What came first...?

[Cre8iveBro]

I have read through quite a few posts, and I have a n00b question:

What comes first? Color correction or spot/blemish removal? I understand that this may be a preference or workflow question, but considering I am fairly new to retouching, I don't have one... I have seen tutorials that start with color correction, and I have seen equally as good tutorials that get in and heal before any color adjustments are done.

Are there any benefits/drawbacks to doing one over the other?

[Southbay]

I usually take care of the most obvious blemishes/dust/stains/artifacts right away. Then touch up those that might be revealed through exposure/tone correction and output sharpening.

[James Penner]

I generally like to start with global corrections before working on individual image elements, so colour correction is usually early in the process for me.

[Steve Payne]

There's two ways of looking at this, if you adjust the overall colour/contrast etc first you won't have to worry about retouching anything that will be blown out or hidden in the shadows in your final image, saving you a bit of time.

The thing is, if you colour correct everything first and then deal with the blemishes/spot removal etc after, you can't then go back and re-adjust the colour/tone/contrast as it will affect all your retouching. But you can add additional adjustments on top obviously.

I don't know how much it matters really, personal preference I'd say.