Electronic Music 411 - Colour management - rich, incompetent, illustrator, black

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Colour management

StoreTags: rich, incompetent, illustrator, black

Author: cbit on August 28 2006

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People who enjoyed reading this: PAWEL, jogn, quicks

--> Hello, so i'll shamelessly abusing the blog posting to ask another illustrator type question.

So, the link is: i'm preparing some artwork for the cover of my album and i'm a bit confused about how to prepare it right for print.

So i understand that when creating black text (or other vector elements) in illustrator, you have the option of layering coloured inks on top of the black ink so instead of c=0,m=0,y=0,k=100 you have something like c=50,m=40,y=40,k=100.

This is fine. What i'm wondering about though is the following: I have 'placed' some tiff artwork in the illustrator file. The tiff contains areas that should be black. Ideally this black should match the rich black im using for the text. How would i go about acheiveing this? (either in illustrator, or before-hand, in phoptoshop).

Relatedly: i've found the 'appearance of black' options in illustrator. I think i should make an informed choice about how to adjust these settings, but i'm feeling uninformed. What options have you chosen for your 'appearance of black' settings panel and why?

Feeling a bit out of my depth: Any advice, links etc very much appreciated.

Colour is so much easier in graphics-for-web land :O

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Comments

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08/28/06 + fakeBlooper

this is why there are dedicated layout programs like inDesign, Quark, Creator, etc... they give you "trapping" options, which illustrator doesn't. for text, i would advise against a composite black (C=40, M=40, Y=40, K=40), and go with a pure black, unless it's in a photo image. if your registration is off even a tiny bit, your text will be unlegible. make sure you are working only in the CMYK gamut across all your apps. K=100 will look fine when printed, it's only on screen it looks funky. what format are you delivering it to your printer? if you deliver it in a proper format (CMYK pdf X1a) and your printer knows what he's doing, they should be able to handle all the trapping issues for you so you get the best looking print. if you like i can take a look at your pdf and make the proper conversions as it gets a bit tricky depending on your layout and the material.

Recent blogs: ableton microtonal oscillator utility, awesome, mobo alert sequencer

08/28/06 + cbit

thanks a bunch fb, that helps.. i was wondering about (what i now know is called) trapping.. and how to handle that kind of thing. i may take you up on the kind offer!

another relation thing i'm not 100% sure of (probably a dumb question):

The printer provided me with illustrator templates for the digipack and a discobag for a seperate project (this was the reason i ended up doing the whole thing in ilustrator

). The illustrator files came with guide layers. I reckon i have to delete/hide these layers before i export to pdf: im wondering how the printer will know how to align my artwork with the folds/cuts etc of the packaging, will it work out fine because the document size is the same as their original template, and they can just use the top left corner (0,0) as a reference point? vague question i know ;)

Recent blogs: Mormo records on Bandcamp, STEIM is safe, Song for Two Mega Sites

edited: Aug 28 2006 + fakeBlooper

if the guide layers are JUST that... guides, then you don't have to hide them. when you export, the guides will already be invisible. if your folds are going to be exactly where they are on the template, i'd assume your printer knows what he's doing and just follow the template.

to further complicate the issue, if you're looking for a "full-bleed" (full color to the very edge of the cut, then you'll need an extra 1/8 inch or so beyond the visible area on all sides of the cut. most printers will use a registration template that looks like precise bulls-eyes on all four corners of the document that they visually align in their pre-flight document. if your printer allowed for a full bleed, then the bulls-eyes will be slightly inside the visible area, if not, then a simple generic template is used and they align fine because the document is the same size (like you guessed).

the great thing about a proper pdf, is that all elements are still isolated with vector info and trapping can be handled by the printer. whatever you do, never send any print-ready layouts to a printer in a jpg or tiff (or a junky ms word pdf).

Recent blogs: ableton microtonal oscillator utility, awesome, mobo alert sequencer

08/28/06 + cbit

ah i see. could guide layers be called 'template' layers in illustator? that's the option i can find anyway.. it looks like its what i need.

to further complicate the issue, if you're looking for a "full-bleed" (full color to the very edge of the cut, then you'll need an extra 1/8 inch or so beyond the visible area on all sides of the cut. most printers will use a registration template that looks like precise bulls-eyes on all four corners of the document that they visually align in their pre-flight document. if your printer allowed for a full bleed, then the bulls-eyes will be slightly inside the visible area, if not, then a simple generic template is used and they align fine because the document is the same size (like you guessed).

I see. there are no bullseye targets in the template files. i noticed that the template has a pink dotted line that runs about 3mm outside the edge of the black outline of the document boundary. i assumed that this represented the outer edge of the extra bleed area.

Recent blogs: Mormo records on Bandcamp, STEIM is safe, Song for Two Mega Sites

08/28/06 + Unknownforce

I read about stuff like this ages ago but when it came to printing a newsletter for work, i forgot all about it!
I used illustrator but saved it as a pdf for the printers.
The black came out fine but some of the other colours got altered slightly in the transition to pdf.

