RE: "Safe CMYK" workflows [was: Misleading Adobe Common Color Architecture]
RE: "Safe CMYK" workflows [was: Misleading Adobe Common Color Architecture]
- Subject: RE: "Safe CMYK" workflows [was: Misleading Adobe Common Color Architecture]
- From: Marco Ugolini <email@hidden>
- Date: Wed, 9 Jan 2008 00:24:10 -0800 (GMT-08:00)
Rick Gordon wrote:
>Well, the terminology is Adobe's, not mine,
Yes, I know, and I didn't mean to sound like I was snapping at you. My apologies if it sounded that way.
>but I actually think it is the best default for a typical CMYK workflow.
That I don't agree with. It may be easier for the user to adopt that route (in a sort of ostrich-like manner) if he/she is not conversant with color management workflows. But that comes at the risk of changing the appearance of elements in the file and obtaining unpredictable results.
As for what someone else said yesterday on this forum (I forget who) regarding the fact that presumably the "preserve CMYK numbers" policy applies only to native InDesign objects and not to linked image files, I would ask other people more in the know than I am about InDesign to please confirm that.
>Most printers want final CMYK, and will ignore profiles anyway.
That is the rub: what is "final CMYK"? There is no such color space.
So, how do you tackle this when you want the final printed product to match your expectations? Or do you have no specific expectations and instead just wait until you receive a proof from the separators to see what you are getting?
Also, there's always another option to consider: *changing vendors*, and finding ones who are color-management-savvy, instead of stubbornly holding on to what, in all fairness, I consider to be the prehistory of our business.
>Generally, I want to avoid layout programs from deciding to change
>my CMYK without my specific consent, while at the same time, leaving
>less chance of an unwanted conversion happening downstream.
If there are conversions happening without your consent (and I'm not clear what those would be), they would probably happen whether or not you honor the embedded profiles. If it's a matter of a buggy application, it's one thing. But if the unwanted conversions happen because one is not digging deep enough into the inner workings of InDesign, then it would be a matter of filling in the gap's in one's knowledge.
As for the unwanted conversions downstream, that depends on whether the vendors are savvy and cooperative or antagonistic and stubborn. In the latter instance, the only thing one can do (even someone who would rather use color-managed workflows) is guess at the output color space and create a situation where damage is minimized. That could mean picking the SWOP v2 profile as the target space, and sending image files that have been converted to it -- leaving all images untagged, though properly converted. That way one has a chance in North-American prepress hell of not seeing *horrible* results, just perhaps.
>So I will rarely send anything but PDFs, which I find most vendors
>that I (or, more accurately, my clients) deal with (all major players
>in the printing industry) specifically request to have profiles removed.
I don't know about others, but I am frankly getting sick and tired of this dance with vendors that cannot be bothered to step up to the current level of technological capabilities.
It's 2008, not 1998. Those of us who know better must stop condoning this sort of backwardness. Raise a fuss, ask to switch over to other vendors who know their stuff -- but let's do something. Things need to move forward, please, really.
End of rant. <g>
Marco Ugolini
_______________________________________________
Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored.
Colorsync-users mailing list (email@hidden)
Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
This email sent to email@hidden