Who handles your color managment?

[overtwo]

Quick question for all the color people out there.

I was curious as to who handles your color calibration at your shop? Pre-press operator? Pre-press manager? Do you have a color expert dedicated to just that? And is the same person making sure that everything stays inline and up to date (according to press conditions)?

Thank you for your input. It's greatly appreciated.

 

[oxburger]

We have a dedicated color expert who does all of our Gracol proofer/plate/monitor calibration.

 

[overtwo]

We have a dedicated color expert who does all of our Gracol proofer/plate/monitor calibration.

Thank you for the quick reponse, I'm looking forward to others as well.

Question, is this dedicated color expert on site (40/hrs week)? If so, what does he/she do to "stay busy" once everything is calibrated?

 

[tmiller_iluvprinting]

I handle our equipment calibrations and our G7 press calibrations. My title is Electronic Prepress Color Specialist. Between calibrations I am color correcting images, manipulating images, preparing files for output, answering questions for sales/customers, facilitating our monthly Color management meetings, and whatever else I can do to help keep our company successful!
Best regards,
Todd

 

[oxburger]

Thank you for the quick reponse, I'm looking forward to others as well.

Question, is this dedicated color expert on site (40/hrs week)? If so, what does he/she do to "stay busy" once everything is calibrated?

Long story short, we were a prepress house that was bought out by a printing company. Our color guy here was in charge of the prepress house, now he does scanning, color correction, and calibration and it keeps him pretty busy.

 

[Colorblind]

I'm a prepress operator for an ad agency, I preflight/proof everything that's made by our studio people, make final PDFs out of pretty much everything then send to publications worldwide via ftp or email + shipping proofs. I handle calibration of our color devices and established some internal color management guidelines (what profiles to use). I do have a color background though (scanner operator in the old days).

 

[rich apollo]

I was curious as to who handles your color calibration at your shop? Pre-press operator? Pre-press manager? Do you have a color expert dedicated to just that? And is the same person making sure that everything stays inline and up to date (according to press conditions)? .

I think you'll find the answers depend on the sizes of the shops.

 

[Eric van der Kop]

Thank you for the quick reponse, I'm looking forward to others as well.

Question, is this dedicated color expert on site (40/hrs week)? If so, what does he/she do to "stay busy" once everything is calibrated?

Calibration is not something you only have to do once. It is a continuos proces. Depends also on the quality you want to delever at your customers and the repeatablity of jobs.
I think this person will be involved in standardazing everything that has to do with color.

 

[overtwo]

Calibration is not something you only have to do once. It is a continuos proces. Depends also on the quality you want to delever at your customers and the repeatablity of jobs.
I think this person will be involved in standardazing everything that has to do with color.

Correct.

So...who handles your color management?

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

Colour Management is to some degree handled by everyone. But ofcourse setting up guidelines and quality controling is an important aspect that will usually need a driven person. I am probably the one responsible, though it was not originally in my job description.
Colour management and quality control go a bit hand in hand… but I can't say it is a 40 hour/week issue. My tasks would also include preflighting, image manipulation, trouble shooting, making templates, IT-maintainance, educating customers and much more.

Also it does (as does any quality work) require that all people have some degree of understanding of the process. When it comes to decisions about changing the workflow we do have discussions and reach a consensus. (mainly it is the guy who was responsible for scanning (don't have many scanns now days, he does mostly image work today) and I that discuss these things. For us the big change was when we wanted to bring in the knowhow rather than rely on exteral experts.

 

[prepresscolor]

Depending on the size of our shop or organization, one person should know the entire process and have setup a path for all to follow. A central source of knowledge is always a great idea because, as I have seen time and time again, everyone has a different take on the the same plan.
That said, I usually recommend the pressroom or prepress manager be that person. They have the authority to make the decisions and can then take the responsibility.
Color management is not a light undertaking. I recommend that large companies have a "color guru" but for small companies I recommend to managers that they hire an outside color management specialist, tell them what they want, and let the specialist do the rest. In the long run it does come out cheaper than having someone out of production try their hand at it.
Jim - Color4Prepress

 

[Dcalandra]

Gmg

Gmg

GMG handles all our color needs, it rocks!!

Home of Color : GMGColor

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

in-house knowledge is vital

in-house knowledge is vital

I recommend that large companies have a "color guru" but for small companies I recommend to managers that they hire an outside color management specialist, tell them what they want, and let the specialist do the rest. In the long run it does come out cheaper than having someone out of production try their hand at it.
Jim - Color4Prepress

I think that is an external colour experts comment. Every site will need somone who is keeping track of changes. External experts need to stop having the monopoly of the "dark arts". Colour experts need to explain what they do and why, so that each site will be more and more self sufficent. Imagine telling people they need an external expert to spell check… and every time a customer complains about a spelling mistake then call in the external expert. Only big shops can afford a 24/7 contract with an expert. Smaller shops usually have more to do with amateurs and so will need to understand colour to be able to make the right quality compromises.

