A survey of books under the keyword color management turned up virtually nothing at Amazon.com, revealing how new this phenomenon is. Those who already needed to handle color management at a professional level have been doing it all along. Everyone else did color by eyeball. Until newer books on color management come out, you might see what Agfa has available; their booklets have the best illustrations which really help make all the insides of the equipment and corresponding software almost understandable to the person facing a steep learning curve.

Gradually color printers and new models of monitors are appearing on the market with ICC profiles built in. Indeed this is a good way to test the professional nature a product. For example, flatbed scanners from Linotype-Hell (Heidelbert CPS in Europe or LinoColor CPS in the USA) have offered the color management capability of calibrating ICC profiles all along. As experienced graphics people know, it is the software that makes the difference in the scanner (since the hardware is mostly OEM from the same factory).

"Cornering the Chaos of Color Calculators," by Cathie Beck, Digital Graphics, Oct. 1998, pp. 42ff is good survey aritlce on color management. Obviously this year (1999) even more articles are appearing.

"GATF Practical Guide to Color Management," by Richard Adams and Joshua Weisberg is one of the few books available. Order from the Graphic Arts Technical Foundation (GATF), probably www.gatf.org.

Budgets for color management now need to include a colorimeter, densitometer, spectrophotometer, and/or other sophisticated hardware and software. Pantone, long established, remains in the software portion of the market with its Pantone Personal Color Calibrator. But most new budgets are expanding to include hardware. GretagMacbeth and X-Rite lead in the color management hardware field.

If you already have a dye sub printer, or will be getting a dye sub or proofer, then you are already facing color management reality. Subscribe to every prepress, digital press, and color management trade magazine or newsletter that is available (and remember the Agfa booklets, even when dated, they are still informative).