Need Help Color shift when printing directly from TIFF vs placing in Illustrator

[ColorFast]

We are seeing a pretty noticeable shift in color when printing certain images directly from their native TIFF format in Onyx (current version) vs printing them after placing them (linked) into an Illustrator PDF. My suspicion (that we are waiting to test) is that this is due to the "Output" settings of our PDF preset being set to "Profile Inclusion Policy-Don't Include Profiles". My assumption is that this should be set to "include all" or "include tagged" profiles. My question is, what is generally accepted as the "correct setting"? Our workflow is InDesign or Illustrator -> save/export to PDF -> Onyx Production House RIP -> HP Latex 560.

 

[Solventinkjet]

I think you're on the right track. You might be designing in CMYK color mode and linking in an RGB TIFF into the file. If you don't include the profiles, it will default to the PDF color setting.

 

[ColorFast]

The native TIFF and our document color mode are both RGB for what it's worth.

 

[Solventinkjet]

The native TIFF and our document color mode are both RGB for what it's worth.

The input profile could still be different. The TIFF might be set to sRGB and the PDF might be on Adobe RGB or something like that. At the end of the day, if the TIFF prints correctly on it's own and not after linking it in the PDF, something is converting the color and that's usually going to be a profile conflict. Could be something else too of course but that's the first thing that popped into my mind.

 

[dypinc]

The input profile could still be different. The TIFF might be set to sRGB and the PDF might be on Adobe RGB or something like that. At the end of the day, if the TIFF prints correctly on it's own and not after linking it in the PDF, something is converting the color and that's usually going to be a profile conflict. Could be something else too of course but that's the first thing that popped into my mind.

Converting should not be a problem it is assigning the wrong profile that would cause that kind of a problem.

 

[brdesign]

Also, check the settings in Onyx, I believe the default setting is to have different rendering intents for vector files vs raster files

Rendering Intents

My opinion is that it is best to come up with a standardized way to save files for printing rather than tweaking the RIP settings for each job unless you are doing real high-end jobs that require critical color matching. For years my standard procedure was to convert everything to CMYK .tif files and send them to onyx. It's not the most accurate way of doing things but it was very consistent, reliable, and good enough for almost all of the jobs I was printing. Now I save everything as CMYK .pdf files since the newest versions of Onyx are much better at ripping pdf files than it was in the past.

 

[Ken R2Graphics]

I can confirm having the same issue: printing a TIFF vs placing it in an Ai file can get different RIP results in the same color space using the same rendering intent. TIFF color profiles seem to be ignored sometimes by the RIP in both Onyx and Flexi.

I actually tested this a couple of weeks ago in Flexi Production Manager, trying to finagle the most dependable print workflows.

I tested RIPs with four sets of four files, using one color space profile per set:
1) a TIFF file (saved from Photoshop with "Color: ICC color profile: ____" checked)
2) a TIFF placed in an .ai file with the same working color space, saved with the "Embed ICC profiles" button checked
3) a PDF file with Color Conversion set to "No Conversion" and Profile Inclusion Policy set to "Include All Profiles" set in the save settings
4) a PDF saved with "Convert to Destination" with the destination color space matched to the placed TIFF, with "Include Destination Profiles" set

I tested sRGB IEC61966-2.1, Wide Gamut RGB, GRACoL, and Printwide input profiles. The Ai and PDF files ripped similarly, but the RIP seemed to ignore the TIFF's embedded profile. The RIP result had typical signs of color space mismatch: having the saturation dramatically blown out, or colors muddied and hue shifted red->orange/brown or blue->purple/cyan. The former is usually what happens if a bigger gamut is displayed or linearized with a default/smaller color space, and the latter is due to a CMYK "crush-down" because the RIP thinks all the colors are way out of gamut.

What's really a puzzler is that the TIFFs still ripped wrong after I turned off "Use embedded ICC profiles" in the RIP, then manually set the input profile myself. Haven't tried that with Onyx, as we're not running it anymore.

Personally, I've found using PDFs as a "container file" gets the most consistent Onyx results, while Flexi seems to digest .ai files best. And sometimes, if a customer's raster file is fiddly when I try to place it, sometimes opening it in Photoshop, saving it as a .psd, then placing that instead fixes things due to Creative Cloud voodoo.

Mileage may vary based on your calibration, setup and printer's ability to remain in profile, but I hope this helps.