7-Color Process

[prepressdork]

I thought this was interesting. Now I just need a 7-color press

[FONT=Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial]http://www.pantone.com/press-release...color-printing[/FONT]

pd

 

[chevalier]

This should have been pushed from an industry association angle! Pantone's interest is in selling books and not standardization!


EXTENDED GAMUT CoatedFrequently Asked Questions (PDF)
They're recommending:
Traditional halftone screens\angles
Density based color.

Just read what's a "specification" and "feature" of this system:

Seven-color process uses industry standard CMYK-OGV inks

is a "specification"

Most commonly used, 100 lb. text-weight paper stock

is a "feature"

As a production prepress person who has to deal with this crap after it's marketed to graphic designers and brand managers but not standardized for production methodology using 21st century methodologies it makes me want to pull my f#$&ing hair out.

 

[prepressdork]

Didn't mean to ruffle your feathers Chevalier

 

[chevalier]

It is progress. However, it's more of the "comrade we'll tell you what to do and how to like it" sort. Pantone somehow has managed to maintain the mindset Microsoft had 10 years ago. They throw around terms like "specification", "certified", "industry standard" like they own it. I'm guessing the management over there hasn't done marketing surveys in >10 years. Thinking (I'm using that term loosely here) things like 100 lb. text-weight paper stock is the most commonly printed substate for Pantone inks. I don't have the data to prove it but I'd almost guarantee that the case is more likely a label substrate or carton SBS. Not that this matters to begin with though as an CIELAB based substrate white point should be prescribed and maintained! They're still pushing density based color for crying out loud.

 

[dabob]

I'm sitting here just laughing to myself . . . . I can just see a designer jump on this "new" technology and design a "masterpiece" . . . then he goes to a printer and gets a quote . . . after the paramedics shock them back to life he says . . . but - but - but - why is it so much more than the last job I printed . . . .

 

[chevalier]

I'm sitting here just laughing to myself . . . . I can just see a designer jump on this "new" technology and design a "masterpiece" . . . then he goes to a printer and gets a quote . . . after the paramedics shock them back to life he says . . . but - but - but - why is it so much more than the last job I printed . . . .

Over here in packaging land the buyers will love this, the designers will fight it tooth and nail and the QA people will be just be incredibly confused because none of it's based on actual standards beyond what the printer says.

 

[gordo]

I think it's a great coup for Esko - good on them. Of course it's not, IMHO, optimal as a solution but that's a separate issue.

I also think that having Pantone promoting EG will help encourage the adoption of process simulation of spot colors which is a good thing for printers/converters and brand owners.

Sidebar to Chevalier - Solid ink density and target Lab values are not mutually exclusive.

Disclaimer - I was on the development team for Creo/Kodak's Spotless solution.

 

[Stephen Marsh]

I thought this was interesting. Now I just need a 7-color press

[FONT=Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial]http://www.pantone.com/press-release...color-printing[/FONT]

pd

If I understand things correctly, you may not need a 7 colour press, depending on the specific colour or variety of hues in the spot colours being simulated.

However, if the intent is simply for a full spectrum EG process, then you would need a 7 colour press.

Sadly, there is not a lot of good info on this new process, I personally believe that Pantone should apply just as much effort in technical education as in marketing their new product.


Stephen Marsh

 

[Stephen Marsh]

The following is a quote from a Pantone Sales Manager (it appears that they went and asked somebody from a more technical perspective). I also asked what this meant to the flexo segment, as the guide was printed litho and not on flexible substrate etc:

The breakdown is in the guide and I will promise to confirm it applies to Flexo as well. Thanks for the question!

This book is unique in that there is no true Ink formulation. We used ISO mono-pigmented inks for CMYK and OGV inks that align to the recommendations coming out of the flexo industry associations. This is an Expanded Gamut process guide that uses different combinations of screen percentages to create the best possible match to the PANTONE PLUS SERIES FORMULA GUIDE Coated. This in effect removes the need for traditional ink formulation and utilizes the prepress workflow to “separate” the spot color into percentages of CMYKOGV. While this guide was printed offset this product can still be used as a guide for the flexo industry. We feel that this guide provides a great communication tool for the industry to use when helping customers understand how the Expanded Gamut process may affect their design intent, both positive and negative.

