CMYK Values & Colour Profiles

[gingerbread]

Getting a bit confused with colour profiles! If I have a colour I'd like to use and the Pantone CMYK guide gives the CMYK values for it. If I start a document with the correct profile that my commercial printer uses, is it just a case of plugging in the CMYK values and the colour should come through correctly? If I were to then start a different document with a different profile and I plug the same values in, will the colour still print the same? Just a bit confused because if I plug CMYK values in and change the profile, it obviously changes the CMYK values to appear the same? Not sure if I'm making any sense!

[walt.farrell]

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums, @gingerbread.

2 hours ago, gingerbread said:

Just a bit confused because if I plug CMYK values in and change the profile, it obviously changes the CMYK values to appear the same?

If you start with one color profile, and then use Document Setup to change the profile, you have two choices: Assign or Convert.

Assign will change the name of the applied profile, but keep all the current color values as they are. This will usually result in the appearance changing.

Convert will change the name of the applied profile, and adjust all the current color values to new values, trying to keep the appearance the same. It sounds like that's what you're using in that scenario.

2 hours ago, gingerbread said:

If I have a colour I'd like to use and the Pantone CMYK guide gives the CMYK values for it. If I start a document with the correct profile that my commercial printer uses, is it just a case of plugging in the CMYK values and the colour should come through correctly?

I don't think that would work, because (if I understand things correctly) Pantone colors are specially recognized and printed with standard inks, but if you simply assign CMYK values that match, they still are not Pantone colors, and would not be handled the same way. (However, I'm not an expert in commercial printing, and could well be wrong in my understanding.)

[Old Bruce]

1 minute ago, walt.farrell said:

I don't think that would work, because (if I understand things correctly) Pantone colors are specially recognized and printed with standard inks, ...

Some Pantone colours are made with actual Pantone Ink of that colour. They are spot colours.

[walt.farrell]

11 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

Some Pantone colours are made with actual Pantone Ink of that colour. They are spot colours.

Thanks. Would those work if the user provided the CMYK values and added the colors to a document palette as spot colors? Or would they also need to have the proper name for the printer to recognize that a specific ink was needed?

[thomaso]

1 hour ago, walt.farrell said:

Would those work if the user provided the CMYK values and added the colors to a document palette as spot colors? Or would they also need to have the proper name for the printer to recognize that a specific ink was needed?

To create a spot colour and a spot colour channel on export neither certain layout colour values nor name are required. But to be useful its name can be important while its colour values are used for screen display / preview only and thus are more flexible.

Since spot colours use extra physical inks their colour values set in a layout don't really matter while their correct naming is fundamental. (while a spot colour may have two names, one for the layout document / swatches panel and another for output as ink channel).

Once I experienced an issue with a client's logo file that included a spot colour named "Gold". A printing company (a national newspaper) had set in their RIP a certain, custom CMYK substitute if any spot colour named "Gold" or "gold" would appear in any client's advertisement print PDF which finally lead to a printed result of the 'golden' logo colour that the client did not expect … while all other colours in their add were printed as expected.

[Old Bruce]

2 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Thanks. Would those work if the user provided the CMYK values and added the colors to a document palette as spot colors? Or would they also need to have the proper name for the printer to recognize that a specific ink was needed?

Not all Pantone Colours have separate Pantone Inks. So if you need to use a Pantone Colour that has its own ink and you have a commercial printer with a 5 or more colour press then use the spot colour route.

Or are you wondering if a printer could mix some Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black inks to make a spot colour ink achieve the Pantone Colour? I guess he/she could but they would hate you.

Take a look at adding some Pantone colours to a Document Palette. Use some from these three Pantone Palettes;

They will be spot colours, others from other Pantone Palettes will be process colours.

Most commercial printers dislike/loathe Pantone. Operating capital is tied up in inks which fall out of fashion. 

 

Free advice (which is always worth what you paid for it): Whenever possible do not use Pantone Colours (or any other proprietary library for that matter).