Inter-instrument variation correction

A method for correcting inter-instrument variation comprising:

• a. obtaining a collection of color measurements of at least one quality control calibration standard using a plurality of production color measurement devices;
• b. generating a mean value for the measurements of the collection of color measurement devices;
• c. determining a sub-set of the collection of color measurement devices having the smallest color difference from the generated mean value;
• d. obtaining a collection of measurements of a training color set using each color measurement device of the determined sub-set-;
• e. Applying the collection of measurements as input values to an artificial neural network (ANN), where the output values are obtained from a control collection of measurement devices;
• generating a conversion coefficient using the ANN;
• f. applying the generated conversion coefficient to at least one measurement made by any one of the remaining members of the production collection.

A system for correcting inter-instrument variation comprising:

• a. A color measurement device selected from a production batch of color measurement devices and configured to measure the color values of a sample;
• and
• b. A processor, having a memory, and configured to:
• i. Receive from the color measurement device, one or more data values corresponding to the measured color values of a sample;
• ii. Access, from a memory, at least one evaluating model, wherein the evaluation model receives color values as an input and the evaluating model was generated using one or more artificial neural network(s) (ANN) trained over a collection of production input values obtained from at least one member of the production batch and control output values obtained from a plurality of members of a control batch of color measurement devices;
• iii. Evaluate the received data values using the model;
• iv. Obtain evaluated measurement values;
• and
• v. Transmit the evaluated measurement values to at least one of a remote computer, display device or human perceptible indicator.