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color chart matching
- Thread starter shacho
- Start date
Pauly
Printrade.com.au
Colour matching charts are for spot colours. You can print off a pantone chart and use that as a reference colour guide of what your printer can print.
If you're having issues getting photos/images to look right colour wise. That will be your printer ICC profile. You'll need to make a better one.
If you're having issues getting photos/images to look right colour wise. That will be your printer ICC profile. You'll need to make a better one.
Michael-Nola
I print things. It is very exciting.
Most RIPs use the Adobe PDF Print Engine which cannot be used for Pantone Chart creation or printing. Also, I've seen plenty of designers take hours making a whole Pantone Chart in Illustrator ... only to have to import to RIP as a PDF, and be thoroughly confused when their chart doesn't match their own spot colors on actual live jobs!
Unfortunately, color management is a complex mixture of IT and print experience. This is exactly what you're paying for when companies pay for a "color expert" to evaluate, fix, and train on these types of color issues.
There's no way I could go through every caveat to get you 100% rolling, but I can tell you "printing pantone charts" is not the beginning or end of your problems.
First things first, you need an excellent calibration. ICC's are limited in nature, which is why some 3rd party applications are developing, like MX. But you can use ICC to get the ballrolling.
For generic/entry level printing, downloaded ICC's are acceptable, but still not preferred.
For OEM warrantied, spot color tuned, efficient, and gray-to-spot accurate profiles, you need to make them yourself. Barbierie, Eye-One, etc. Buy one!
You need a clearly defined color workflow and preflight process. (Prelfighting is a technical software methodology, not just saying you checked it ... this is a common problem I run into with workflows).
Need to determine output parameters, including profiles honored or disregarded and at which level. Input and output rules/file types/compliance levels and color spaces (I often move companies to an exchange space over traditional Gracol or Fogra options .. .the difference is outstanding.)
THEN once your digital workflow is controlled, scientific, and predictable:
You need a proper way to send out large spot quantities for confirmation and true-life color checks - this is your pantone chart stage. How this is done is usually dependent upon your entire digital workflow and RIP brand.
BUT
for a lot of smaller shops (and lots of big ones too), this just isn't their cup of tea. If you want to just download an ICC and print ... then match your spot old school. Eyeballs and CMYK mixes. However, if you have to do this often, you will be wasting tons of valuable time.
Unfortunately, color management is a complex mixture of IT and print experience. This is exactly what you're paying for when companies pay for a "color expert" to evaluate, fix, and train on these types of color issues.
There's no way I could go through every caveat to get you 100% rolling, but I can tell you "printing pantone charts" is not the beginning or end of your problems.
First things first, you need an excellent calibration. ICC's are limited in nature, which is why some 3rd party applications are developing, like MX. But you can use ICC to get the ballrolling.
For generic/entry level printing, downloaded ICC's are acceptable, but still not preferred.
For OEM warrantied, spot color tuned, efficient, and gray-to-spot accurate profiles, you need to make them yourself. Barbierie, Eye-One, etc. Buy one!
You need a clearly defined color workflow and preflight process. (Prelfighting is a technical software methodology, not just saying you checked it ... this is a common problem I run into with workflows).
Need to determine output parameters, including profiles honored or disregarded and at which level. Input and output rules/file types/compliance levels and color spaces (I often move companies to an exchange space over traditional Gracol or Fogra options .. .the difference is outstanding.)
THEN once your digital workflow is controlled, scientific, and predictable:
You need a proper way to send out large spot quantities for confirmation and true-life color checks - this is your pantone chart stage. How this is done is usually dependent upon your entire digital workflow and RIP brand.
BUT
for a lot of smaller shops (and lots of big ones too), this just isn't their cup of tea. If you want to just download an ICC and print ... then match your spot old school. Eyeballs and CMYK mixes. However, if you have to do this often, you will be wasting tons of valuable time.