Pantone represents the language of color. We respond to market needs. Since the PMS guides are distributed globally, our own clients asked for a gamut that matched PMS color schemes. Formula guides are just that and do not pretend to be science. Our market is being driven now by the design world and the brands, so we vendors just have to respond to the latest market need. By the way, ink companies arent crazy in love with EG, but they know its here to stay, so they just deal with it, as we all do.thanks for writing!

Note, there is no information that I am aware of if there is a multi-channel ICC profile available for proofing, nor if there is any CxF/X-4 data available, nor a good old LUT, nor if this supported via a PantoneLive subscription. I don’t even know if there are L*a*b* target values for the colours. Nor is there any information on how one is supposed to colour separate raster content for this process. It would appear that this process is only intended for manual creation of spot colour builds (not wider gamut photos) in authoring software with no way to soft or hard proof the results.


Stephen Marsh

 

[Stephen Marsh]

I have just updated my Pantone Color Manager software to add the new fan book for EG Coated (when they released this a few weeks ago there was no PCM support).

There are Lab values that one can export out of the PCM software, however the PCM software does not list the screen tint builds, so one still requires the physical fan book for the Pantone recommended values and other info to supposedly make all this work “out of the box”.

This is on the same day that mysteriously all of my old Pantone fan books have lost their PantoneLIVE subscription! And here I thought that I was perpetually licensed for the PCM software by right of activation from my purchased physical fan books.


Stephen Marsh

 

[gordo]

Note, there is no information that I am aware of if there is a multi-channel ICC profile available for proofing, nor if there is any CxF/X-4 data available, nor a good old LUT, nor if this supported via a PantoneLive subscription. I don’t even know if there are L*a*b* target values for the colours. Nor is there any information on how one is supposed to colour separate raster content for this process. It would appear that this process is only intended for manual creation of spot colour builds (not wider gamut photos) in authoring software with no way to soft or hard proof the results.

Some observations...

The printing of the swatchbook is excellent. This pic shows the integrity of dot formation:

Kudos to Disc printing and Sun Chemical.

The halftone screening is actually Euclidean (round/square/inverted round). Pantone says it's "Round dot" however they are using Esko's nomenclature which says the screen is the Round (Fogra) dot.

Pantone could have made this clearer.

For Lab hues comparing Pantone's solids to GRACoL targets the deltaEs are
Cyan is 3.4 (76) 2.55 (2000)
Magenta is 3.29 (76) 1.83 (2000)
Yellow is 2.79 (76) 1.33 (2000)
Black is 4.13 (76) 3.84 (2000)

Paper White is 2.98 (76) 2.80 (2000)

Which is acceptable.

These are the Solid Ink Densities: C 1.30
M 1.40
Y 0.96
K 1.69
O 1.88 (Yellow Filter)
G 1.45 (Cyan Filter)
V 1.68 (Magenta Filter)
I don't understand why the Orange reads higher than the Black.
The SID relationships are correct and reasonable (although C and M are low)

The Black dot gain is 23%
The Orange dot gain is 22%

This suggests to me that the SID for the Orange might be an anomaly of the instrument.

Interestingly - Esko says that EG inks in their Equinox system should be run linear - which does not seem to be the case here. Pantone states that the screen percentages in the Guide are only to provide an indication as to what colors it may be possible to simulate and as a starting point for a printer to use to achieve their desired color noting that the printer will likely need to develop their own custom screen tint builds. Pantone notes that they tweaked the screen builds that Equinox provided in order to achieve a better visual match.

 

[Stephen Marsh]

So it is not an “out of the box” solution, no more than standard CMYK printing to match the Pantone Color Bridge CMYK is “out of the box” for the same tint builds? ;]

I found the following link more helpful than the Pantone link provided earlier in the thread:

http://whattheythink.com/articles/75310-pantone-extended-gamut-coated-guide-ecg-standardization/

it appears that one can softproof using PantoneLIVE ColorBook and Viewer software for Adobe Illustrator.

http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone.aspx?pg=21067


Stephen Marsh

 

[gordo]

So it is not an “out of the box” solution, no more than standard CMYK printing to match the Pantone Color Bridge CMYK is “out of the box” for the same tint builds? ;]

I found the following link more helpful than the Pantone link provided earlier in the thread:

http://whattheythink.com/articles/75...andardization/

[SNIP]

Stephen Marsh

Right, it's actually not a solution.

