How come flexi does not print exactly like...

[imagep]

Corel Draw? We get beatiful and fairly accurate color prints when we print to our Mutoh from Corel. but frequently we have to screw around a lot with flexing (trying different colors etc). I just printed the same mini-swatchbook from Corel and Flexi (the file was copied from corel into flexi and both were printed with the exact same settings in the production manager. Corel print was perfect, the flexi print sucked, it was no where near the right colors (I compaired against our pantone book).

Anyone know what causes this? Or better yet, anyone know how to fix Flexi so that it prints the same colors as corel draw?

I currently print almost everything from Corel, but sometimes I need to use flexi to setup the print and cut for decals.

By the way, this issue only happens with vector art. They both print bitmaps the same.

 

[bob]

Corel Draw? We get beatiful and fairly accurate color prints when we print to our Mutoh from Corel. but frequently we have to screw around a lot with flexing (trying different colors etc). I just printed the same mini-swatchbook from Corel and Flexi (the file was copied from corel into flexi and both were printed with the exact same settings in the production manager. Corel print was perfect, the flexi print sucked, it was no where near the right colors (I compaired against our pantone book).

Anyone know what causes this? Or better yet, anyone know how to fix Flexi so that it prints the same colors as corel draw?

I currently print almost everything from Corel, but sometimes I need to use flexi to setup the print and cut for decals.

By the way, this issue only happens with vector art. They both print bitmaps the same.

What RIP? What are your rendering intents? How are you printing from Corel? What steps?

 

[Conor Knoxx]

good question Bob.

I didn't think it was possible to print on the mutoh directly from Corel Draw?

 

[imagep]

Basically for all uses. My issue today is we are printing/cutting some decals for a semi-pro sports team. It is a very simple 1 color (purple) decal that we have in a vector format. We are printing on a 48" Mutoh Valuejet onto 3651, then we wil be laminating and contour cutting on a graphtec. We are using Flexi, I guess the RIP is the sort of built in one that comes with it -Production Manager.

And yes, as long as we have our rip program running, we can print to the Mutoh from any program and from any computer in our shop. Just like we would print to any other printer (we have a half dozen other printing devices including a imagesetter with a rip and several color printers and copiers). In otherwords, the Mutoh shows up like any other printer in our print dialoge box, and I can change the print settings of the Mutoh from the print dialogue box. We print most of banners directly from Corel Draw and the color is nearly perfect.

But when we need to print Corel Draw files from Flexi (for the print and contour cut feature), the color is crap. I mean like pms 268 prints as gray, pantone purple prints as a horrid pink, pantone violet prints as solid black, and some yellows become green-esh. This happens regardles of the material and settings.

So in otherwords, printing from Corel is not my problem - it does fine. Printing Corel files from flexi is the isue. Bitmaps do fine, but the color of corel vector art and text printed from flexi sucks.

And although I would like to discover the cause and a direct solution, since my origional post I have discovered that if I save my Corel files as an eps and then import the eps into flexi, the problem goes away. So at least I now have a workaround.

 

[letterman7]

I'd like to know how you're printing directly from Corel as well, as that would save me a step. In almost every instance, I'll take my Corel file and convert it into a .jpg, then import that into Flexi and print from there. I haven't had any instances where the color was screwy, and I use a lot of Pantone colors. A caveat, though, you'll need to play with the output profiles until you get a setting that works. I outputted several Pantone swatches and played with the profiles until they very closely matched.

 

[Mike Paul]

What's your rendering intent for vector graphics set at in Rip and Print?

 

[bbeens]

Rendering intents can be ignored at this point. After the OP's last post he states printing from Corel works fine and saving as an EPS works fine. The question is what file type was causing the issue. I would guess .cdr. There is where your issue is. The color settings in Corel was either adding an embedded profile or converting colors in some way.

To Letterman7 - I would guess the OP is printing using a PPD printer to generate a .ps compatible file in a hot folder set in Flexi to print automatically. This is how I setup my customers to print out of windows applications. Wasatch ships with a utility to make this easy to setup and PPDs.

Bryan

 

[javila]

Corel is using a print driver between corel and it's own rip created my mutoh. (I assume this works similar to Versaworks, in that it creates a ps file and throws it to the rip program).

Flexi is not, it's using it's own rip(which is very robust), which more than likely you haven't set up properly.

 

[johnnysigns]

Why not skip Flexi entirely and just use cutting master from graphtec to cut? I've completely abandoned Flexi in lieu of Cutting Master driven by Illustrator. I was a diehard Scanvec fan for a long time and I can't be happier not using it now.

 

[imagep]

I'd like to know how you're printing directly from Corel as well, as that would save me a step. In almost every instance, I'll take my Corel file and convert it into a .jpg, then import that into Flexi and print from there. I haven't had any instances where the color was screwy, and I use a lot of Pantone colors. A caveat, though, you'll need to play with the output profiles until you get a setting that works. I outputted several Pantone swatches and played with the profiles until they very closely matched.

Maybe this is a new feature in Flexi (I have the newest version). When I installed Flexi it gave me the option to create a print driver. We do most of our printing straight out of Corel.

