Colors appear different between original file and final PDF

[nykaroc]

Hi everyone! This is my first time using Publisher after needing a replacement for InDesign. This entire thing might be a little long especially since everything is so new to me, so I'll try my best to condense it!

So far everything does what I've needed it to do, but when I export my file for printing, the colors are drastically different. I've viewed each file both on the HP laptop I am using as well as my iPad and the color differences show on both so it's not a monitor/computer issue. I'm not sure if there are settings I need to change or what. I've tried using a CMYK and multiple RGB color outputs and both give me completely different looks (CMYK makes everything blue and the RGB profiles made everything EXTREMELY dark.) I'll also be including specifics below in case more information is needed, as well as a photo comparison of all of the files. 

For starters, the project I'm working on is a comic so while the inside is in greyscale and I hopefully shouldn't have this same issue with it--though the blue tint effect worries me--the cover of the comic is in full color. When printing directly from my iPad for my initial tests, everything printed great, so I know it's not an issue with the specific colors I chose since, y'know... my printer could handle it fine. I'm printing everything as a booklet, at a half-letter size for the pages so I can stack two of the comics on top of each other (individual pages of the comic measure 4.25x5.5" so 2 spreads fit well on top of each other.

As of now, I do not have the inside pages in the document as the main concern for the set up was ensuring the cover was going to print well. I know the layout for the booklet printing is going to have me do a funking way of placing my interior pages, but once again, it isn't my current concern.

I've changed initial color profiles, final color profiles, swapped the render to perpetual, relative and absolute colormetric, used both linked and embedded files, and probably a lot more with the amount of times I've clicked, changed, and swapped settings around.

Hopefully everything attaches in the order I placed them, but it will be the original, the CMYK export, and then one of the RGB exports. Each of the RGB look the same with minimal if any differences between the three that I tried so I'm just going to place one. The pdfs are also... extremely blurry by comparison. All of these colors match just about perfectly with my iPad screen with very minimal differences.

 Original

 CMYK

 RGB

Please let me know what I can do to get the print-ready pdf to match the original! Thank you!!

 

 

[Dan C]

Hi @nykaroc,

Welcome to the Affinity Forums

We're going to need to see a copy of your .afpub file and the export settings used to generate your PDF to further investigate this issue.

Can you please attach a copy of your file here, alongside screenshots of these export settings (including the 'More...' dialog)?

If you'd like a private upload link for this file - please let me know.

Many thanks in advance!

[nykaroc]

7 hours ago, Dan C said:

Hi @nykaroc,

Welcome to the Affinity Forums

We're going to need to see a copy of your .afpub file and the export settings used to generate your PDF to further investigate this issue.

Can you please attach a copy of your file here, alongside screenshots of these export settings (including the 'More...' dialog)?

If you'd like a private upload link for this file - please let me know.

Many thanks in advance!

Thanks for getting back so quickly!

Here's a screenshot of the print settings I was working with:

The only settings I changed from the default that show up are the layout to format it as a booklet and some settings in Color Management!
I changed Rendering Intent from perceptual to both relative and absolute colorimetric based on recommendations given on other forum posts, I changed color handling between being performed by my printer with the same results, and I also changed the printer profile from the default to the same sRGB but linear, as well as to the CYMK SWOP profile. 

When I tried to export it under the Export option, although the colors stay right, the booklet doesn't get optimized for printing regardless of using the for print vs press-ready presets. Instead of the first and last page (which make up my cover) being side by side, it would have them printed off on two separate sheets of paper. 

I also attached the file as well!

Thanks again for the help!! I'm sure it's a pretty obvious answer but having done everything a specific way when working with InDesign, it's all a bit confusing at the initial jump

attempt at this stuff.afpub

[Dan C]

Thanks for providing that for me and my apologies for the delayed response here!

I can see your document is set to CMYK, however you are 'printing' to an RGB format, which will introduce colour conversion.

Equally, the image you have placed in your file is apparently CMYK, using an sRGB profile, which isn't something I've seen before:

Again, when exporting to RGB the image/colours will be converted. Do you know the actual colour space/profile in use for this linked image?

I'd certainly recommend using the Export options for this, as when printing in this manner the Microsoft PDF driver will be used in conjunction with Affinity, and this Microsoft Print driver has not been designed to handle said conversion well.

Can you please expand on the issue you have with layout when exporting? As I believe it will be easier to get the export working correctly for you, over this print to PDF driver.

Many thanks once again!