Spot vs. process colors with transparency

[stephenj148]

Sorry if this has been covered before, I searched and could not find what I'm looking for.....

I am trying to print something which has transparency in it. When I save as an .eps, I get a message that states changing spot colors to process in other programs could have different results. In Roland Versa works, I loose my cut line.

Can anyone help me?

 

[Malkin]

The usual recommendation is to export as a jpg/tiff image, then place the image in an eps and overlay the cut line.

Also, there has been some limited success with using the "flatten transparency" tool.

 

[jfiscus]

If the spot color in question (giving you grief) is the CutContour, them the only reliable solution I have found is the flatten into a raster with photoshop & place the contour over that in Illustrator. (in a new file obviously)

 

[beermonster]

ok mac based here with illy cs3 - whats your set up?

right - if the contour cut interacts with transparency then saving it as an eps will convert it to process most likely.

if you can't use .ai files then your best solution is to save out as pdf higher than a version 1.3. past 1.3 and live transparency is kept

also in raster settings make sure keep spot colours is selected and in the eps save box select keep overprints. this is some good fight back against losing spot colours and overprints in eps files

eps in some "worlds" of "printing" (think litho) is just about dead. pdf is what most RIP's and workflows accept and APPE 2.5 systems are the latest and greatest, happily rendering spot colours and transparencies in pdf's with few issues. Bung in "old school" eps's and the fun starts - but it depends on your rip/workflows capabilities and your budgets to upgrade - coz these damm things coz waaay toooo much!

 

[signswi]

Coming from the offset and web worlds to sign making, I use PDF/X-4 or PDF/X1-a for just about everything. EPS is a terrible format for layout output.

 

[sjm]

As a reminder Spot Colours are solid ... and all things are not equal. For example show me a 50% PMS 485 in the Pantone swatch book.

 

[CentralSigns]

Dude actually just what I posted about, just a while ago. I stumbled across the answer by accident. What I did was create a contour around the object at .05 in in white, then another at .05 using your contour again for a cutline using your cut colour. So what I did was cut lined my contour and it worked. pm me for any more help if needed.

 

[ackerman139]

1. Make a rectangle that covers edge to edge ( so a surrounding box), bring that to the bottom of all layers. Then ungroup all and select just all the CutContour's. Copy them. Then Delete. Then bring the rectagle to the top and do CTRL+A (select all), then while holding the shift button click the rectangle (surrounding box). Group all the items selected. Make a clipping mask and export as an eps. Then once exported, release clipping mask, delete everything but the surrounding box, and CTRL+f (paste in front). Then make a clipping mask of all the CutContour lines. Export as eps. They will be in the exact same spot as needed to cut if you do all this correctly, and you wont loose your vector artwork. I know it sounds like a lot but it is REALLY easy once you do it a couple times