A question about color profiles

[Paul C]

In CS2, I noticed that Color Settings defaults contains a North American Prepress profile. Gone is the venerable US Prepress until you expand the profile list. I have used US Prepress for so long I am hesitant to change. Can anyone enlighten me on the difference? Is it designed to replace US Prepress?
peace

[The Repro Kid]

Paul, I'm pretty darn sure that us prepress and northamerican prepress are swop coated profiles. This is a profile for a 133 line screen web press that prints magazines. I don't like this profile because magazine web press' have a 300 dmax limit which is actually a crappy profile for quality printing. the sheetfed profile is better because it contains more information and can always be kicked down by the printer if he has a lesser press. You can't kick up the information from a lesser profile. I always think it's best to supply more information and let the printer pare it down when necessary rather than the other way around.

[Paul C]

Thanks Repro. I've been happy with US Prepress since a lot of my work is mainly national magazines that all seem to have a 300 ink density. The other main bulk of the work is newsprint with 220-240 ink density. There's so much work that getting an ink density for all the publications is impossible. There's always at least two people between me and the printer (a marketer and a sales rep) and neither of them understand what I'm talking about. So I have to assume that a glossy magazine is 300 and newsprint is around 240.
In this scenario do you really think it's wise to send more ink than they're looking for? My experience with newsprint has shown me it isn't. I used to have no clue about ink density and as a result, my work looked extremely muddy. I see examples of this all the time in the LA Weekly.
I do have a couple of vendors in town that I send special jobs to. I'll have a conversation with them about what they would like to see. Maybe I can kick it up a notch…
peace

[The Repro Kid]

If your vendors won't adjust an ink density for you than it is clear it is that you are on your own with your vendors. It makes no sense to me that they don't have profiles to pare down your d-max for newsprint. This is why I hate color profiling. You never know what page people are on. At least before color profiling you knew that what you put out will be what you get. Now that is no longer so. In the case of your vendors, it sounds like they are assuming that you understand color reproduction and that they are not applying a profile to your work, thus you get out just what you put in. I like this treatment from vendors better, but that's I because I know how to adjust my own inks and find the profiling to be a necessary evil for those that cannot control their own ink. But I assume that most vendors will at least check your dmax and apply their profile when a customers dmax exceeds their own press. Yours clearly will not.

However, if you handle your own ink conversions than profiles shouldn't make too much of a difference.

When you are working on an ad that will go to newsprint rather than a magazine, you can either change your profile setup and embed the profile in the image and the layout, then change your settings right back so you won't forget, and keep using the embedded newspaper profile when reopening (this means you need to use the "ask me when opening" option in profile management -- which is the best mode to use anyway). Or you can keep your profiles settings at us pre-press and re-separate your image manually to a newsprint friendly conversion. Of course this also involves resetting your profile color settings for the conversion, and then resetting back to normal after the conversion, with presets this should not be too difficult. What's different about this than the first option is you won't have to embed a profile as the manual conversion will permanently alter the separation, with the first option you will have to embed profiles and hope the vendor doesn't override and/or throw them away (see why I don't like profiling).

Once you've converted your image manually various color profiles won't affect it too much upwardly, only downward, meaning, if you convert a 300dmax 80K image down to 260dmax 80K, someone who opens it and uses a 300 dmax profile will not be able to affect your image too much, they may cause 3% or 5% more total density but overall it won't matter too much what their profile is, it can't add very much ink.

The other main bulk of the work is newsprint with 220-240 ink density. There's so much work that getting an ink density for all the publications is impossible. There's always at least two people between me and the printer (a marketer and a sales rep) and neither of them understand what I'm talking about.

As far as that is concerned, all periodicals have spec sheets. These spec sheets list ad sizes, page sizes, ink colors allowed, total maximum ink density, bleed, live area, and trim.

Your sales reps should have no problem whatsoever obtaining these spec sheets, it is their job to obtain these sheets for you. If, for some reason, the sales reps are so inept that they cannot obtain these sheet for you (studies show that 80% of employees are incompetent at their jobs), a simple phone call to the publication's sales dept. should get the specs e-mailed to instantly. Sales reps for publications always have these on hand and are happy to e-mail them to you, mainly because they don't understand them and would rather not have to explain any of the info they contain.

