Re: color display, help needed [now very long]

[Steve Rickaby]

At 11:51 -0400 22/6/12, Stuart Rogers wrote:

Isn't it more complicated than that?  (I'm no colour expert; I've just had 
some confusing and *bad* experiences trying to deal with colour through 
FM/Acrobat/Windows.)

Pantone does specify printing inks -- but isn't it the case that results also 
depend on the specification of the paper the inks will be applied to?

Stuart, you are absolutely correct. I was trying to keep the explanation 
simple. In fact there are many Pantone libraries, each fine-tuned to the actual 
printing process that is going to be used (solid (spot) coated, solid uncoated, 
process uncoated, process coated, pastels and so on) - my copy of Illustrator 
lists 10 different Pantone libraries and InDesign 13). I only know as much as I 
need to know to take books to press, but my contact with professional printers 
has led me to believe that their area of expertise is certainly no smaller than 
ours as document creators, but orthogonal to it.

As a digression that might also be helpful to Susan, in FrameMaker you will 
also need to specify whether the color is 'spot' or 'process'. This refers to 
the printing process: a spot color is (or was, traditionally) printed using a 
single plate and a premixed ink, while a process color is printed using a 
four-plate process, mixing the color from the relevant levels of cyan (C), 
magenta (M), yellow (Y) and black (K), much as a laser printer does. 
Originally, these would be printed using, say, offset lithography and four (or 
more, for art work) actual physical plates, but this distinction has been 
blurred by the advent of machines such as the Xerox iGen, which is basically a 
giant high-resolution laser printer.

To illustrate for physical print, assume a book that contains black and a 
single color, such as is often used for textbooks. If the single color is 
specified as a stop color, the resulting PDF *should* request only two 
'plates', one for the black and one for the color. If the single color is 
specified as 'process', the resulting PDF will requite four plates, mixing the 
single color from cyan, magenta, yellow and black. This is often not what is 
required.

Here is an example of the sort of thing I mean:

http://www.amazon.com/Java-Actually-First-Course-Programming/dp/1844804186/ref=sr_1_5?s=booksie=UTF8qid=1340448980sr=1-5keywords=mughal+java#reader_1844804186

This book was done in FrameMaker using just black and a spot Pantone color.

There is a good page on Pantone in Wikipedia...

'One such use is standardizing colors in the CMYK process. The CMYK process is 
a method of printing color by using four inks - cyan, magenta, yellow, and 
black. A majority of the world's printed material is produced using the CMYK 
process, and there is a special subset of Pantone colors that can be reproduced 
using CMYK. Those that are possible to simulate through the CMYK process are 
labeled as such within the company's guides.

However, most of the Pantone system's 1,114 spot colors cannot be simulated 
with CMYK but with 13 base pigments (15 including white and black) mixed in 
specified amounts.'

In the latter case, assuming two-plate printing, the printer (human) first 
mixes the Pantone spot color ink from the base pigments, then applies it in the 
printing process from one plate. However, it's important to know what printing 
process will be used; if the printer (thing) itself is intrinsically CMYK, such 
as a laser printer, then, as described in the Wikipedia quote, many Pantone 
shades won't reproduce correctly.

Susan did not specify whether her documents were principally for online viewing 
or for print, and I am afraid I sort of assumed the latter. It matters.

   And what about online docs?  In my (limited) experience with FM/Acrobat, 
 printing a Pantone colour to PDF can result in wildly out-of-whack results 
 (probably mangled by the Windows GDI).

That is quite likely, as the Pantone system was primarily intended for physical 
printing onto paper, card and so on. There is also the issue of Windows itself. 
I have no direct experience, as I've always worked with FrameMaker on Mac (so 
far, at least), but I have read here and elsewhere that Windows doesn't (or did 
not) handle CMYK well.

 Pink Pantone in FM becomes ugly orange in the PDF; blues become purples, etc. 
  (I realize those results may be due to my inexperience with the software; 
 but it doesn't sound like Susan is in any better a situation.)

