Publishing to Lulu.com: 'Document colour profile not suitable for PDF/X'???

[benged123]

Trying to prep a book with a lot of black and white photo for Lulu.com. It seems I should be setting the colour space to Grayscale 16 and either Generic Gray Gamma 2.2, or Generic Gray profile, or Grayscale D50. All three give me: 'Document colour profile not suitable for PDF/X' when I do a Preflight.

I'm trying to get the Lulu.com print-ready PDF to look exactly like the one I'm sending them.

I believe I did an earlier version of this book, a test run, six months ago, which was set at CMYK, and got a decent replication of the photos. But Lulu is telling me 'Grayscale' will be better.

Any suggestions?

 

Ben

 

 

[benged123]

NOTE: If I just ignore the prefilght warnig and export ... my choice is a PDF. I don't think I've ever seen the PDF/X as an export. Is this some kind of protocol thing I'm missing? Or does Affinity Publishing automatically export a PDF/X (but calls it a PDF)?

[Oufti]

2 hours ago, benged123 said:

I don't think I've ever seen the PDF/X as an export. Is this some kind of protocol thing I'm missing? Or does Affinity Publishing automatically export a PDF/X (but calls it a PDF)?

PDF/X are PDF, with specifications adapted for graphical exchange. It is used by some Affinity export presets. 

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDF/X 

[benged123]

Oufti,

Aie yie yie. Parsing that down ... 

Do I just ignore the warning?:  'Document colour profile not suitable for PDF/X'

Lulu is asking for Grayscale, to get the best black & whites. If I go against that advice and use CMYK or RGB then I don't have that issue. What would you recommend?

And if I have to choose between CMYK or RGB, which would be better for a book with all black and white photos? I'm using the heaviest weight and best printing paper in the book.

Actually, I'm also going to test run the lighter weight more standard paper too. And would CMYK or RGB (or overriding the warning to have Grayscale be the best choice then?

All ears ...

[Oufti]

@benged123 Well, I don't see that PDF/X would be mandatory for Lulu (but I've no experience with them). Why do you want/need to use this standard?

Having read this:

When Should I Use Grayscale?

Most text-based projects, such as novels and memoirs, don’t have any colors in the interior file. Even if there are graphic elements, if the final intent is to print in Black and White, then you may benefit from working in or converting to the Grayscale color space. This can produce a more consistent and predictable print across our network, as CMYK and sRGB still carry color information. When a black and white file is printed in a different color profile, it can cause an unpredictable color cast in some instances. Working in the Grayscale space reduces this chance and makes the final print more predictable as you develop it.

https://help.lulu.com/en/support/solutions/articles/64000280479-color-differences

The gamma of grayscale images should be between 2.2 and 2.4.
https://help.lulu.com/en/support/solutions/articles/64000255519-pdf-creation-settings

If it was for me, I would try settings like this (but according to your 1st message, it's perhaps what you already did?):

[Oufti]

One more thing…
I overlooked this:

3 hours ago, benged123 said:

It seems I should be setting the colour space to Grayscale 16 and either Generic Gray Gamma 2.2, or Generic Gray profile, or Grayscale D50.

which seems in contradiction with these recommandations:

 

What About Bits/Channel And Other Settings?

If you want to get really technical about it, then you should make sure your file has 8 Bits/Channel in its color profile. This reduces the file size and complexity, which makes it go through our system much more easily. Many designers prefer to use 16 Bits/Channel, but this may cause unnecessarily bloated files to overload the processors at our printer, potentially causing a printing error. The more “lightweight” and “clean” you can make a file before uploading, the more consistent your print will be across our global network.

https://help.lulu.com/en/support/solutions/articles/64000280479-color-differences

 

[Oufti]

26 minutes ago, PROdult said:

“Generic Gray” isn’t a standardised print profile for PDF/X, partly due to its lack of a defined tone response curve. “Gray Gamma 2.2” follows industry standards, ensuring predictable grayscale reproduction. Unfortunately, Affinity does not include this profile, which comes with Adobe’s suite. Generic profiles are for basic grayscale display rather than professional print.

I don't know if "Generic Gray Gamma 2.2" is the same as the above "Gray Gamma 2.2"? I agree it 's a display profile but it has well a tone response curve — and Lulu seems OK with sRGB profiles which are also display profiles.

