Flagging Illy CS3 files for Pantone to banner produces
Lewlew (6 points) | Tue, 2009-01-20 11:21I supply artwork for banners and 99% of them are CMYK with no Pantone colours used. This time I did have a corporate background colour that I specified in the palette taken from the colour book. 2766C. The lettering was a gradient made up of CMYK.
The banner guy has come back with a CMYK background colour which of course isn't the same and said he didn't "see" any Pantone reference. It's there...in the swatches and in the colour slider when you click on the object, the swatch/slider displays Pantone 2766 I said. He has Illy CS 3 as well so I know he has the libraries/colour books that I have.
So why didn't he pick it up? On pdfs it's not a problem, as I have output preview and printers have pre-flight, etc. Do you have to send a separate pdf as well even though it's not used? If the artwork was complicated, eg layers, clipping masks etc I would have, but this was a simple 30" x 60" sign with one background and some gradient lettering. The Illy file looked just as the pdf.
Thanks, Lew
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A lot of this depends on how he is printing the banners. Chances are that they are being printed on a 4 or 6 color printer, in which case the best you can hope for is to tweak your CMYK mix to closely approximate the Pantone color.
Banners aren't generally printed in the same fashion that you would print a brochure or business card.
I am not sure of your level of proficiency, so maybe some more information will help to clear things up.
mbennett is right. while there are probably some processes out there (silk screening?) that can print a pantone color on a 30x60 sign, almost all banners/signs that size are printed on inkjet printers, which do not print pantone inks, but process inks. the best you can hope for is to find a process color that most closely matches the PMS color. perhaps your printer will work with you one color matching that specific color as closely as possible in CMYK.
I have a MacDermid Colorspan 72" printer and HP Designjet 60" printer and I have Pantone color charts printed out for both of them on various medias. When somebody needs to match a Pantone, we look at the charts for the media they will be using and find the closest match. Usually it is a couple/few notches off of the original PMS number, depending on the media.
It can fluctuate wildly though. My Macdermid prints on everything from paper to glass to plywood, so you can imagine the profile problems I run into...
true, but it's still not actually outputting pantones. you're just doing your best to match a PMS color on a 4 or 6 color inkjet. and that's what he needs to do with his printer, sit down and figure out how best to match that color.
He may have meant that he didn't "see" any reference to it in your billing. If it is a pantone color, they will have to offset print it rather than print it on their inkjet/laser printer. This means making plates, ordering ink, etc... way more costly and may not be within their capabilities.
Thanks so much for the replies. I didn't consider they wouldn't be set up to print pantones. They do a lot of trade show work, so to be honest it didn't cross my mind.I am only 2 years into using CS products.
On the other hand, I would have thought them getting artwork with pantone refs has come up before and he'd have come back and said they don't do them and to pick a process number closest to 2766.
I don't do the invoicing, I am contracted by a print service so when they gave me the Pantone reference, I just created the artwork, sent them the pdf, got the approval back and forwarded the Illy file to the banner guy. The print service gets the prices, etc for the customer from banner guy.
I really appreciate the answers... thought I was missing a feature I should have had "turned on". Next time I will specify it in the upload/email to be double safe.
:) Lew
Next time, output your pdf from ID and preflight it. Attach a printed proof with registration marks (full) which should show all colors used. If a pdf is the only format, include the crop marks and all info in that file.
Have the printer confirm he understands all colors to be used before you approve the job be printed.
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