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kg109 · Jan 13, 2004, 11:21 AM

Problem: I created my business card in Illustrator 10. The business who printed them brought the .ai into Photoshop, then sent me a proof. The colors were completely off. And yes they were both setup for CMYK format. So I pulled the .ai into Photoshop CS (doesn't matter which version) and sure enough, the colors were entirely different (blue in one, purple in the other for instance).

Example: if I make a single rectangle in Illustrator at the CMYK color of 100/65/35/20, then create a rectangle in Photoshop at the exact same 100/65/35/20, then appear to be two entirely DIFFERENT colors.

Why? I would think that they two apps should work seamlessly together.

MacDog · Jan 13, 2004, 11:42 AM

Color calibration. It's that simple. Never trust what you see on the screen. If the color readings match, they absolutely will print the same. The only hitch is, if the printer outputs the file from PS, their output settings may (and probably are) different than yours - which will change the colors.

Tell them to output the file from either Illustrator, or place the .eps file into Quark or InDesign and output from their.

I would question the knowledge and quality of anyone who would be so stupid as to import another file into Photoshop for output... it's just plain stupid.

kg109 · Jan 13, 2004, 12:32 PM

Yeah I see your point - and understand that the screen never tells the truth, but this difference is ridiculous. I'll test it myself tonight and see what happens. It still does not make sense. I'll print from Photoshop and print from Illustrator and see what they look like.

But even something I'm working on for my business (catalog) - The basis of the catalog is done in Illustrator - with photo images from Photoshop brought in as .tifs. The cover however, I plan to do 90% of it in Photoshop, then carry the .tif into Illus. - which is where the dilema re-occurs.

I'll do a test right now and see what happens from here (PC-work, Mac-home).

Thanks.

kg109 · Jan 13, 2004, 12:47 PM

I just ran a test:

Photoshop: I made a rectangle with CMYK 100/65/35/20 and printed it.

Illustrator: 'Made a rectangle with CMYK 100/65/35/20 - identical to Photoshop specs, size color, etc. and printed it.

Two totally DIFFERENT colors. Not even close. Photoshop is a lighter, teal green; whereas the Illustrator image is a nice, dark blue.

Here's what I have done in the past to fix the problem (which apparently is what I'm going to have to continue to do). I took a screenshot from Illustrator, pasted the image into a layer in Photoshop. Using the Color Picker I selected the color (the 100/65/35/20) In Photoshop it comes in as 100/87/39/36!!!

What the...?

MacDog · Jan 13, 2004, 03:40 PM

oops

MacDog · Jan 13, 2004, 03:41 PM

Without going into a lot of detail. The problem most likely is that you have two different "color spaces" that you're dealing with.

Check in Photoshop's "Color Settings" under the file menu. Set them to this (for testing purposes):

Then, when you save the photoshop file, make the settings look like this (match what I have, giving the file whatever name you want):

We are telling PS to embed the U.S. Sheetfed Coated v2 profile in the file itself.

Then go ahead and place the image in Illustrator. When you hit print, select from the drop down menu the "Adobe Illustrator" option. It will look like the one below (somewhat, depending on what version you have). Make sure you select the same color space/profile as I have.

That *should* take care of the problem. If it doesn't, then you have something else going on that I can't really help with without actually sitting down at your computer.

himself · Jan 13, 2004, 10:40 PM

As MacDog just explained, you have to enable color management for both illustrator and photoshop, and both settings should be the same. The best policy is to keep it all as simple and consistent as possible, so that the printer won't have to guess whether your color spaces are calibrated specifically for your monitor or not, etc etc...

My setup is ColorSync Generic across the board � ColorSync RGB for the RGB space and ColorSync CMYK for the CMYK space. My conversion engine is also set to Apple ColorSync.. it doesn't have to be, but whatever you choose, make sure that is consistent across all of you apps.