 

My question is more: why PDF/X?

[benged123]

HI Oufti, I tried your suggestion: PDF 1.7 (Acrobat 8). Here is the puzzle: I've tried about 6 ways and I get the same results back from LuLu.com ... their PRINT READY PDF file. No matter what kind of PDF I export from Affinity ... and upload to the LuLu.com site ... I get back a Print Ready that is darker and muddier. See examples attached. I'm not getting something. All 6 ways I output from Affinity were virtually identical to the eye. And all Lulu.com's print-ready PDF's coming back to me (almost the same megawattage as my original, so no obvious compression going on) the photos are dark. And muddy. By comparison.

Any thoughts on that? I'm holding my breath.

 

 

[Callum]

Hi benged123,

I'm not familiar with lulu.com however I wonder if perhaps the PDF viewer built into their website is causing the PDF to appear darker. If you open the exported PDF back into Affinity or another PDF viewer do the colours match the ones shown on lulu.com or within Affinity?

Thanks
C

[wonderings]

can you upload the picture that printed darker in the same PDF format that it was sent to Lulu as? I am wondering if your one image was CMYK and then converted to grayscale on their end.

CMYK is full colour printing. If you sent as RGB it is going to get converted to CMYK for print. 

Grayscale is going to just print 1 colour black, which can be in shades of grey. 

For printing, it is cheaper printing 1 colour black/grayscale then it would be if the book was full colour. 

[benged123]

 

2 hours ago, Callum said:

I'm not familiar with lulu.com however I wonder if perhaps the PDF viewer built into their website is causing the PDF to appear darker. If you open the exported PDF back into Affinity or another PDF viewer do the colours match the ones shown on lulu.com or within Affinity?

Hi Callum, I've been looking at their PDF, that they sent back to me, and comparing it with my original -- both in Affinity and in Apple Preview. They are decidedly different as you can see in my attached file above. The side by side is a screenshot of the two versions, mine on the left, theirs on the right.

My brother suggested that maybe the 'preview' they are sending back to me has been doctored by an algorithm to show me how the images will look once printed. I'm going to see if I can connect with an actual human being at Lulu to possibly explain their darker version. I'll post here if I get luck with an answer.

[benged123]

2 hours ago, wonderings said:

can you upload the picture that printed darker in the same PDF format that it was sent to Lulu as? I am wondering if your one image was CMYK and then converted to grayscale on their end.

CMYK is full colour printing. If you sent as RGB it is going to get converted to CMYK for print. 

Grayscale is going to just print 1 colour black, which can be in shades of grey. 

For printing, it is cheaper printing 1 colour black/grayscale then it would be if the book was full colour. 

Hi Wonderings, that sounds intriguing. My version I did in most of the possible export formats of Affinity -- and each yielded the same response from Lulu (darker image). I'm not sure how to upload their actual version here (50 MB), coz it's an entire book. And the moment I pull an example page out of the document it becomes a differently formatted version (even if still a PDF). The example I give above is a screenshot of both my version (left) and their version (right) loaded into two instances of Preview and placed side by side.

I'm going to do my Monday morning espresso and see if I can find a way to talk to a human being over there at Lulu. Will report back ...

 

[wonderings]

6 minutes ago, benged123 said:

Hi Wonderings, that sounds intriguing. My version I did in most of the possible export formats of Affinity -- and each yielded the same response from Lulu (darker image). I'm not sure how to upload their actual version here (50 MB), coz it's an entire book. And the moment I pull an example page out of the document it becomes a differently formatted version (even if still a PDF). The example I give above is a screenshot of both my version (left) and their version (right) loaded into two instances of Preview and placed side by side.

I'm going to do my Monday morning espresso and see if I can find a way to talk to a human being over there at Lulu. Will report back ...

 

you could just export the page that has the picture. Under export there is an option to select the page, instead of the whole thing. 

