CMYK Color Model Is for
Print Projects Setting Up Digital Files for
Color Separation
The actual work of making the color separations
is usually handled by the commercial printing
company, which uses proprietary software to
separate your digital files into the four CMYK
colors and to transfer the color-separated
information to plates or directly to digital presses. Graphic designers should set up their digital files
destined for four-color separation in the CMYK
mode to avoid unpleasant color surprises. All the
high-end software—Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator
and InDesign, Corel Draw, QuarkXPress and many
more programs—offer this capability. It is just a
matter of changing a preference.
Most print designers work in the CMYK model
to more accurately predict the appearance of the
colors in the final printed product.
RGB Is Best for Onscreen
Viewing
CMYK is not the best color model for documents
destined to be viewed onscreen. They are best built
using the RGB (red, green, blue) color model. The
RGB model contains more color possibilities than
the CMYK model because the human eye can see
more colors than ink on paper can duplicate.
Exception: If your printed project contains a spot
color, a color that usually must match a specific
color exactly, that color should not be marked as a
CMYK color. It should be left as a spot color so when
the color separations are made, it will appear on its
own separation and be printed in its own special
color ink.
If you use RGB in your design files and send the
files to a commercial printer, they are still color-
separated into the four CMYK colors for print.
However, in the process of converting the colors
from RGB to CMYK, there can be color shifts from
what you see onscreen to what is reproducible on
paper.
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