Hi, I think I have a decent understanding of color management from image input, display and PDF output related to desktop publishing and photography editing software, etc. but I am not familiar with what goes into actually having a printing press calibrated and being able to produce accurate and predictable color from different printers, inks and papers from the POV of someone operating the printers themselves. I have the suspicion that the person I interface with when communicating with the printer I have no option but to work with, and who holds the responsibility and decision power of what and how to tweak in either the files I send or the printers themselves, is not particularly versed in current color management concepts either. I actually have the suspicion that he is stuck in mid-90s ways to do stuff, doing manual tweaking of ink output levels and so. I am meeting with that person in order to know why the magazines we print with them all seem washed out and seem to have a blue-ish shift in all pages, why they feel they need to tweak the ink balance of the PDF files we send them (if I understood correctly that that is what they feel they need to do each time we send them something), and how we should be sending them our stuff in order to make their lives easier and less prone to unexpected colors. Without one bit of intention of sounding like a jerk to that person (I have to work with him and them whatever the conclusion), I would like to anticipate what concepts that person should be familiar with in order to know, well… whether he knows what he is doing and there is something we can do to have better output, or whether he knows his stuff but there are other determinants (like cost) that limit how nice our prints can be or whether we are stuck with someone that does not know his job. When I send a PDF to the printer, and they will use, say, 5 different printing machines to print it, what goes into having them all print the same source consistently? I assume different levels of color consistency and predictability have different associated costs. What would be different "leagues" in printing press calibration related to how much equipment, software and calibration process would cost? What can those costs add up to for the printer? If the printer is able to handle RGB objects in a PDF (which they seemingly do), is there any benefit **from their POV** in me providing a PDF/X-4 instead of a PDF/X-1a and use RGB where it seems it makes sense (like pictures and other elements where I am not concerned about what/how many inks with what halftone pattern they use but with having their colors print predictably)? (I would assume so, if they somehow need to apply color conversion to my files to their particular CMYK color space, but I do not know). Up until know we have been generating the PDFs with Adobe's UncoatedFOGRA29.icc as output intent without really confirming whether that is appropriate for their printers (besides just knowing that the paper is uncoated). What our output intent should be is one of the answers I would like to ask, but I would like to anticipate whether this person can actually provide an answer to that. Jorge