[Paul C]

This is why I hate color profiling.
I couldn't agree more - it seems to be basically a lie, at least in my case. But I have to start somewhere.
You never know what page people are on. At least before color profiling you knew that what you put out will be what you get. Now that is no longer so. In the case of your vendors, it sounds like they are assuming that you understand color reproduction and that they are not applying a profile to your work, thus you get out just what you put in. I like this treatment from vendors better, but that's I because I know how to adjust my own inks and find the profiling to be a necessary evil for those that cannot control their own ink. But I assume that most vendors will at least check your dmax and apply their profile when a customers dmax exceeds their own press. Your's clearly will not.
Well said Repro. I have to constantly engage in CYA design because of the endless number of printers my stuff goes to. But profiling is a necessary evil, isn't it? There is no way to work unprofiled that I know of - but I could be wrong. My approach was to pick the profile that applied to most of the situations I encounter.
However, if you handle your own ink conversions than profiles shouldn't make too much of a difference.
That is the same conclusion I've come to. Curves is my best friend…
Or you can keep your settings at us pre-press and re-separate your image manually to a newsprint friendly conversion.
Exactly what I've been doing. I have made many attempts to make a color profile that works in newsprint but it hasn't looked as good as old fashioned ink by ink adjustment. Maybe someday…
As far as that is concerned, all periodicals have spec sheets. These spec sheets list ad sizes, page sizes, ink colors allowed, total maximum ink density, bleed, live area, and trim.
You should see some of the specs I receive. I spend a lot of time calling these places. National magazines are the best, and dmax is almost always 300 so US Prepress does a pretty good job. But 2col x 8"? By the way since SAU is a lie how wide is 2cols in your newspaper?
Your sales reps should have no problem whatsoever obtaining these spec sheets, it is their job to obtain these sheets for you. If, for some reason, the sales reps are so inept that they cannot obtain these sheet for you (studies show that 80% of employees are incompetent at their jobs), a simple phone call to the publication's sales dept. should get the specs e-mailed to instantly. Sales reps for publications always have these on hand and are happy to e-mail them to you, mainly because they don't understand them and would rather not have to explain any of the info they contain.
Here's an example of the chain of information:
My print production manager gets orders from one of our companies marketers who has ordered the ad through the marketing director at an arena who has ordered the ad through her sales rep at the local paper. I don't know if that even makes sense but the bottom line is I am 5 steps away from the printer and I'm running in 40 markets with multiple newspapers. And it's due yesterday. Sometimes capitalism feels like a house of cards.:) It is very hard to even get correct dimensions let alone anything detailed. So I have to use common denominator thinking and assume that newsprint is 240dmax.
I have closer relations with the local papers…
When I was talking about vendors I meant the people who print flyers and posters for us. I can actually talk to them and have time to get proofs. So I'm going to investigate what ink density they like to print. I can't believe I haven't found this out before. Thanks for the help…
peace

[The Repro Kid]

Originally Posted by The Repro Kid
However, if you handle your own ink conversions than profiles shouldn't make too much of a difference.
That is the same conclusion I've come to. Curves is my best friend…

That's not what I meant by manual conversions, Make your settings in the color settings dialog. Such as in the screen shot below.

First, convert your CMYK orig to lab with your orig settings and or profile, then adjust your settings to affect a new separation, then convert your lab back to CMYK for a newly separated image.

This is quite a bit different then tweaking color with curves. This creates a separation gray ramp which is crucial to correct undercolor.

[Paul C]

Cool Repro.
By the way, did you know that your Creative Suite applications are not synchronized for consistent color?:)
I've been through this with newsprint and the results so far have not been as good as using Curves to get the ink density correct and knocking down the quarter tones (which will kill you in newsprint). But it's always worth a try. When I start a tour, I usually send a pdf with 4 different tweaks to an ad mat laid out on a full page for proofing at the LA Times. So far the Curve approach has won every time, but if there is anything I have learned so far it is that it pays to be a perpetual student…
peace

[The Repro Kid]

The separation table gray ramp is a highly technical advanced function that will make more sense to a drum scan operator than to a designer.

The grayramp is geared to your specific press, and so trying to understand separation tables be sending to multiple unknown presses would probably confound you rather than help you learn about what it is.

If you were intimately familiar with the types of presses you are printing to you may understand its function better.

The idea is that the image color is assumed to be perfect and you are only redistributing the separation to allow the perfect image to be reproduced on various different presses but always keep the same color fidelity. When used properly you shouldn't have a difference in your image from one type of press to another.

Futzing with the curves to make an already perfect image print well on a different press is like drowning out a poor winwood (sp?) section with the brass section. It works, but it may not be the optimum implementation of the orchestra.

And oh, about my seemingly unsynced color settings, they are in fact totally synced, but Adobe Creative Suite 2 has no clue because I set custom separation gray ramps in my color settings of each program.

CS2 wants you to set your color settings in Bridge because 99.99% of all computer artists can't seem to set the same settings in each of their various adobe programs, and adobe knows this.

So now, whether you like it or not, if you do not pick one main color setting in adobe bridge, all your programs tell you are un-synced, even if all the settings in each program are equal.

The real pisser about this is you do not have the ability to create a custom separation gray ramp in bridge the way you do in photoshop. In fact bridge doesn't even has US sheetfed coated as an option. All it has is North American prepress standard which is really a crap profile if you're printing to anything other than a humongous magazine web press. I think I may be able to save off my custom photoshop settings as preset and load this to bridge but frankly I haven't seen the need. My ink balance comes off very sweet with or without adobe bridge's help.

