Color – pre press

DO
Posted By
Delila_Omerbasic
Feb 24, 2004
Views
257
Replies
9
Status
Closed
Hi,

I need some help with saving photos for print. When I saved photos in Photoshop (and print them at my printer) they looked wonderful. However, when I got them back from the printer, they looked really bad (too red/dark, etc…), so the printer needed to adjust them. I tried to work with them to figure out what I was doing wrong, but didn’t get really far (except that images had to be cmyk, and mine were rgb, which I now know is a huge problem).

Now, I am working on another project with a lot of photos and I don’t want to run into problems again. So, I’ve saved all my images in cmyk, removed any assigned profiles and saved them as tifs. They still look wonderful in Photoshop, but when I place them into the Pagemaker file, they look bad (really bright colors, many are reddish, very high contrast). I am assuming they should not look like this when placed. (They look just as bad when I print them at my printer).

Please help. Thank you!
Related Tags
color press

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TD
Thee_DarkOverLord
Feb 24, 2004
You need to set up your colour settings in PS, then make sure your finished files are cmyk 300dpi tiffs. If working on the origanal files in rgb i would turn on the Gamut warning.

Dont worry about how things look in PM, but do make sure you have the hi-res preview on in PM to get the best feel for the finished article you can.
J
JasonSmith
Feb 24, 2004
Where are they being printed at? US? UK?
L
LenHewitt
Feb 24, 2004
Delia,

when I place them into the Pagemaker file, they look bad <<

They will.

Unless you set up and turn on PageMakers, somewhat primitive, Colour management PM does a very rough_and_ready conversion of the CMYK data to RGB for display. It is ALWAYS very contrasty and dark.

You do not need to strip profiles – all a profile does is state what colour space your file was created in. That is helpful information.
TL
Tim_Lookingbill
Feb 24, 2004
Find out from your printer if his RIP reads profiles or straight CMYK data in the file. If it reads just data, you’ll have to have an accurate profile of his press or ask the printer if he adheres to PS’s SWOP standard-US Web offset. You can convert to that space from RGB or before that view in Proof View with Proof Setup set to your press profile. If you get a bad look to the file, you can edit in RGB to get it right, then convert.
RB
Robbie_Boyer
Feb 26, 2004
There are a few things to consider here.

The biggest one is getting the paramaters for printing from your printer.

You need to know if you are printing offset (sheetfed) or web (rolls). Depending on what they are using you may have to use PCR/UCR for best results.

You’ll also need to know if you are printing on a coated or non coated stock. Coated stock would not have as much dot gain as an uncoated stock.

The other things to ask is what they would like to see as a min highlight dot and max shadow density. Depending on the press/printer, the dot gain can wipe detail in both areas.

Rob
SJ
sandy_johnson
Feb 26, 2004
Have you calibrated your monitor or run Adobe Gamma? Maybe you’re not seeing true color at all.

Keep in mind dot gain, particularly on uncoated or web stock. And remember that magenta appears to gain more than yellow (because of the more intense magenta color) so be sure skin tones are on the yellowish rather than pinkish side.
DO
Delila_Omerbasic
Feb 26, 2004
Hello – thanks for all of your replies!

I did run Adobe Gamma.

I think that we are using coated stock for this.

I do have a few more questions. What is PCR/UCR? Also, where would I adjust the highlight dot and shadow density?

Thanks!
DO
Delila_Omerbasic
Feb 26, 2004
Hi – I just noticed something, so maybe you can help with this too :).

If I save the picture as an eps, the colors look similar when placed into PM. I tried opening both the tif and eps in illustrator – and the tif gets dark/red, the eps stays "normal". Does this mean anything?

Thank you!!!
L
LenHewitt
Feb 26, 2004
Delila

What is PCR/UCR? <<

That should be GCR/UCR. GCR stands for Grey Colour Replacement and UCR stands for Under-colour Removal.

When you have a colour that is made up of C,M and Y inks, a certain percentage will be equate to a neutral grey. For example, 80C, 60M, 10Y, 0K there is a 10% grey component. Consequently as 70C, 50M, 0Y, 10K.is the same colour. This reduces the amount of ink that is required and is an example of GCR.

Take a look at:

http://www.photoshopfocus.com/cool_tips/tips_color_basics_p4 .htm

For more details of the difference between the two.

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