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Printing grey scale

designflow

designflow

New Member
Just finished a window perf. job and the image was mostly black and white photo with elements in color. I noticed that the black and white areas printed a bit green.
1 I didn't design the artwork and 2 the game me the wi dow to scale in a jpeg.

I'm correctly printing on a Roland sp540v, can I make any corrections to make it more grey scales and not green?? Or do you think the artwork was done incorrectly?
Appreciate the feedback.
 
ucmj22

ucmj22

New Member
Ive had this problem before printing a grayscale image on canvas, that was converted to grayscale in photoshop so it had no color values but it was still coming out greenish. I ended up dropping the cyan and Yellow levels in versaworks to get rid of it.
 
designflow

designflow

New Member
Sc did you drop those levels by a lot. I have yet to make changes in versaworks but that would make sence.
 
kffernandez

kffernandez

New Member
search the forums for it. having profiles that could properly print warm greys have always been an issue since it needs a good balance between the cyan, magenta and yellow colors to get the greys right.

kelly
 
ucmj22

ucmj22

New Member
I think I did one auto click for the cyan and 2 for the yellow if I remember correctly. Might be reversed
 
S

splizaat

New Member
We've had same issues on xc540..inside the greys looked great, installed thirty binders wrapped in this and started setting them near the window as I finished. I sat back once I was done, glanced over at them near the window and WTF!!! They're GREEN! :) Looked completely different in different lights.
 
Tim Kingston

Tim Kingston

New Member
splizaat said:
We've had same issues on xc540..inside the greys looked great, installed thirty binders wrapped in this and started setting them near the window as I finished. I sat back once I was done, glanced over at them near the window and WTF!!! They're GREEN! :) Looked completely different in different lights.
Click to expand...

Yes exactly, and don't forget, depending on the laminating product the colour can change quite a bit again. What we do is get it as close as we can with the profile, test print a few small variations, laminate and check the result with exterior light too ( view it outside ) if it is to be used outside. It helps to have something grey close-by to compare it to.

Switching to optically clear laminate helps to lessen one variable and if you are way out in left field try reducing the cyan and yellow one stop and increasing the magenta and brightness one stop in Versaworks, as a starting point.
 
Hwy

Hwy

New Member
Roland black ink has much to be desired.

We switched to FieldCenter Inc. JEP ink set on our Roland machines and we're happy to report that for three year we've been achieving near neutral grey with using Roland Swatch Library.
 
Msrae

Msrae

Rae
It is kind of funny to see this as I just had a client send me his logo, which is gray/black with some color lines. (I'll have to get a picture).

The first print was very green, so I tried a few other profiles, and some were much closer to gray, but I still had to adjust the colors and even play with the black a little. I still see a tiny tinge of green, but maybe that is just my eyes. lol.

On a side note (thread jack!)
The client that sent me the file was surprised there was a green issue (which surprised me because he claims he was in the sign business for years). He said, "the logo isn't gray, it is shades of black, big difference". I'm no designer, and this statment confused me, can anyone bring light to this statement for me?
 
ucmj22

ucmj22

New Member
he probably meant that it was grayscale which removes all color data, and is simply different percentages of Black. I had the same issue. Versa will put color values in to a grayscale image even if there isnt any.
 
Custom_Grafx

Custom_Grafx

New Member
1) Greyscale mode photoshop.
2) Preserve Primary Colours checkbox Versaworks.

Problem solved.

Google Versaworks roland greyscale printing and you'll find the bulletin somewhere with all the fineprint.
 
D

duggan

New Member
Don't mean to sound stupid, but where in Versaworks is the Checkbox to Preserve Primary Colours?
Thanks

Custom_Grafx said:
1) Greyscale mode photoshop.
2) Preserve Primary Colours checkbox Versaworks.

Problem solved.

Google Versaworks roland greyscale printing and you'll find the bulletin somewhere with all the fineprint.
Click to expand...
 
ucmj22

ucmj22

New Member
Custom_Grafx said:
1) Greyscale mode photoshop.
2) Preserve Primary Colours checkbox Versaworks.

Problem solved.

Google Versaworks roland greyscale printing and you'll find the bulletin somewhere with all the fineprint.
Click to expand...

I wish that was problem solved, but like I said. I personally took the image in to photoshop, and removed all color data and still had the problem which I corrected by playing with the color adjustment bars in versa. but Hey, this post wasnt for me.
 
S

Salmoneye

New Member
He is saying that the preserve primary colors checkbox will keep versaworks from converting your K or black to a process color and thus make it shades of black like you said. Did you try it?
 
Custom_Grafx

Custom_Grafx

New Member
After watching one of the webinars recently, I picked up a really great way to print greyscale (or any roland library spot color for that matter) bitmaps.

1) Convert your photo to greyscale in illy or PS.
2) In Illy assign it a roland spot colour (if you want black ink only, use the black only, if you want composite black, use that one).
3) Print via versaworks using the roland library.

In step 2, you could also use any of the other colours in the roland spot library - or pantone or whatever.

You could also create your own spot colour and use what YOU think is neutral... for example if you find that 10/10/5/90 looks neutral to you, create a spot as such, and assign it to your greyscale photo in illy, and go to step 3.

I think it's a great way to force black channel only on the graphic you need to, while enabling you to print colour as per your usual processes/management everywhere else within the same file.

Hope that makes sense?
 
Bly

Bly

New Member
Using black ink only will usually give a thin, banded grey.
A proper custom profile is the only way to do this properly.
 
Custom_Grafx

Custom_Grafx

New Member
True, but being able to choose a grey off roland color pallette I think is a pretty good way of knowing what grey you're going to get before printing.

I make my own profiles, but grey is just grey... it could be warm grey, could be cool grey... I like being able to show someone the roland pallette and just saying... "which grey/black/colour" do you want? The bad part about relying on the profile is, what you or your spectro might think is neutral, your client sometimes doesn't... (never had that? lucky you...).

Alternatively, I can choose a pantone grey, and assign pantone grey to the greyscale image in illustrator. You just select the greyscaled bitmap in illy, and make the 'fill' whatever you want. I just feel it gives much more control that way, knowing which solid colour you're referencing.

When you print a photo in greyscale, and you want to control the grey you're printing, what do you do? I have tried colour balancing etc in photoshop, and that works well, but just feels like a long road to the same place.
 
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