I spent hours today playing with settings. Absoulely nothing worked. Then I noticed that if I converted the art to a bitmap (like you), it printed perfectly. So I converted it to a vector eps and imported the eps into flexi, it worked perfectly also. Although I did not find a solution, I did find a workaround similar to yours.

 

[imagep]

What's your rendering intent for vector graphics set at in Rip and Print?

I am sorry - I am a little retarded about some things. After 20 years in the graphics industry I have no idea what "rendery intent" is and I have not noticed any settings called that in the version of flexi that I have. I will take a closer look.

 

[imagep]

Rendering intents can be ignored at this point. After the OP's last post he states printing from Corel works fine and saving as an EPS works fine. The question is what file type was causing the issue. I would guess .cdr. There is where your issue is. The color settings in Corel was either adding an embedded profile or converting colors in some way.

Bingo - I find it strange since lots of sign people use Corel, but flexi must have some weird color incompatibility with corel draw.

To Letterman7 - I would guess the OP is printing using a PPD printer to generate a .ps compatible file in a hot folder set in Flexi to print automatically. This is how I setup my customers to print out of windows applications. Wasatch ships with a utility to make this easy to setup and PPDs.

Bryan[/quote]

Actually it is not nearly that complicated, nor am I sophisticated enough to do all of that. In Corel Draw I just click on the "print" button and I select the ValueJet as my printer. It is that simple.

Actually, that is exactly how we send files to the rip on our imagesetter also. The rip program mimics a printer, we print to it just as we would any normal desktop printer, we go over to the imagesetter rip computer, select the file, and send it to the imagesetter.

We also make pdf's the same way using pdf995 (a free download). From any program we can select pdf995 as the printer, and pdf995 then "prints" us a pdf file.

 

[imagep]

Why not skip Flexi entirely and just use cutting master from graphtec to cut? I've completely abandoned Flexi in lieu of Cutting Master driven by Illustrator. I was a diehard Scanvec fan for a long time and I can't be happier not using it now.

I don't know. Never heard of "Cutting Master". Is it better? What I do like about Flexi is that it is soooo easy to setup a print and cut job. 3 clicks to create the contour, two more clics to send the file to both the printer and the cutter.

 

[imagep]

Corel is using a print driver between corel and it's own rip created my mutoh. (I assume this works similar to Versaworks, in that it creates a ps file and throws it to the rip program).

Flexi is not, it's using it's own rip(which is very robust), which more than likely you haven't set up properly.

I think that the rip in flexi is actually mimicing a printer (driver), so when I print from corel to the Mutoh, I am actually printing to the rip in flexi (as in the corel draw file shows up on the rip applet "production manager" of flexi and I can stop the file from ripping or restart it or make setting changes in production manager)

But what is funny is that I can print out non-corel files (from flexi), and bitmaps even if I created them in corel, just fine. It is only when I copy and paste corel images into flexi that I have a problem.

 

[johnnysigns]

i'm not sure it allows you to conveniently contour cut. i'm on an old graphtec so i have to 'fudge' my print and cut work.

Scanvec makes cutting master as a plug in to illustator or corel. here's a general link to it on graphtec's site. http://www.graphtecamerica.com/FAQs/cutting_master2.html

 

[bob]

Rendering intents can be ignored at this point....

No. If the RIP is Flexi then rendering intent is involved unless color correction is turned off. Even then I'm not all that sure that rendering intent is bypassed.

 

[imagep]

No. If the RIP is Flexi then rendering intent is involved unless color correction is turned off. Even then I'm not all that sure that rendering intent is bypassed.

I must be a dumbarse (of course you have probably figured that out by now). What the heck is "rendering intent"? Is that the same as a profile or substrait type or a print mode or color mode or dither?

 

[bob]

I must be a dumbarse (of course you have probably figured that out by now). What the heck is "rendering intent"? Is that the same as a profile or substrait type or a print mode or color mode or dither?

Rendering intent is a set of specifications on just how to perform color correction on various types of objects. It is set in Flexi under Edit->Preferences, in both the RIP and Print and Production Manager with, if memory serves, the 'color specifications' or something like that button on the Advanced tab.

There's also rendering intents in Corel under Tools->Color Specs.

Note that I'm doing all of the menu and button references from memory, the entree and button labels may be slightly different from what I've indicated here.

You need to make sure that all of your rendering intent specs are the same everywhere. The best results are usually gained by setting everything except bitmaps to "No Color Correction" or "Spot" as second choice and bitmaps to "Perceptual".

 

[imagep]

I just checked, apparently Flexi 8.5 don't have that feature. It has a multitude of settings that can be used for color adjustments, but nothing called "rendering intent".

 

[luggnut]

there are rendering intents in flexi.... if i remember right they are under your color settings.. one tabs sets input profile and default rgb color space and one sets the cmyk or printer you are using. but when you open up to RIP and print on the same page that you select what profile you are using.. Advanced tab i think.. there is a button with linearization and one with properties or advanced properties. and ther are rendering intent settings there. but i think it is a proplem between the programs... if it only prints bad if you copy and paste from corel to flexi. unless like Bobalready pointed out ... if your color settings in flexi are effecting the art you are pulling in so what i'm saying is your RIP and print may have the settings correct but your program color settings are not correct, so when you print straight thru the RIP color is not effected by the programs color settings...