same color appearance on completely different substrates...

[motormount]

Carrying on with my - not exactly succesfull - effort to get to know what real people do with color management i came up with another question.

A good color management solution is supposed to provide same color appearance for a product in multiple applications, outdoor banners, magazine ads, tshirts etc. as theory and marketing say.

Now lets say one has much simpler goals.

To print the same very vivid color illustration on both gloss coated paper for a magazine ad and uncoated white paper for a direct mail campaign.

To my knowledge and experience this can't be happening.

Either prints will look different, or you must sacrifice the vivid colors of the gloss paper to look similar to the duller colors of the mail paper.

What's your experience/practice in such a very common -i think- case?

Do you print to the lower uncoated paper gamut so the other media can match it?

Do you proof and give the client a picture what the illustration will look like printed on uncoated paper?

Can you actually print both coated and uncoated stock and produce the same optical result?
- with any kind of method, color management, trial and error, special inks, some combination of the above-


All answers welcomed, thanks in advance!

 

[Deleted member 16349]

Can you actually print both coated and uncoated stock and produce the same optical result?
- with any kind of method, color management, trial and error, special inks, some combination of the above-

There is at least one characteristic with how the Landa nanography process will print that might do what you have asked.

Since the nanoink that is applied to the blanket will be basically dry by the time that it is applied to the substrate, then the ink would tend to look the same if it is printed on coated or uncoated stock. The Landa process is more like lamination than printing.

I think it will be interesting to see how this specific issue will perform, once and if the Landa press gets going.

 

[gordo]

A good color management solution is supposed to provide same color appearance for a product in multiple applications, outdoor banners, magazine ads, tshirts etc. as theory and marketing say.

One can always dream.

To print the same very vivid color illustration on both gloss coated paper for a magazine ad and uncoated white paper for a direct mail campaign.

To my knowledge and experience this can't be happening.

I would agree

Do you print to the lower uncoated paper gamut so the other media can match it?

I doubt anyone would do that.

Do you proof and give the client a picture what the illustration will look like printed on uncoated paper?

I've never seen that done in any shop because, typically, print buyers seem to prefer pretty proofs. The exception is press proofing which is usually reserved for more color critical work such as limited edition art prints.

Can you actually print both coated and uncoated stock and produce the same optical result?
- with any kind of method, color management, trial and error, special inks, some combination of the above-

You can get a closer alignment between the two by varnishing/coating the area under the image and then varnishing/coating over the image.

 

[motormount]

Thanks Erik, but i think we must be very patient untill we see Landa's ''presses'' in day production...

I doubt anyone would do that.

That's why i put that emoticon at the end of my sentence!

Thanks again Gordo, nice idea with the double varnishing.

The first varnish between paper and image should it dry before printing process colors, or you can run it straight in a 6 colors press?

 

[Stephen Marsh]

Wouldn’t the cost and effort of performing a pre/post print varnish hit on uncoated stock be greater than simply using a coated stock? Is this a case of technically feasible vs. realistic? One could hit a gloss stock with a selective single matt varnish too.

When it comes to logo design and brand colour design, if the goal is to maintain brand identify through colour – then a good designer will often use Pantone colours that are “in gamut” for coated, uncoated and CMYK simulations for coated/uncoated (they may print a different Pantone on uncoated vs. coated to achieve the same target colour appearance).

Colour management is used daily to “dumb down” rich colour into duller colours – this happens in inkjet proofing for press conditions, where a “simulation profile” (press profile) is used in the processing before the data is converted to the wider gamut inkjet profile for output. As you mention, doing so for press matching an uncoated to coated run is not generally done, however it is of course technically possible.

Even if it is possible to match the colour between two substrates “by the numbers” via hardware, the actual substrates may affect the visual appearance of the colour to a human observer – especially if there are large areas of blank substrate around the colour elements. Same for gloss levels, the colour may be “the same” however the overall appearance will be governed by the substrate sans finishing coatings.


Stephen Marsh

 

[gordo]

Thanks again Gordo, nice idea with the double varnishing.

The first varnish between paper and image should it dry before printing process colors, or you can run it straight in a 6 colors press?

Ideally yes.

 

[gordo]

Wouldn’t the cost and effort of performing a pre/post print varnish hit on uncoated stock be greater than simply using a coated stock? Is this a case of technically feasible vs. realistic? One could hit a gloss stock with a selective single matt varnish too.

Yes but there may be reasons to use the varnish technique, for example the uncoated paper may have a texture that is unavailable in a coated paper.

When it comes to logo design and brand colour design, if the goal is to maintain brand identify through colour – then a good designer will often use Pantone colours that are “in gamut” for coated, uncoated and CMYK simulations for coated/uncoated (they may print a different Pantone on uncoated vs. coated to achieve the same target colour appearance).

Of course that makes sense - which is why most designers don't do it LOL!

