What are your PDF color policies

[fiatlux]

Hi,

If a customer is supplying CMYK PDFs, should they embed the colour destination profile, e.g. US Web Coated?
If they do, is it used by the printer for anything? Or is the embedded profile ignored.

I assume that when supplying RGB PDFs, then the colour destination profile e.g. US Web Coated should be embedded. And it would be used by the RIP to do the RGB to CMYK transform. Correct?

thanks, FL

 

[mattbeals]

Just give me a PDF/X-4 file with all profiles included whether it's RGB or not doesn't matter. I would prefer to have the OI defined and color left alone until the last possible minute.

 

[fiatlux]

Just give me a PDF/X-4 file with all profiles included whether it's RGB or not doesn't matter. I would prefer to have the OI defined and color left alone until the last possible minute.

With all due respect, that doesn't really explain or answer my question.
Do you mean that PDFs should have the profile embedded no matter CMYK or RGB?
What do you mean by "color left alone"?

FL

 

[mattbeals]

Yes, I would like to have a PDF come in to me that has RGB and CMYK profiles attached to their respective objects. If that's 10 different profiles that's okay with me. If they want to embed an OI as in PDF/X-4 that's even better.

So if they are supplying to me a CMYK PDF I would like them to embed an OI or have tagged objects so that I can handle the color conversions. I would then use that information to make the color conversions myself.

In the second part I would prefer they not embed an OI. If they do embed an OI then I can always switch it to my desired CMYK space.

What I want is information about what the customer has done or wants done. I can then make better decisions about how to handle the file by using all the bits (ICC profiles) of information (preflight included) I have available to me. I'd like to get back to printers being color separators rather relying on the customer being the separator. Chances are the customer doesn't know what profile to use so they use something generic like SWOP v2. Having them separate the color ties my hands. So give me everything raw and unadulterated. Do all your PhotoShop work, what ever you need to do. But please don't make the final separation to CMYK. I know how I want it done and I know how to do it well. Let me help you, but "don't do *me* any favors...".

 

[mattbeals]

If you're on Skype/Yahoo/MSN I'd be happy to have a real time chat (no microphone, sorry).

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

Agree with matt on this one PDFx4. Allows the printer to let the CMYK through if output intent is compatible with output device, and allows for repurposing, with the knowledge of how the client saw the file.

The output intent is necessary to get a visual consistency. And to know how the creator intended the print to look.
I would say that where it is practical, or rather impractical not to, the printer should be free to do an ink reduction (ink save, is only one aspect though this is the commonly used term to motivate such colour engines) as long as the hard copy output is consistent with the visual appearance of the Rendering intent (minus all the problems that theoretical ideal separations will have when they arrive in the real world)