Pivot Kristen
New member
Hello All,
Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere and better! I did a search of the forums and didn't find my exact question. I'm preparing a PDF best practices document for the designers in my department, and I want to make sure that I'm giving them the best recommendation regarding color management. I am based in the USA.
For most projects we send final print files to the client. They then either print the document in house, or send it to their preferred vendor. In most cases, we do not have access to who the printer is.
In terms of color management, I am most curious about how to make a recommendation for Output in the Save as PDF window. It is my understanding that many printers can do a better job of converting RGB images to CMYK than the standard US SWOP coated profile, so I think we could get good results from choosing [No Color Conversion] when exporting from Illustrator or InDesign to PDF. However, given that we really don't know who or where the files are being printed, I'm not sure that's the best policy.
So I'm wondering if it would be better to keep the [Convert to Destination] and leave things US SWOP Coated because of that uncertainty. Another option would be to use GRAcOL for coated paper, FOGRA for uncoated, and US Newsprint for newspapers for better results, assuming we know the type of paper they are printing on.
Does anyone have any advice for me? We've been sending things out with [Convert to Destination (Preserve Numbers)] and haven't gotten any complaints from the clients, but if there is a better output that will give better color, I'd like to use it.
Thanks,
Kristen
Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere and better! I did a search of the forums and didn't find my exact question. I'm preparing a PDF best practices document for the designers in my department, and I want to make sure that I'm giving them the best recommendation regarding color management. I am based in the USA.
For most projects we send final print files to the client. They then either print the document in house, or send it to their preferred vendor. In most cases, we do not have access to who the printer is.
In terms of color management, I am most curious about how to make a recommendation for Output in the Save as PDF window. It is my understanding that many printers can do a better job of converting RGB images to CMYK than the standard US SWOP coated profile, so I think we could get good results from choosing [No Color Conversion] when exporting from Illustrator or InDesign to PDF. However, given that we really don't know who or where the files are being printed, I'm not sure that's the best policy.
So I'm wondering if it would be better to keep the [Convert to Destination] and leave things US SWOP Coated because of that uncertainty. Another option would be to use GRAcOL for coated paper, FOGRA for uncoated, and US Newsprint for newspapers for better results, assuming we know the type of paper they are printing on.
Does anyone have any advice for me? We've been sending things out with [Convert to Destination (Preserve Numbers)] and haven't gotten any complaints from the clients, but if there is a better output that will give better color, I'd like to use it.
Thanks,
Kristen
