what you see is what you get ( freehand colors & print design)

[theory1]

If you only have a black and white laser yet you want to design color documents, cards etc using freehand 10 what is the best way to pick colours so that there is no nasty suprise when you print?

[matticiousg]

It's hard to tell you how to proceed without knowing more of the details like how you intend to print it, what the design will consist of... ect. Offhand, the easiest way I can think of is to pick some pantone colors. You can probably find a book of them in your local art store. However if you are going to print in cmyk, you'll want to find a pantone book with cmyk conversion tables and use those formulas. CMYK printers are notriously bad a parsing pantone colors so the formulas should give you a much more acurate color.
Hope this helps,
Matt

[ThePavewalk]

Yeah, Pantone Swatch Books are around £80 in the UK, which would make them around $140.

You will need to go into the place where you intend to get the the stuff printed (even if you don't) and take an interest in colour output (you are a student of the subject, whatever) - then maybe you can get your hands on some free (or loaned) CMYK colour books which will give you an idea of the finished output.

This will still only be an idea as colour output can depend on various variables and is always a contentious issue.

With the right colour books, experience and a good relationship with your printer you will get the finished job as you expected it to be.

Any Q's, just ask.

Pavey.

[theory1]

thanks for your replies.

looking at the 3 little cricles > pantone colors are RGB ? I thought you were always supposed to use CMYK for print stuff rather than RGB(on screen)

so confusing.. and what is a spot color exactly?

[Black_phoenix]

Originally posted by theory1
thanks for your replies.

looking at the 3 little cricles > pantone colors are RGB ? I thought you were always supposed to use CMYK for print stuff rather than RGB(on screen)

so confusing.. and what is a spot color exactly?

RGB is red green blue and is never used in printing, CYMK are the printing colours

pantone colours (spot colours) are always exactly the same colour as shown in the pantone book, these spot colours are not mixes of rgb of cymk but are a colour on there own

ok a cymk cover is printed with 4 plates so the paper is printed with cyan, then yellow, then magenta then finally black. The thinness of the inks on top of each other make up the CYMK final colour

a spot colour is just one plate from a pot of specially pre mixed paint (best way to describe it)

if u design an image as cymk and u specify spot colours, the job will be a 5 or 6 colour job (v expensive), the way round this is to choose a pantone colour then convert it to cymk, this will give u roughly the same colour

i have found that unless u get chromalins and work v closely with the printer the colours are just close to what u wanted, eg if u print 500 in january, then re run the same job in june when u hold the print work them next to each other they will be slightly different

i suppose it depends on the printer, they can calibrate the printing press to get exact matches, but from my experience it does nt make u v popular (unless its a v big job)

also if u have a printer at home (prints rgb) dont expect the colours when printed cymk to be the same, the blues will still be blue but mb not the exact shade as u want (unless u do the pantone cymk convert thing)

hope this explains it ?



bp

[theory1]

I sort of see now, you can see my confusion over the pantone=rgb thing from the image below:



So if you are is using say 3 or less colors (that includes black right?) then pantone/spots are best and if more then CMYK yeah?

In general when should one use coated/uncoated ? is that to do with what paper is being used to print on?


Thanks,

[Black_phoenix]

Originally posted by theory1
So if you are is using say 3 or less colors (that includes black right?) then pantone/spots are best and if more then CMYK yeah?

if its 3 colours u can use either spot colours (vector look and feel) or depending in the design tritone settings in photoshop, my advice would be to ask the printer. If eg the printer runs digital spot colours will be of no use at all (as the printer will as default only run cymk)

what is the print job in question ?

also are u working on a pc or a mac and what program are u putting the final eps in ?

bp

[Black_phoenix]

i am not 100% sure on this but i think the 3 circles are to do with the printer settings (i guess u have a RGB printer as default) thats why u get the circles, its worth buying adobe acrobat (distiller) to make pdfs before sending them to print, then u can click "separations" and look at all the individual plates in the pdf so if its pantone 032 (red), black and 285 blue u will get a pdf with only 3 pages if u get more u know u have done it wrong

bp

[theory1]

what is the print job in question ?

also are u working on a pc or a mac and what program are u putting the final eps in ?

No particular job, I have both pc/mac, that screen was taken on my pc but i think i may end up using the mac for my design stuff because of the fonts/printer options. I have a black and white laser.

when i used a mac at college and wanted to print something I could choose to print crop marks, seperations, registration marks etc straight from freehand but on my pc with Freehand 10 i get no such options.