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08/28/06 + fakeBlooper

when it comes to bad prints (composite black text, sh#tty color correction, hard gradients in black in photo pics, off-registration plates, font defaults), designers will always blame the printers and the printers will always blame the designers. in my 6 years in graphics/publishing i've learned the best way is to cover your own ass and do all your own trapping and color correction on your end, so all the high school drop-out (who thinks he's an artist) at the printer has to do, is print it. ther are some good ones out there, but overwhelmingly, they don't know their asses from their elbows.

Recent blogs: ableton microtonal oscillator utility, awesome, mobo alert sequencer

08/28/06 + cbit

mmmm. when i export to pdf, the resultant file contains only what falls within the black document bounday in illustrator (logical).. but this cuts off the bleed border i think (the 3mm between the document edge and the pink dotted outer border that was included in their template). hmm what to do..

Recent blogs: Mormo records on Bandcamp, STEIM is safe, Song for Two Mega Sites

08/28/06 + bb01

tiff is the devil

and yes, guide lines are invisible
what you can also do if you dont know about your printer, is making cropmarks yourself
you have the real kind (the ones that make your bounding box disappear) and a filter;
goto hoofdbalk> filter - create - crop marks
best applied only on the edges of the complete artwork though

Recent blogs: akai s-1000, matrix 1000, em411members full albums

08/28/06 + fakeBlooper

cbit said: "mmmm. when i export to pdf, the resultant file contains only what falls within the black document bounday in illustrator (logical).. but this cuts off the bleed border i think (the 3mm between the document edge and the pink dotted outer border that was included in their template). hmm what to do.."

if that's the case, the printer may just want you to send an illustrator eps. just make sure to convert all your vectors to outlines (select all> crtl+alt+O) to avoid font issues and screwy compound paths.

when i send to a printer w/ full bleed this is what i do: say my document is 5x10... i add 1/8 to all 4 sides, so i get 5 1/4 X 10 1/4, then make guides 1/8 all the way round and build my doc just within that center. if you drag from the ruler area in the upper lefthand corner to the upper left hand corner of your centered area, your new 0,0 will be where the guides are and all your measurements from the template will translate over.

i'll look at your pdfs in acrobat later tonight... just looked at the email and it looks good, but i think your black settings in photoshop are off (just judging by the placed tiff)

Recent blogs: ableton microtonal oscillator utility, awesome, mobo alert sequencer

edited: Aug 28 2006 + cbit

but i think your black settings in photoshop are off (just judging by the placed tiff)

ahh, i'm curious about this..

when i send to a printer w/ full bleed this is what i do: say my document is 5x10... i add 1/8 to all 4 sides, so i get 5 1/4 X 10 1/4, then make guides 1/8 all the way round and build my doc just within that center. if you drag from the ruler area in the upper lefthand corner to the upper left hand corner of your centered area, your new 0,0 will be where the guides are and all your measurements from the template will translate over.

ahh yeah i see. makes sense. weird that it wasnt set up this way to begin with..

Recent blogs: Mormo records on Bandcamp, STEIM is safe, Song for Two Mega Sites

08/28/06 + bb01

I posted without seeing your

but apparently I was talking about the same thing, psychic I guess

if you want crop marks without cutting off the overbleed, just use the filter style crop marks

Recent blogs: akai s-1000, matrix 1000, em411members full albums

08/28/06 + cbit

thanks for all the info guys.

another q: i realised that so far the tiffs ive been importing to illustrator were in RGB mode. I thought to be safe i should switch them to CMYK tiffs but when i tried re-importing these the colour looks very wrong inside illustrator somehow (the rgb ones look perfect though).

If my illustrator document is set to CMYK mode, can i safely use rgb tiffs? or.. and if not: any ideas why my cmyk tiffs look so wrong in Ill. thanks!

Recent blogs: Mormo records on Bandcamp, STEIM is safe, Song for Two Mega Sites

08/28/06 + bb01

its prolly because calibrating a monitor to represent the same colour in photoshop and illustrator correctly, takes 525 shaolin monks 32 lightyears and the patience of an oyster.
I hate colour management, but its porbably because Im no adobe expert

and youre right, using rgb for print is very risky
and after converting pics to another colour mode, its very normal that they should look weird
(only solution is to tweak them, the colour setting I mean)

Recent blogs: akai s-1000, matrix 1000, em411members full albums

edited: Aug 28 2006 + bb01

its prolly because calibrating a monitor to represent the same colour in photoshop and illustrator correctly, takes 525 shaolin monks with the patience of an oyster.
I hate colour management, but its porbably because Im no adobe expert

youre right, using rgb for print is very risky
-after converting pics to another colour mode, its very normal that they should look weird
(only solution is to tweak them, the colour setting I mean)

Recent blogs: akai s-1000, matrix 1000, em411members full albums

08/28/06 + bb01

double post, sorry

Recent blogs: akai s-1000, matrix 1000, em411members full albums

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