[The Repro Kid]

Here's a screenshot of my un-synced settings. They are identical yet since I set them without bridge, bridge knows better than me and tells me they are unsychronized.

[The Repro Kid]

Here is the type of sep table I like to run when I have a good press and good press people. Believe it or not, the type of table that can be run depends not only on the press, also on how good the pressmen are. The table I show below needs not only a good press but also good operators.

[AdobeAce]

Hey Repro,

You're right! Designers (like me) do get totally lost looking at stuff like this. To me it looks like some failed science project of wacky professor. That's why I always call my printers to get their advice and a CMYK profile, if they have one, for me to use.

But, there is really no reason to set up your Color Settings separately in Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign. I get all my settings from my printer, set it up once in Photoshop and Save it. Then in Bridge, I find my Saved Settings from Photoshop and select it from the list of settings in Bridge and apply it to ALL of Creative Suite. Creative Suite will be happy it's "in Sync" and you'll save time.

Ace

[Paul C]

Excellent information, guys. Still struggling with this after all these years. LA Times, for example, will not supply me with the kind of info I need to set this up correctly. I will try again…
Adobe Ace - I also use Bridge for synchronization. It's the only place I change color settings.
peace

[The Repro Kid]

Thans Ace, I figured as much.

It's actually better the way they have it set-up now.

paulc, you won't be able to get the info from your printers, except for the dmax, but thats okay.

Use medium generation, light generation means less black and more undercolor, this won't be optimum for newsprint. Use 90-100 percent black becuse the less black you use, again the more undercolor. I never allow 100 black in the seps, but again this may help newsprint. Lastly use 0% UCR as this gives the most amount of black in your seps and the least amount of undercolor.

The muddyness in your newprint is probably due to excessive amounts of black these standard profiles introduce into the seps. You could try something radical like a light generation with 80% black, but you would have to keep the DMAx way down to 240-250 like you mentioned. Most newspapers claim to be able to hold 280.

Light generation always gives you much nicer colors than the medium generation, providing the press(men) can handle it.

[DCurry]

Holy crap, Repro - your RGB working spaces are set to a monitor profile? Tsk, tsk!

[Paul C]

Repro - I'm sorry to hear you feel dissed and if I've added to it I apologize. My unsynchronized remark was a bad joke that I don't think worked (of course at that moment you were unsychronized, you were trying to show me a newsprint setting).
I have used this Color Settings method to try and get something a little more automatic but it just hasn't worked yet. The settings I have used are very similar to the ones you showed us here, with a lower ink limit and the black raised to 100%. The LA Times ink limit is 220 now that they have gone to thinner paper. At the beginning of a tour I send 4 images on a full page for proofing on newsprint. 2 of these are Color Settings experiments and 2 are done with Curves. So far the Curves have won. I am happy with the results I'm getting so if it's not broke…
But it doesn't stop me from trying. I hope you won't stop either. You are extremely knowledgable and you, DCurry, Adobe Ace and I go back a ways to the previous incarnation. Let the information flow…
peace

[The Repro Kid]

Yesh. Shhounds good. Let flow whats will flow.

[DCurry]

I don't really feel the need to respond to needling but here goes:

4) The RGB working space represents your monitor in a color profiling scheme. Me thunked yoo'd knew dat, and so derfore can't rightly figger yer point??

The repro kid is needlessly growing weary and so therefore may drop out of site for a while.

Sorry - didn't know you were so touchy. You're right - I don't know that you didn't just overwrite an existing profile, but I know you are pretty detail-oriented and it doesn't sound like a logical thing to do.

On point #4, perhaps you could educate me before you "drop out of site for a while" - I've never heard that before, and I've never read anywhere that a monitor profile should be used as a working space.

The way I understand it is that the monitor profile is a smaller gamut than say sRGB or AdobeRGB, and that a color profiling scheme translates from the working space to the monitor profile so you see a (relatively) accurate representation of color.

Sorry if I'm coming across with a bit of a "tone", but I don't think that my original post regarding your RGB working spaces warranted such a snippy reply. It was meant in fun.

[The Repro Kid]

DCurry and everyone else, I was having a really bad week earlier this week and I guess I let the strain get the better of me.

I deleted the posts that I made earlier that weren't useful.

[DCurry]

DCurry and everyone else, I was having a really bad week earlier this week and I guess I let the strain get the better of me.

I deleted the posts that I made earlier that weren't useful.

No sweat, Repro - we all have days like that. Hope there's no hard feelings - there are none on my end.

[The Repro Kid]

I'm totally cool about it, D.

I've had a few things happen lately to grate on my nerves. To be specific, a good friend somewhat mysteriously drowning and some chowder-head, in a fit of his own road rage, rear-ending my vehicle. But that's no reason for my going on a tirade.

I'll re-boot and be back on top of things soon.