[benged123]

Yes, but am I not then creating a new PDF in the export? It will no longer be the exact same PDF I got from Lulu. But let me do it anyhow ... see attached.My original - grayscale.pdfFrom Lulu.pdf

[wonderings]

27 minutes ago, benged123 said:

Yes, but am I not then creating a new PDF in the export? It will no longer be the exact same PDF I got from Lulu. But let me do it anyhow ... see attached.My original - grayscale.pdfFrom Lulu.pdf

Your file and the file from Lulu is CMYK. While it looks to be grayscale it is made up with all the colours in CMYK. I converted it to be a true grayscale, so only using black ink in the file I have attached. Not sure what Lulu is doing with their printing, if this was me and you came in for printing I would be converting to be 1 colour black aka grayscale. This is cheaper to print for me and you. 

If might be worth while connecting with a local print shop for pricing, this will allow you to work with the shop to get a print you are happy with as well as supporting a local business.

 

 My original - true grayscale.pdf

[benged123]

I will study this Wonderings, thank you. I sent a note to Lulu support, we'll see if they have an explanation.

I did try a local print shop (Montreal), several in fact; but they all wanted a print-run, didn't do one-offs, which I need at this point. I did do a version of this book with Lulu and it was fairly decent. I'm just trying to see if I can tweak it better (plus fixed all the typos etc.).

I will study your suggestions ... when I get back from a meeting I'm late for ....

More shortly ...

 

 

[lacerto]

You would need a press-based grayscale profile (e.g. Dot Gain profiles that come with Adobe apps, or some Generic Grayscale profile) to be able to export to PDF/X. PDF/X-1a is a CMYK profile, but PDF/X-3 and PDF/X-4 allow other color spaces, as well, though I suppose they will convert Gray-16 to Gray-8. PDF/X-3 has the benefit of automatically flattening transparencies (even if this happens in Affinity apps always by rasterization), which may be useful, since services like Lulu typically require transparency flattened PDFs.

You could also use e.g. PDF 1.7 (the most compatible PDF version that Affinity apps support), and Greyscale D50 profile (that comes with Affinity apps), to force a grayscale PDF, but then you should also have the grayscale photos processed with that profile (to avoid dark grayscale PDF output, and export time color changes). Other than PDF/X-1a and PDF/X-3 would also leave transparencies unflattened, so if the printer requires flattened transparencies, you should do this manually. On the other hand, exporting to non-PDF/X mode allows you to produce DeviceGray output, which may be useful, if the printer does not accept ICC-based PDFs. 

Whenever using a grayscale document color mode, remember to specify your black components using the grayscale definition G0. K100 would be converted to dark gray within Affinity apps whenever creating grayscale PDFs. Attached are two Affinity produced grayscale files that would probably be good candidates to be accepted at Lulu.

pdfx3_transparency_flattened_ICC-based_fullystandardcompliant.pdf

pdf17_greyscale50_devicegray.pdf

UPDATE: For clarification: when using PDF/X-3 or PDF/X-4, you need a press-based grayscale profile, something like this:

Greyscale D50 would not be listed (and therefore you might get a Preflight warning that the currently used D50 profile is incompatible with PDF/X). But as mentioned, you can use Greyscale D50 if exporting with non PDF/X-based presets. To get a DeviceGray output, remember to leave "Embed ICC profiles" unchecked. 

 

[benged123]

Wow. Lacerto, this is going to take a bit of learning-curve absorption on my part. Most fascinating. I'm going to spend the rest of the afternoon today, seeing if I can follow your instructions. And will post if I end up not quite able to understand.

I moved away from Adobe when they started subscriptions. And confess I was never very comfortable with their manuals in general. I used Photoshop and Premiere Pro et al for years ... and probably spent years studying the manuals.

2 hours ago, lacerto said:

You could also use e.g. PDF 1.7 (the most compatible PDF version that Affinity apps support), and Greyscale D50 profile (that comes with Affinity apps), to force a grayscale PDF, but then you should also have the grayscale photos processed with that profile (to avoid dark grayscale PDF output, and export time color changes).

So I'm getting the first half of the above quote. But not the second half: 'but then you should also have the grayscale photos processed with that profile .. etc.' The '(to avoid dark grayscale PDF output ...' sounds like what may be happening (at least in the sense that the print-ready is 2 stops darker than the original).

For this particular book all the photos came as .PNG's. So I would be working with .PNG's. What format would I need to convert them to? (Though that may be the issue: I've got Affinity Photo/Designer/Publisher, Apple Photos, Apple Preview, PDF Expert, Quicktime, Pixelmator Pro, etc. This is if I could find the courage to replace the scores of photos now in the book. I'd do a test first, to see if this made any difference with Lulu's print-ready version.