No, it's not due to inexperience. There are several factors at work here. First 
off, it's always been my experience that FrameMaker's rendition of *any* color 
on screen is not to be trusted: a PDF is a much better reference, and printing 
it even better. Secondly, you only stand a chance of seeing colors even 
remotely correctly on screen if you use a reference monitor, a color 
calibration thingie, and color profiles. I have no experience of the latter 
other than what I've read, as I don't take full-color work to press, 

color display, help needed [now very long]

[Steve Rickaby]

At 11:51 -0400 22/6/12, Stuart Rogers wrote:

>Isn't it more complicated than that?  (I'm no colour expert; I've just had 
>some confusing and *bad* experiences trying to deal with colour through 
>FM/Acrobat/Windows.)
>
>Pantone does specify printing inks -- but isn't it the case that results also 
>depend on the specification of the paper the inks will be applied to?

Stuart, you are absolutely correct. I was trying to keep the explanation 
simple. In fact there are many Pantone libraries, each fine-tuned to the actual 
printing process that is going to be used (solid (spot) coated, solid uncoated, 
process uncoated, process coated, pastels and so on) - my copy of Illustrator 
lists 10 different Pantone libraries and InDesign 13). I only know as much as I 
need to know to take books to press, but my contact with professional printers 
has led me to believe that their area of expertise is certainly no smaller than 
ours as document creators, but orthogonal to it.

As a digression that might also be helpful to Susan, in FrameMaker you will 
also need to specify whether the color is 'spot' or 'process'. This refers to 
the printing process: a spot color is (or was, traditionally) printed using a 
single plate and a premixed ink, while a process color is printed using a 
four-plate process, mixing the color from the relevant levels of cyan (C), 
magenta (M), yellow (Y) and black (K), much as a laser printer does. 
Originally, these would be printed using, say, offset lithography and four (or 
more, for art work) actual physical plates, but this distinction has been 
blurred by the advent of machines such as the Xerox iGen, which is basically a 
giant high-resolution laser printer.

To illustrate for physical print, assume a book that contains black and a 
single color, such as is often used for textbooks. If the single color is 
specified as a stop color, the resulting PDF *should* request only two 
'plates', one for the black and one for the color. If the single color is 
specified as 'process', the resulting PDF will requite four plates, mixing the 
single color from cyan, magenta, yellow and black. This is often not what is 
required.

Here is an example of the sort of thing I mean:



This book was done in FrameMaker using just black and a spot Pantone color.

There is a good page on Pantone in Wikipedia...

'One such use is standardizing colors in the CMYK process. The CMYK process is 
a method of printing color by using four inks - cyan, magenta, yellow, and 
black. A majority of the world's printed material is produced using the CMYK 
process, and there is a special subset of Pantone colors that can be reproduced 
using CMYK. Those that are possible to simulate through the CMYK process are 
labeled as such within the company's guides.

However, most of the Pantone system's 1,114 spot colors cannot be simulated 
with CMYK but with 13 base pigments (15 including white and black) mixed in 
specified amounts.'

In the latter case, assuming two-plate printing, the printer (human) first 
mixes the Pantone spot color ink from the base pigments, then applies it in the 
printing process from one plate. However, it's important to know what printing 
process will be used; if the printer (thing) itself is intrinsically CMYK, such 
as a laser printer, then, as described in the Wikipedia quote, many Pantone 
shades won't reproduce correctly.

Susan did not specify whether her documents were principally for online viewing 
or for print, and I am afraid I sort of assumed the latter. It matters.

>   And what about online docs?  In my (limited) experience with FM/Acrobat, 
> printing a Pantone colour to PDF can result in wildly out-of-whack results 
> (probably mangled by the Windows GDI).

That is quite likely, as the Pantone system was primarily intended for physical 
printing onto paper, card and so on. There is also the issue of Windows itself. 
I have no direct experience, as I've always worked with FrameMaker on Mac (so 
far, at least), but I have read here and elsewhere that Windows doesn't (or did 
not) handle CMYK well.

> Pink Pantone in FM becomes ugly orange in the PDF; blues become purples, etc. 
>  (I realize those results may be due to my inexperience with the software; 
> but it doesn't sound like Susan is in any better a situation.)

No, it's not due to inexperience. There are several factors at work here. First 
off, it's always been my experience that FrameMaker's rendition of *any* color 
on screen is not to be trusted: a PDF is a much better reference, and printing 
it even better. Secondly, you only stand a chance of seeing colors even 
remotely correctly on screen if you use a reference monitor, a color 
calibration thingie, and color profiles. I have no experience of the latter 
other than what I've read, as I don't take full-color work to press, only