Roland Versaworks Issue - Color problems and "glitches"

[VinylLab]

Hey Everyone,

I've had some color issues with Versaworks. I have Versa Works Version 5.5.0, a Roland SP540v and am using the new Windows 10. Even before I updated Windows, Versaworks would print certain dark greens and browns as black. I'd fix the issue by changing the color in Illustrator then saving as a new PDF. This isn't the best way, however, since it obviously messes with the original color. Has anyone else had this issue?

Also, now I'm having a new issue with Versaworks. I've attached a picture of my issues. The top two pictures demonstrate the dark brown changing to black in Versaworks. THe left images are the original images. The new issue is the white appearing at the top of the Frost logo in Versaworks. The right two pictures are from Versaworks. Any ideas on what is causing the white? I've tried saving as a PDF and Jpeg, but the PDF has the issue and Versaworks says the Jpeg is a corrupted file.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[GVP]

Have you run the test print in Versaworks? This might help determine if it's something in your file that's causing it? Also, in your example, are you working with spot colours or is it all CMYK?

 

[P Wagner]

The first issue (darker tones > black) is caused by over-inking the media. All of your shadow tones are plugging to black. CMYK printing is a subtractive process, and adding ink in any combination ultimately creates black. The amount of ink that is being jetted is defined inside of the Media Profile that you select in the RIP. My advise would be to to do one of the following:

a) Experiment with other Media Profiles and print modes, and see which one yields the best result to you. This is what most operators do.

b) Best practices in color science would dictate that you build a custom media profile on your printer, which will take into account all of the unique variables that are always present in every installation. These include the specific behavior of your machine including it's linearity, the resolution that you would like to print at, the media itself, and your print room environment. To do option b, you would need a supported color measurement instrument, and additional software to build the ICC component, as Roland Versaworks lacks this functionality, although it can perform all of the preliminary steps, including primary ink restrictions, and linearization steps.

The second issue (white in the logo) is probably caused by the RIP's mis-interpreting of a postscript effect or element in the PDF file. Solutions here would include flattening any vector effects, or rasterizing them (or the whole file). Saving as an uncompressed TIF would be the most reliable way of resolving this specific issue.

 

[VinylLab]

Spot colors

Have you run the test print in Versaworks? This might help determine if it's something in your file that's causing it? Also, in your example, are you working with spot colours or is it all CMYK?

This customer designs their own graphics so I'm not sure if he used spot colors. Is there a setting in Versaworks that I can change to properly print spot colors. Also, believe it or not, I am not quite sure of the difference between CMYK and spot colors. I know what CMYK is, but spot colors? Is it a color in Illustrator that hasn't been converted to the CMYK scale? I'm disappointed in myself for being in the digital printing business for three years and not knowing what spot colors are.......eeeeeesh.

 

[player]

What Vinyl?

What Profile are you using?

Are you letting VW handle everything in printer controls? ( 3 separate drop-downs in Printer Controls section)

Have you tried converting the file to RGB?

Print a test print from the button on the panel.