Neuro nailed it. Color accuracy is a sliding scale between easy and hard; inaccurate and accurate:
  • easiest: JPEG+AWB
  • easier: RAW+AWB
  • easy: white balance dropper on anything reasonably neutral in the frame.
  • medium: take some effort to ensure there is something reasonably white in the frame (e.g. any old piece of white paper).
  • accurate: get something in the frame that is *very* neutral (e.g. purpose-built white balance cards, expo disc, etc.)
  • very accurate: take a colorchecker shot of the general lighting conditions, change the white balance for each specific shot, and build one profile for the set.
  • crazy: build a separate color checker profile for each and every change in lighting.



Personally, I find that any old white piece of paper is usually accurate enough for most of my shots. I only bring out the color chart and profile-building software if color accuracy is particularly important.


Of course, after you achieve "accurate" color, the next step is "pleasing" color, but that's pretty much all just in post.