When Color Management Fails: Dan’s Strategy

iPads, Vimeo, Clients & A Whole Lot Of …Arghhhh!

One of the most frustrating a colorist can hear is this heart breaking sentence:

[blockquote]Your grade does not look right on my iphone/ipad/grandma’s tv. Please change it.[/blockquote]

Our color management has failed. We spend thousands & thousands of dollars on calibration meters, color critical monitors and learning how to build a solid color pipeline and it can all be unravelled by a client viewing your grade on an iPhone while drinking cocktails on the beach at sunset.

Like many of you my first instinct is to push back and say :

[blockquote]I get it, but we really need to be making color critical decisions in a calibrated environment. So why don’t you come in and take another look?[/blockquote]

This is what your client hears coming out your mouth:  I don’t care, I want to charge you more money… and the hell with your damn iPhone! 

So, I realize what I’m going to say next will probably go against what most other people will do in this situation and I understand all of the reasons to only make critical decisions in a reference environment.

However…