Difference between colorimeter and spectrophotometer

The instrument for detecting the color of an object can be called a colorimeter. However, there are many kinds of colorimeters, including colorimeter and spectrophotometer. There are many products of color difference meter and spectrophotometer on the market, which makes many customers often feel headache about which product to choose when selecting this product. Today, let’s talk about the difference between colorimeter and spectrophotometer, and how to choose and buy them.

What is a colorimeter?
The color difference instrument, literally, is to detect the difference between the colors of different objects. It generally uses the filter principle to judge the color. The filter is made of glass or plastic and added with special dyes. The refractive index of the unstained glass is similar to that of air, and all colored light can pass through; The molecular structure of the stained glass will change, and the refractive index is also different. The red filter can only let red light pass, the green filter can only let green light pass, and the blue filter can only let blue light pass. For example, when a white light passes through the blue filter, it emits a blue light, while the green light and red light are very few, and most of them are absorbed by the filter.

CD-320PRO Detail Pictures

The colorimeter based on the filter principle is installed with a color filter. After the color light reflected by the target sample passes through the filter, the instrument will read the corresponding color data, but this data is only a relative value and is not accurate.

Features of colorimeter:
Because of the simple structure of the colorimeter and the inaccurate color data, this type of product can only be used for quality inspection and color difference detection. It belongs to the low-end products of the colorimeter, and the price is relatively low,

What is a spectrophotometer?
The spectrophotometer uses the grating spectrophotometer principle for color measurement. Grating is an optical element with a set of parallel periodic lines or grooves (often carved into an inclined plane) carved on a plane. When a beam of compound light is incident on the grating plane, its periodic structure will diffract, and the transmitted or reflected diffracted light will also interfere. The energy of the light will be redistributed. The light of different wavelengths will travel in different directions, and the superposition extremum of specific wavelengths will be formed at a certain position, thus realizing light splitting. Spectroscopic colorimeters can produce spectral curves, which are equivalent to a color ID card and are unique. Therefore, the color data read by the spectrophotometer is absolutely accurate.

DSCD-920_Desktop Spectroradiometer

Features of spectrophotometer:
Because such products can accurately measure the specific value of color, they are the mainstream technical means in the field of color meters at present. They are high-end products, and the price will be higher.

How to choose a color meter suitable for you?
When actually selecting colorimeter and spectrophotometer, you can choose from the following dimensions:
1. Budget: less budget, select color difference meter; The budget is sufficient, and the spectrophotometer is selected;
2. Accuracy requirements: the accuracy requirements are not high, only the quality inspection function is required, and the color difference instrument is selected; It requires high accuracy and needs to measure the absolute value of color, so the spectrophotometer is selected;
3. Color matching required: select spectrophotometer;
4. Need data transmission and communication: select spectrophotometer.

Portable Colorimeter/Chroma Meter is an innovation color measuring tool with powerful configuration to make color measurement easier and more professional; It support Bluetooth to connect with Android and ISO devices, Portable Colorimeter/Chroma Meter will take you into a new world of color management; It can be widely used to measure color value, color difference value and find similar color from color cards for printing industry, paint industry, textile industry, etc.

CD-320PRO_Portable Colorimeter/Chroma Meter

Benchtop Spectrophotometer (Reflectance and Transmittance) DSCD-920 adopts 7 inches touch screen, full wavelength range, Android operate system. Illumination : reflectance D/8° and transmittance D/0°(UV included / UV excluded), high accuracy for color measurement, large storage memory, PC software, because of above advantages, it is used in laboratory for color analysis and communication

DSCD-920_Desktop Spectroradiometer

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