Colour Management is the "spelling" of colour. We all need to get better. Some will get better faster. Designers need and press men need to learn to communicate. Designers need to understand the less is more of colour, ie as I go richer in total ink the pressman will need to compensate by holding ink back and I get less, where lowering my total ink the pressman can keep the higher full desities and we get full rich colour.
Colour is a dialogue. And we need to learn this language.

Better that having an expert do it for you have an expert coach you. Let a Colour Guru spend half a day with the whole company. It is infact cheaper for a small site for everyone to sit for half a day with a colour Guru

In Sweden there is a move to Certified Graphics Production, and there too there is a major emphasis on inhouse knowledge. Where inhouse knowledge does not just mean one Guru knows it all but evry player knows and understands at least their part in the colour chain (and other aspects of their work as it relates to ISO 12647).

 

[Luc St-Pierre]

I do all the color management tasks in-house, I also run the prepress department. Being in the flexo wide-web industry, I also do on-site press characterizations, press-side toubleshooting, create press curves and profiles and when I am left with nothing to, it is probably 'round midnight...

 

[Louis Dery]

Colour Management is the "spelling" of colour. We all need to get better. Some will get better faster. Designers need and press men need to learn to communicate. Designers need to understand the less is more of colour, ie as I go richer in total ink the pressman will need to compensate by holding ink back and I get less, where lowering my total ink the pressman can keep the higher full desities and we get full rich colour.
Colour is a dialogue. And we need to learn this language.

Better that having an expert do it for you have an expert coach you. Let a Colour Guru spend half a day with the whole company. It is infact cheaper for a small site for everyone to sit for half a day with a colour Guru

Hi Lukas,
Agree with you!
Color Management is COMUNICATION between each steps of the production:
–Graphic design must communicate what they want, not let others guess what it is supposed to look like.
–Prepress must validate and communicate the client expectation (through color proofing).
–Print receive proofs and render expected color (color proofs) to press AND if there is a problem matching the proof… THEY MUST COMMUNICATE with prepress to report the problem IF they think that it is not a press related problem.
COMMUNICATION is the key success to color management.

As far as consultants: they also have to communicate hot to do it and how to maintain it. If not, it will be an endless loop.

Louis

 

[ImBET]

I perform all color calibration and profiling for our shop. When I am not doing those things I also do color correction and retouching. When not doing that I am studying, researching and always learning about color management. I have been in "color" for a long time and still learning more all the time. We also have had a consultant in from time to time (when purchasing a new printer)
Bruce

 

[Munsell]

I do.

My job kind of echoes what a lot of people have already said. I do calibrations, press profiling, color correction, ink mixing and proofing. I also preflight jobs, do a little IT, and communicate with customers about color and printing issues.

 

[Pickle7]

Our shop handles it just as Lukas's shop . We have 2 excellent color people. Then the rest are knowledgeable enough to help out and keep learning as we go. We have 3 sheet fed press, 2 half webs, 1 HP TJ8500, 1 FB6700 and several other digital output devices. With all that its a pretty much a full time job.

 

[twooodogz]

Quick question for all the color people out there.

I was curious as to who handles your color calibration at your shop? Pre-press operator? Pre-press manager? Do you have a color expert dedicated to just that? And is the same person making sure that everything stays inline and up to date (according to press conditions)?

Thank you for your input. It's greatly appreciated.

Let me just propose having Your best Pressman or Pressroom manager having complete control over the color management process. 99% of the time they are the most experienced person in a shop at seeing color. I am actually in this position at my shop. Although I do require technical assistance from my prepress guru. I decide the changes that need made and he helps me make them. We are currently running gmg which I have learned rather well. I still to this date have not done a proofing calibration that didn't need some visual editing afterwards, why not have the press room who is ultimately responsible for matching proofs decide when the proofs are matching the press properly? Not only do I decide when they are correct but I also make any adjustments needed. Yes I agree there are dangers to this if Pressroom does not understand the rest of the process it is very possible proofing calibration or even plate calibration could be used to adjust for a press problem so your best guy needs to be technically savvy as well and understand the repercussions of making adjustments that dont need to be made.

 

[sandpiper]

We're in Saudi Arabia. Our prepress specialists handle color management, monitor calibration (monthly), proofer calibration(monthly), CTP linearization (if out of spec) and even press calibration to PSO-ISO(twice a year).

But daily, they do file preflight, color transformation via devicelink, impose jobs using preps, operates the Arkitex and Apogee workflows, and they also run the CTP machines.