companies change their colors slightly pretty frequently. But the Wikipedia article on ColorChecker[2] has a listing of the exact colors in the ColorChecker. So you can use a site like Match My Paint Color[3] to find the nearest paint color to put together a list of color names that you can then go scoop up at your local hardware store!1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pusFS7JmKQM 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ColorChecker 3. https://www.matchmypaintcolor.com/
- dylan604I worked in camera department on a low budget feature and one of my contributions was using a ColorChecker. The DP was concerned it would take too much time, and the director echoed those concerns. We compromised by only using the chart on the first take of each new setup. Nobody complained about how long it took to slate/chart once we got into production. I did get a message of appreciation from the director once they went to post. The editor/colorist sung the praise of having that data available.The ColorChecker is one of those things that once you know its power, you'll never want to not use it again. Of course, you'll not use it for everything unless you're trying to impress. It's just one of those things that have fallen out of favor with digital. Things like light meters, chip charts, etc are just things younger people never working in film seem to not learn about any more
- nayukiI didn't learn much from reading this article. Questions linger in my mind, for example: What are the CIE XYZ coordinates of each colored square? What is the spectral distribution of each square? How were the colors chosen?
- isomorphicThese are great, even for manually-adjusted color workflows.Fun fact, though: You have to replace them every couple of years (or sooner) because no pigment/dye is stable, especially if exposed to bright light.Having a test shot with one of these in it saves you untold amounts of pain later.
- potamicPleasantly surprised to see dpreview still running, I thought they had shut down. It was a fantastic site back in the day. Not sure how it fares these days.
- alwaThe paper where the target values originated:https://home.cis.rit.edu/~cnspci/references/mccamy1976.pdf [1976, PDF]It’s a charming read, with lines like> The orange and Yellow patches visually matched some samples of oranges and lemons, both freshly picked, not dyed.> Some blue flowers, most notably the morning glory of the variety "Heavenly Blue," are prized for their blue color, but frustrate the attempts of photographers to depict them.…speaking as a longtime cultivator of morning glories—I’m gazing at a “Heavenly Blue” variety in bloom as I write [0]—they are absolutely correct; and I love that this fact informs the norms of the entire photographic industry!And, of course, the bottom line:> Having developed a well-characterized test object, we feel obligated to point out that color-reproduction systems hardly ever reproduce all colors exactly. The practical limitations of such processes make perfect color reproduction virtually impossible.[0] https://www.gardenia.net/plant/ipomoea-tricolor-heavenly-blu... — and if those charm you, may i recommend the ‘Keiryu’ / ‘Mountain Stream’ variety, which, needless to say, is far more impressive than the photos suggest: https://organicplantit.com/product/keiryu-mountain-stream-mo...
- jimnotgymNostalgia! I don't remember them coming out, but I was involved in setting up Calibrite. I was more involved in the monitor calibrators (my team developed the new software) and the infrastructure.
- tambourine_manIn other news, dpreview is still around and I didn’t know it.I used to visit it daily.