Colour management is used daily to “dumb down” rich colour into duller colours – this happens in inkjet proofing for press conditions, where a “simulation profile” (press profile) is used in the processing before the data is converted to the wider gamut inkjet profile for output. As you mention, doing so for press matching an uncoated to coated run is not generally done, however it is of course technically possible.

Yup technically possible but typically not done.

Even if it is possible to match the colour between two substrates “by the numbers” via hardware, the actual substrates may affect the visual appearance of the colour to a human observer – especially if there are large areas of blank substrate around the colour elements. Same for gloss levels, the colour may be “the same” however the overall appearance will be governed by the substrate sans finishing coatings.

Yup. And don't forget the really big issue - the OBA difference between the proof paper (which typically doesn't have OBAs and the press paper that typically contains a lot of OBAs. That not only affects the colors as observed but also the colors as measured and reported by different instruments.

 

[Schnitzel]

There is at least one characteristic with how the Landa nanography process will print that might do what you have asked.

Since the nanoink that is applied to the blanket will be basically dry by the time that it is applied to the substrate, then the ink would tend to look the same if it is printed on coated or uncoated stock. The Landa process is more like lamination than printing.

I think it will be interesting to see how this specific issue will perform, once and if the Landa press gets going.

Sorry Erik, I can't get down to details, but that's not the way it works. Dry ink electrophotography does work like that, with the toner film being so thick it practically fills the hills and valleys of the paper, producing a glossy appearance on whatever stock you print on.

 

[aqazi81]

@shnitzel... Erik is right, nano ink is first applied to the heated blanket, at this time all water content evaporates from the nano ink and a dried ink layer is then transferred to the substrate.

 

[motormount]

Wouldn’t the cost and effort of performing a pre/post print varnish hit on uncoated stock be greater than simply using a coated stock? Is this a case of technically feasible vs. realistic? One could hit a gloss stock with a selective single matt varnish too.

You're right, but there are still some rare cases where the client is willing to pay for the result he wants.
- uncoated paper for drawing or completing a form is better than coated papers most of the times, that's not a real job anyway but an example i thought to better display my query-

I understand all the things you write below, how we limit our inkjets to simulate an offset press, how a different substrate can give a totally different look to the observer even if printed color measured values are the same, what i don't understand - wasn't quite sure - is if all the stuff i read every know and then about color ''uniformity'' regardless the media - paper,vinyl,fabric etc- is really achieved by anyone and to what extend this might be.

Thanks again!

 

[Correct Color]

The problem with varnishing is that it won't make uncoated paper into coated paper, and it will not change the inherent gamut of the uncoated stock.

The reason coated stock typically has a larger gamut than uncoated stock is actually very simple. Since all printed color is reflected light, the smoother the printed surface, the more light hits it and is reflected directly back, which means directly back to the viewer's eye. The softer and more fibrous the surface, the more it id diffused.

So you can varnish a soft surface, and change its appearance, but you can't change its structure.

In actuality, I've had this basic question come up many times, in many different situations. It's a question that comes up in large format pretty frequently, as many are sold on the idea that all printing has to look exactly alike, and that should be the purpose of color management.

My response is that should not be the purpose of color management at all. The purpose of color management -- digital color management -- should be to describe the characteristics of every device in a workflow in such a way and to communicate them between devices in such a way that all devices should be capable of achieving as close as possible fidelity to the original image they are asked to reproduce.

So people then ask if this device and this device will match when I'm done. And the answer is, "Yes, with the caveats of the gamut of the device, and the white point of the media."

And if they ask if they can constrain the gamut of a large-gamut device/ink/media combination to match that of a smaller one, the answer is yes. It's no different than making a proof, really. However, the question I always ask at that point is, "Suppose you're running an ad, and it's going to appear in Architectural Digest, and in the Sunday supplement of your local newspaper. Do you, really, really want then one in Architectural Digest to look like the one in the newspaper?"

I've asked that question mny more times than I can count, and I have yet to have anyone say yes.


Mike Adams
Correct Color

 

[gordo]

The problem with varnishing is that it won't make uncoated paper into coated paper, and it will not change the inherent gamut of the uncoated stock.

The reason coated stock typically has a larger gamut than uncoated stock is actually very simple. Since all printed color is reflected light, the smoother the printed surface, the more light hits it and is reflected directly back, which means directly back to the viewer's eye. The softer and more fibrous the surface, the more it id diffused.

So you can varnish a soft surface, and change its appearance, but you can't change its structure.

What the varnish/coating does is smooth out the surface and increase ink adsorption - so in that sense it does, to an extent, change the surface's structure. It is one of the reasons newspaper printers typically use a YCMK ink sequence. The Y channel (with conventional separations) typically has the most ink coverage so by laying it down first it acts somewhat like a varnish/coating on the very rough newsprint paper. The varnish/coating helps, but you're right it can't deliver the same appearance as a coated stock.