What Does Color Management System (CMS) Mean?
A color management system (CMS) is a collection of software tools used to ensure that colors remain the same regardless of the medium or device used for displaying the colors. As color is dependent on devices and as different devices make use of different technologies to produce colors, consistency in color across mediums is a big challenge. A color management system is used in devices such as scanners, monitors, image setters and printers.
Techopedia Explains Color Management System (CMS)
The focus of any color management system is to ensure that different applications, devices or operating systems display colors consistently. The color one sees on a device depends on the device producing the color. In other words, color is device dependent. A scanner could interpret an image with certain RGB values, which may differ from the color interpretation of a monitor displaying the RGB colors. Different values need to be sent to the different devices in order to achieve consistent results. For this, transformations are required which are performed with the help of equations, tables or other similar tools. In fact, the quality to produce colors of many products is judged by the ability to do these color transformations.