Also, make sure you put time in to calibrate you display. Doing it by eye is not precise, but it is much better than not calibrating at all. Make 3 or 4 (or 5) display calibration profiles and compare them to see which is more accurate to your eye (and stick to that one). It is best to calibrate your display with a neutral gray background for your desktop, and afterwards you'll be surprised how much better everything looks...

also, I'm willing to bet that Photoshop's interpretation of the colors in your file are the more accurate ones, not illustrator. post your results so we can know how it turns out.

kg109 · Jan 14, 2004, 01:44 AM

Wow. That did it. Every single day there's something new to learn about PS and Illus, etc, and I've used both these programs for longer than I want to admit.

I adjusted the Color Settings to mirror MacDog's - just as a control. What it did, was bring the colors in Illustrator to Photoshop's specs actually - so Himself was right in theorizing that Photoshop is the more "correct" of the two. Interesting.

Thanks a lot for the help!

Originally posted by himself:
As MacDog just explained, you have to enable color management for both illustrator and photoshop, and both settings should be the same. The best policy is to keep it all as simple and consistent as possible, so that the printer won't have to guess whether your color spaces are calibrated specifically for your monitor or not, etc etc...

My setup is ColorSync Generic across the board � ColorSync RGB for the RGB space and ColorSync CMYK for the CMYK space. My conversion engine is also set to Apple ColorSync.. it doesn't have to be, but whatever you choose, make sure that is consistent across all of you apps.

Also, make sure you put time in to calibrate you display. Doing it by eye is not precise, but it is much better than not calibrating at all. Make 3 or 4 (or 5) display calibration profiles and compare them to see which is more accurate to your eye (and stick to that one). It is best to calibrate your display with a neutral gray background for your desktop, and afterwards you'll be surprised how much better everything looks...

also, I'm willing to bet that Photoshop's interpretation of the colors in your file are the more accurate ones, not illustrator. post your results so we can know how it turns out.

MacDog · Jan 14, 2004, 02:44 AM

Glad we were able to help!

kg109 · Jan 16, 2004, 12:35 AM

And while I'm on the color topic (kinda) - why is it when you convert an RGB image in Photoshop, to CMYK, all BLUE colors get de-saturated like crazy? They turn a pale, unsaturated gray-blue--purple.

I tried to boost saturation back up with "Hue/Saturation" and the "Channel Mixer". It helps...but 'doesn't look as good as the RGB.

Do you always have to convert to CMYK when printing? Or is that a misconception?

Thanks.

designbc · Jan 16, 2004, 11:10 AM

Originally posted by kg109:
And while I'm on the color topic (kinda) - why is it when you convert an RGB image in Photoshop, to CMYK, all BLUE colors get de-saturated like crazy? They turn a pale, unsaturated gray-blue--purple.

I tried to boost saturation back up with "Hue/Saturation" and the "Channel Mixer". It helps...but 'doesn't look as good as the RGB.

Do you always have to convert to CMYK when printing? Or is that a misconception?

Thanks.

You have to convert to CMYK when you are sending to press. The traditional printing method is based in 4 inks (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and blacK). You get the color by adding patterns of those 4 colors.
RGB mode is the way your screen shows color. This mode has "more visible colors", or, better expressed, more gamut.
In Photoshop, under the View Menu, you'll find Gamut Warning. If you activate it with an RGB, image, it will show you (in grey) the colors that will be out of gamut when converted to CMYK.
That's why I always have my Pantone Process Color book at hand.

himself · Jan 20, 2004, 06:56 AM

Colors will always shift a bit (or a lot) when converting from RGB to CMYK or vice versa. It's the nature of the beast... CMYK has a smaller range (gamut) of colors than RGB, so some of the colors from the RGB space will be lost when converting to CMYK.

One way to manage this is with (once again) the color management settings you use in your applications. Whichever one you use (Adobe ACE, ColorSync, etc) it should be the same in all of your applications. Also, the Rendering Intent has to be set for the proper result... the setting that tends to work best is Relative Colorimetric. It won't alway provide the perfect result, but it's about as good as you're gonna get, without expensive, secondary software.

godzookie2k · Jan 20, 2004, 05:58 PM

i have nothing to contribute that hasn't been covered, but all I wanted to say was: wow thats alot of brushed metal.