HELP: colour of linked graphics always changes!

[Rumpelstilzchen]

I have almost hundred advertisings from the same client. The footer of these advertisings always is identically. In the footer, the logo, the postal address and some more infos are included. All these elements are blue (100% Cyan, 100 % Magenta).

Therefore, I made a separate publisher document named "footer.aftemplate". I want to place this document in every advertising at the bottom. These advertising-documents have different ICC colour profiles.

Unfortunately, if I place my footer into these advertising-documents, my blue colour changes. It's ultimatively important, that the colour values don’t change! It always must remain 100% Cyan and 100 % Magenta!

I tried to achieve it by choosing 'Document Setup' > 'Colour' > 'Assign'. But annoyingly, it always changes back to 'Convert'.

If I place the footer, there is no adjustment option to whether the colour values stay (Assign) or change to the document’s ICC profile (Convert).

I also don't have an option to delete the ICC profile of the footer document itself, so that a change of colours can't be realized.

To place the footer instead of embedding it, would save me tones of working hours! But as long as the colour values of the footer changes, I'm not able to use the placement function of Publisher. This makes me very frustrated.

Can you help me, please?

[stokerg]

Hi @Rumpelstilzchen,

Where are you seeing the change in colour, in app when you place the template or is it when exported to PDF?  Ideally you want the colour profiles to match, eg your template file uses the same as your main document.  Also please keep in mind, when converting from RGB to CMYK (or CMYK to RGB) there isn't always a like for like colour, which will results in a colour change.  Shame with ICC profiles, not all have the same spectrum of colours, so again, can cause a colour change. 

Is there a reason why all of the documents have a different colour profile?

 

On 2/10/2022 at 10:19 AM, Rumpelstilzchen said:

I tried to achieve it by choosing 'Document Setup' > 'Colour' > 'Assign'. But annoyingly, it always changes back to 'Convert'.

 

No its not changing back.  @walt.farrellreplied with the correct explanation on your thread here about how this works.

[Rumpelstilzchen]

Hi Stokerg

Thank you for your answer.

As soon as the footer is placed, the colour value isn't 100 % Cyan, 100 % Magenta anymore. Only if I embed the footer, I'm able to change the colour back to 100%C 100%M.

The original footer file is a publisher document in CMYK.

The advertisements are printed in very varying publications like news papers, glossy magazines and so on. Hence the different profiles.

There must be a way to place vector graphics without changing their colour values. I simply cannot find the way. I'm very desperate. I hope, you can help me.

[thomaso]

5 hours ago, Rumpelstilzchen said:

There must be a way to place vector graphics without changing their colour values. I simply cannot find the way. I'm very desperate. I hope, you can help me.

This has been confusing and was discussed quite a few times since years. – In short: Affinity does not offer yet the option to preserve colour values / swatch definitions independent of a profile conversion of e.g. images.

This usually gets particularly nasty for corporate design Affinity objects based on swatches. These should be able to retain certain values regardless of any influence in pre-press. Simply put, a logo in pure cyan, 100 | 0 | 0 | 0 %, must be able to remain 100 cyan – even if printed aside an image of the sky.

 

[NotMyFault]

For documents having only one specific color, a workaround could be to add an recolor adjustment, applied in the final document to the linked / embedded image.

 

[thomaso]

3 hours ago, NotMyFault said:

For documents having only one specific color, a workaround could be to add an recolor adjustment, applied in the final document to the linked / embedded image.

The OP want the applied colour value 100 / 100 / 0 / 0 in certain layout objects to be retained. – How would you setup a Recolour adjustment (HSL sliders) to achieve a specific colour value? Also a Selective Colour adjustment (CMYK sliders) would not allow to set a specific value.

And what advantage would an adjustment have over directly adjusting the colour definition of the object itself, e.g. as global swatch?

[Wosven]

And an adjustment would rasterize the content, not really what we want for text.

 

The not optimal but "best" way to do this would be, and if you only use PDF 1.4 to 1.7:

• to use an application palette in the footer document,
• and export this footer as PDF.
• to import the PDF in other documents,
• And use "assign" when needing a different profile in a document in which the PDF is placed.

 

But it would be better if the apps were working differently with colour values and profiles.