I'm seriously out-of-my-depth here ...

B

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[lacerto]

59 minutes ago, benged123 said:

For this particular book all the photos came as .PNG's. So I would be working with .PNG's. What format would I need to convert them to?

Having PNGs is fine. When you place them (even color images) in a grayscale Publisher document, Affinity handles them as composite grays. If you use Greyscale D50 document color profile, then you would use the following settings to produce DeviceGray output, and force converting the RGB-based PNGs to grayscale (notice the difference in handling; if your document were in CMYK color mode, or if you exported to CMYK PDF, your RGB based gray PNGs would be converted to four-color black, and this is something you do not want):

I would process the PNGs so that they look good in sRGB color space, but I'd imagine you have that, already? 

UPDATE: Here is an example of how an sRGB handled gray PNG would look when placed in Greyscale D50 document and exported to Grayscale, forcing image color spaces converted:

pdf17_greyscale50_devicegray_with_compositegrays.pdf

[benged123]

Terrific. Thank you lacerto. I will try it this afternoon and post back the results from LuLu. Ha. This looks like something I can actually do.

More shortly ...

 

 

 

[benged123]

Help!!

I did as you suggested. And I get this for my pre-flight:

 

 

I went ahead anyhow. But now this is what I'm getting when I try to upload to Lulu.

This is with the original file (the only thing I've changed is the colour/gray space) that I used successfully numerous times (but getting the darker 'print-ready' version back from Lulu. Now it won't even upload.

So I created a NEW Project, and copied over all the pages (Document > Add Pages From File) in case there was some kind of corruption.

But I got the same result. Maybe I need to post this NEW Page Layout problem in a separate post? My pre-flight says absolutely nothing about any page size or orientation discrepancies. Is there somewhere in Affinity Publisher where I can check if there is some kind of page size/orientation issue?

At a loss ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

[lacerto]

I am sorry to hear that the problems continue.

I do not know what Lulu requirements are exactly, but this sounds as if they specifically required PDF/X compliant file, so my suggestion for using PDF1.7 to produce a DeviceGray document using Greyscale D50 profile would not be accepted. To produce a genuine PDF/X compliant grayscale document you would need a press-based grayscale profile, since otherwise Affinity apps would use the factory default U.S. Web Coated v2 as a fallback profile, and that would produce four color CMYK for grayscale content.

DotGain and Generic Gray profiles that are common in the industry are something that come with Adobe apps and apps like QuarkXPress, and I am not sure if it is ok to share them, but you can go to

https://www.colormanagement.org/en/isoprofile2009.html

...and download ISOcoated_v2_grey1c_bas.ICC for the purpose. It should work well for basic greyscale jobs for coated stock.

The following file has been produced with this profile as PDF/X-3, and it can use RGB composite PNGs and Greyscale D50 and have grayscale color intent by embedding image ICCs:

pdfx3_compliant.pdf

Could you try if this file is passed at Lulu, and if it produces acceptable gray levels?

If this does not work, the only solution would be producing a PDF/X-1a:2003 document and converting the document to CMYK color mode using the recommended ICC profile (Affinity apps come with U.S. Web Coated v2 for coated stock and U.S. Web Uncoated v2 for uncoated stock), convert all RGB PNGs as genuine grayscale files (they can be D50, but you could also use the above mentioned ISO grey profile), and then specify all text and pure black objects from G0 to C0Y0M0K100. While this may sound an overwhelming task, it can actually be performed pretty fast (also within Affinity apps) once you know the procedures. E.g. using Select Same Fill Color, and/or Select Frame Text and Select Artistic Text operations you could change grayscale based color definitions to K-based, in a few steps. Images would be DeviceGray in this case.

This would be the kind of file described above:

PDFX1-compliant_konly.pdf

But I do not think that you need to go this far (to produce PDF/X-1a file).

E.g. at https://help.lulu.com/en/support/solutions/articles/64000255582-image-formatting-the-basics it is specifically mentioned that for black and white books grayscale is required, and for "color books", sRGB, instead of CMYK. Also, word processing apps like Word (to which they constantly refer to) produce text and grayscale images typically as DeviceGray, and based on this, requirement specifically for CMYK color space sounds odd. Standard grayscale images with press-based profiles will also be output as DeviceGray when exported to PDF/X-1a:2003 (even if K100 text will be DeviceCMYK and C0M0Y0K100), so definite requirement for CMYK only does not sound plausible.

