Dumb question for european prepress specialists: Which ISO profile?
Dumb question for european prepress specialists: Which ISO profile?
- Subject: Dumb question for european prepress specialists: Which ISO profile?
- From: Henk Gianotten <email@hidden>
- Date: Sun, 27 Nov 2005 00:43:25 +0100
At 12:58 26-11-2005 +0100, Rolf wrote:
Hi,
the discussion reveals a big issue the printing industry has, and
this issue is reflected in this list as well:
A group of colormanagement "experts" on one hand and a group
of "non-experts" on the other hand.
In february this year I made a poll.
I chose 20 german print-houses offering their work via internet.
The print-houses were chosen out of recommendations of advertising
agencies and graphic artists.
The questions I confrontated them with were:
1) In which standard should I deliver my files? Do you have an ICC-profile
you recommend?
2) May the PDF-files I send to you have embedded fonts or not?
For me, these are two simple questions to proof if "the other side" is able
to help me getting best results or not.
2 print-houses didn't even answer. 5 anwered with ISOcoated or sent it to me.
3 said Euroskala, the rest couldn't say.
Quote: "We don't have any standard, either for CMYK nor for the PDF"
The question about the PDF or the embedded fonts was answered the same way.
3 printing-houses gave me extensive descriptions how to produce my PDF,
supplied
Acrobat settings or offered a proof and data-check.
The rest could not say.
This poll is in no way to understand as a general criticism of
printing-houses.
It reflects that colormanagement and understanding or setting up a workflow is
still, after years of pushing it to a hype, an expert theme and isn't easy
enough for non-experts that may never have learned it.
Rolf Gerling
Hi,
I agree that a large number of printers don't communicate with potential
customers on those subjects.
A few years ago I wrote a booklet for printers and designers how to handle
fonts in files such as native Quark, PDF/X-1 and PDF/X-3.
Such a document is needed to improve communication on these difficult subjects.
The same applies for the implementation of standards for color management,
color spaces and print standards.
National associations of designers, advertising agencies, prepress
companies and printers have to agree on the usage of certain sets of standards.
In Germany magazines and the big advertising agencies agreed with the
printers (both offset, web offset, newspapers, gravure and screen) to use
the national set of Printing Standards 2004.
That's a great step. One document for nearly all technologies presented in
one booklet (Medien Standard Druck 2004).
All those standards are based on ISO standards and accompanied with
instructions how to use and to control them.
IFRA, FOGRA, ECI and UGRA helped the BVDM (German Printers Association) to
create those documents.
And even big suppliers of presses, ink and paper assisted in this process.
Other national associations have to take identical steps to promote the
standards we need to optimize the communication process.
The better such a documentation, the more printers and designers are
willing to use those standards.
Yes, that will take some time. It took more than 12 years to convince
printers and designers that PostScript would dramatically change our business.
It took more than 10 years to convince designers and printers that PDF is
the only solution to streamline our process.
And it will take even longer to get general acceptance for color
management, the profiles and the printing standards.
But there is no reason to doubt.
We need standards to optimize our workflows.
Discussions on list like colorsync can help us to reach those goals.
I think,
regards,
Henk Gianotten
P.S.: If you are interested in the PDF of the English publication "Fonts
and (illegal) software", don't hesitate to ask me.
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