[NotMyFault]

4 hours ago, thomaso said:

The OP want the applied colour value 100 / 100 / 0 / 0 in certain layout objects to be retained. – How would you setup a Recolour adjustment (HSL sliders) to achieve a specific colour value? Also a Selective Colour adjustment (CMYK sliders) would not allow to set a specific value.

And what advantage would an adjustment have over directly adjusting the colour definition of the object itself, e.g. as global swatch?

I was thinking about a potential workaround within specific constraints , not a permanent fix for the general issue. A fix by Affinity would be strictly preferred- if available, which is very unlikely to happen anytime soon. 

On iPad, the adjustment allows to enter numeric input. Using channel mixer, you can set specific numeric input even for CMYK, for Desktop and iPad.

 

again, all this only as workaround, it can never compete with getting a real fix.

[thomaso]

11 minutes ago, NotMyFault said:

On iPad, the adjustment allows to enter numeric input.

Different than on mac/pc? Does it allow to set e.g. 100 / 100 / 0 / 0 as wanted by the OP?

I was aware you mentioned this as workaround only … I just don't understand how this can be used to result in a certain cmyk value 😏 , and how/if this workflow would have an advantage over applying a colour swatch instead.

[R C-R]

56 minutes ago, thomaso said:

Does it allow to set e.g. 100 / 100 / 0 / 0 as wanted by the OP?

If it does, I can not find any way to do that. For me, like with the desktop version, it allows setting H, S, & L values by percent but that has nothing to do with setting CMYK values that I can see.

[NotMyFault]

I revise my recommendation:

Only a channel adjustment allows to specify any cmyk color. A HSL allows to specify a HSL color, which can be converted to CMYK, but this is unnecessary complication.

1 hour ago, thomaso said:

, and how/if this workflow would have an advantage over applying a colour swatch instead.

I can’t see a way do to that - how do you apply a swatch to an imported placed document, preserving the different shades?

[thomaso]

46 minutes ago, NotMyFault said:

how do you apply a swatch to an imported placed document, preserving the different shades?

I understood this OP's info as objects which got a certain fill / stroke colour assigned (either via swatch or not & with no shades/tints/tones):

On 2/10/2022 at 11:19 AM, Rumpelstilzchen said:

The footer of these advertisings always is identically. In the footer, the logo, the postal address and some more infos are included. All these elements are blue (100% Cyan, 100 % Magenta).

[NotMyFault]

47 minutes ago, thomaso said:

I understood this OP's info as objects which got a certain fill / stroke colour assigned (either via swatch or not & with no shades/tints/tones):

agree.

And I understood that the color changed once he place this into another file:

On 2/10/2022 at 11:19 AM, Rumpelstilzchen said:

Unfortunately, if I place my footer into these advertising-documents, my blue colour changes. It's ultimatively important, that the colour values don’t change! It always must remain 100% Cyan and 100 % Magenta!

So my workaround is intended to re-assign the 100/ 100 / 0 / 0 CMYK color which was lost during the process.

[Old Bruce]

On 2/10/2022 at 2:19 AM, Rumpelstilzchen said:

Therefore, I made a separate publisher document named "footer.aftemplate". I want to place this document in every advertising at the bottom. These advertising-documents have different ICC colour profiles.

I must be missing something obvious but I have to ask; Why are we all surprised that different profiles show different colours?

Myself I would make a swatch with the colour, put it in a Document Palette and then export that palette. Import that palette and use it's colour to colour the Asset that is the footer. An Asset not a template document.

On 2/10/2022 at 2:19 AM, Rumpelstilzchen said:

The footer of these advertisings always is identically.

 

[Wosven]

With an linked document, you can modify it annualy or punctually, it's like for logo: each time you open a document with this file imported, and it has been modified, you just need to update the link.

You can have hundred of files using this linked file.

Or you can have hundred of ads linked to a server with all the logos organized. A company have a new logo? Just modify the logo on the server, and check, if it's used in a file, that it's updated and get enough space on the document.

 

If we had a way to have "colour profile blind" documents, keeping the exact values set for CMYK or Pantone or other predefined colours swatches, we could import those documents in other ones and export depending of the needed spec. And the convertion would only occur when exporting to PDF, like other apps do.

For example, we use different types of paper for cover or inside paper in magazines, books or newspaper. Each time, I need to export or ask people to send me correctly exported ads with the appropriate profile. If I try to convert an already converted file, it'll be a mess, and the colours will be wrong. That's why it's important to begin with files with correct colours.