Other than that, their general instructions mention about transparencies needed to be flattened (which PDF/X-1a and PDF/X-3 both do automatically).

More specifically, they mention the following:

Quote

File Standards

To ensure your PDFs meet our distribution requirements, we recommend creating a PDF from your own word processing or page layout software. The following standards should be maintained when creating your PDF:

• Ensure that all fonts are properly embedded in your PDFs.
• All layers must be flattened and all vector images must be rasterized.
• Your PDF should be a single-page layout.
• Do NOT include trim or bleed marks in your PDF
• Recommended file size less than 500 MB.

The requirement for "vector images" needing to be rasterized is odd, but if you do have vector images placed, rasterize them in-place within Publisher if your document color space is grayscale. 

The note on page orientation and size might refer to your PDF output be created spread-wise, so be sure that when you export, you export "All pages" (not "All spreads", which is the default for Facing Pages PDF output in Publisher).

Anyway, if the PDF/X-3 based file above is not accepted, then try the provided PDFX1-based.

I would try to contact someone on Lulu and ask them what specifically they need.

[lacerto]

NOTE: Having re-read the message, the Lulu specific note was not about color space but for page sizes, so please ensure first that your PDF was actually exported as "All pages", and NOT as "All spreads".

Did you create a PDF 1.7-based export with Grayscale and Color Profile set to GreyscaleD50, as I mentioned in my last but previous post? If you did, and you did not get other warnings from Lulu, it is a good chance that you can use that file, once produced page-wise. The only concern when creating non-PDF/X-1 and non-PDF/X-3 based outputs is that your document contains transparencies (less than 100% opacity, or blend modes), as these would most probably not accepted by Lulu. If it is so, you either need to flatten your transparencies manually, or use PDF/X-1 or PDF/X-3, or produce all-rasterized output (no-one wants that). Affinity apps do not support PDF v1.3, which would also automatically flatten transparencies.

[benged123]

Lacerto!!

You are truly amazing. I'm copying and printing out your notes and saving them. And will certainly be referring to them in the near future. But!! 

On 2/10/2025 at 3:04 PM, lacerto said:

Having PNGs is fine. When you place them (even color images) in a grayscale Publisher document, Affinity handles them as composite grays. If you use Greyscale D50 document color profile, then you would use the following settings to produce DeviceGray output, and force converting the RGB-based PNGs to grayscale (notice the difference in handling; if your document were in CMYK color mode, or if you exported to CMYK PDF, your RGB based gray PNGs would be converted to four-color black, and this is something you do not want):

This worked!!! I got a print-ready that looks exactly like my original.

In the 'Document Setup' I also set the 'Colour' to Colour Format = Grey/16, and the Colour Profile = Grayscale D50.

And your other suggestion, bang on: I had inadvertently (actually it was the default, that's why I didn't notice it) had Affinity exporting the document as 'All Spreads'. Whew! One single setting change, and the document went through seamlessly.

So YOU have solved my days-long issues. I'm sooo pumped. I have a bunch of books I want to publish this year, and have been totally daunted by the interfacing with the POD online services. I think you've gotten me over that particularly daunting hurdle. And for that I will be eternally grateful. Thank you times-a-gazillion, Lacerto. You are truly an ACE!

PS, If you are now, or ever get, into filmmaking, and have any questions (in any of the departments) ... in that world I actually know some stuff, which I'd be most happy to share any time.

Ha ha ha. I'm just finishing the next book, which is all-colour – photos pulled from a recent film. I have a sneaking suspicion I'll be back here soon asking more questions.

All the best, Ben

 

 

 

[PaulEC]

39 minutes ago, benged123 said:

I had inadvertently (actually it was the default, that's why I didn't notice it) had Affinity exporting the document as 'All Spreads'.

This has been happening to many people ever since APub was first launched, but Serif refuse to simply make this a "sticky" setting, so that once the user sets it, it stays as they want it. Apparently the developers think that it's better to have to remember to change this setting every time you export the document!