It's a guide as to what Pantone Plus colors may be simulated by a 7 color process printed under the conditions that their swatchbook was printed under - which is not clear. For example, in the post you linked to there was this question:

"Were the plates curved to make the press work for the EG inks linear? What was the target dot gain for the EG inks that you used?"

The answer by Michele Nicholson was:
" You are correct. We did use a linear method for defining the TVI targets for Orange, Green, and Violet."

But measuring the swatchbook indicates that the EG inks were not run to print linear.

Another issue is the 7 color ink laydown sequence.

In their FAQ and in the swatchbook they do not specifically address this.

The closest thing is when they write: "Print Screen Rotation Angles"

Assuming that they are also referring to ink sequence under that title then the sequence is:

VKCGMOY

Two things are interesting about that:

Having the VOG inks interrupting the KCMY ink sequence means that the press needs to be dedicated to this EG process because switching from VKCGMOY back to KCMY would require a major washup and down time. It also may mean that aligning the VKCGMOY to conventional KCMY will be problematic (due to the difference in ink trapping).

 

[bteifeld]

Regarding expiration of Pantone Color Manager:

http://printplanet.com/forum/prepre...nagement/21503-pantone-colour-manager-expired

 

[Stephen Marsh]

Regarding expiration of Pantone Color Manager:

http://printplanet.com/forum/prepre...nagement/21503-pantone-colour-manager-expired

Thanks, I had forgotten about that topic thread, all sorted!


Stephen Marsh

 

[David Milisock]

It is progress. However, it's more of the "comrade we'll tell you what to do and how to like it" sort. Pantone somehow has managed to maintain the mindset Microsoft had 10 years ago. They throw around terms like "specification", "certified", "industry standard" like they own it. I'm guessing the management over there hasn't done marketing surveys in >10 years. Thinking (I'm using that term loosely here) things like 100 lb. text-weight paper stock is the most commonly printed substate for Pantone inks. I don't have the data to prove it but I'd almost guarantee that the case is more likely a label substrate or carton SBS. Not that this matters to begin with though as an CIELAB based substrate white point should be prescribed and maintained! They're still pushing density based color for crying out loud.

I​ hear you, some cheap as they come stock is most likely a house sheet

 

[chevalier]

I've been absent from pp for awhile. Has anyone encountered this in the wild?

 

[gordo]

I've been absent from pp for awhile. Has anyone encountered this in the wild?

It appears to be more of a marketing ploy than a practical, effective solution since Pantone and Esko (and X-Rite) are owned by the same parent company (Danaher Corporation).
There's at least one extended gamut solution for spot color simulation that is much better (I'll not name it as it's up to them to do their marketing). What is good about what Pantone/ Esko/X-Rite has done is to, at the very least, raise the visibility of fixed palette printing.

 

[Deleted member 16349]

What is good about what Pantone/ Esko/X-Rite has done is to, at the very least, raise the visibility of fixed palette printing.

And any fixed palette printing method would benefit greatly is all the units printed a very consistent and predictable solid density. You can guess where I am going with that.

Gordon, I would also think that printing with a fixed palette would also tend to result in much lower coverages on average for each print unit since more inks could be used to get to a specific target. Have you found this to be true or does is it not a significant factor?

 

[Deleted member 16349]

I think that positive ink flow is irrelevant, because even though the ink train is only receiving ink from the ductor every two or three revolutions (sheets), every sheet holds density consistently.

You might be misunderstand the term positive ink feed or ink flow. Positive ink feed is a term also used by Goss and it related to ink feed that is not affected by changes in the conditions in the press. They usually equate it to their positive displacement pumps which are used on their digital inkers. The ink feed is supplied to the press at an average rate, no matter what the water conditions are or the roller train temperatures are. They correctly state that their system is more consistent. One of their marketing statements was "Set and forget".

Positive feed is not only related to continuous feed. It can be intermittent. Positive feed requires that the volumetric ink feed is consistent on average.

The problem with existing ink transfer methods used in presses today, which have open ink fountains, is that the intermittent ductor or the continuous ductor, both do not transfer the ink consistently and are affected by changes in the water conditions , the temperature conditions and the press speed on the roller train.

With positive ink feed, the ink only flows in one direction and that is into the press. With existing systems, ink can go in both directions, from the ink fountain to the roller train and from the roller train to the ink fountain.