In InDesign what settings give the most realistic preview of a CMYK document (no spots)

MarieMeyer  wrote … Is "Overprint Preview" still the best option? Or is that only for use when spots are involved?

Hi Marie,

best use Separation Preview turned on.
Overprint preview is automatically activated with that.

In case of spot colors:
For previewing L*a*b* spots to CMYK separations correctly, I think you have to use Separation Preview.
Overprint Preview alone would not be good enough. Also check your Ink Manager settings about spots and the conversion policy.

Regards,
Uwe

Hi Marie,

FWIW: Separation results could be different of placed RGB images where reduced opacity is used within the image ( e.g. a layer option with PhotoShop is used ) in comparison to opacity effects applied by InDesign's Effects panel applied to a not transparent RGB image.

Below an example that is demonstrating this.
The same PhotoShop image with three layers placed three times.

The PhotoShop layers from top to bottom:
Layer 1: Opacity 100% showing a gradient
Layer 2: Opacity 50% showing the same gradient

Layer 3: Background Layer with fill color RGB 255|255|255 ( a "white" )

Now the image is placed 3 times on an InDesign page.

See screenshots from my German InDesign below.

Case 1 on top: All 3 layers are turned on. No effective opacity is visible.

Case 2 below: Exactly as case 1 with one difference:
An effect from InDesign's Effects panel is applied:

Opacity is reduced to 50 %

Case 3 at the bottom of the page:

Layer 1 is turned off. In effect you see the gradient of layer 2 with opacity 50% on the background layer that is filled with white.

Perhaps you would expect that 2. and 3. will lead to the same separation?

Apparently that's not the case.

Image of case 2 selected, Separation Preview on:

Image of case 3 selected, Separation Preview on:

So be careful what you are doing with effects on InDesign objects on the page.
The separation result of case 3 is much better than the one of case 2.

If you can, avoid RGB colors for text and vector objects in InDesign.

At least avoid tints on RGB swatches. You'd see the same separation values like in our case 2 that are not optimal. *

RGB fills that are not touched by InDesign effects and do not come with tints will separate as expected when output to PDF/X.

That goes for exported PDF/X-1 and PDF/X-4 alike.

* EDIT: CORRECTION
As long as you do not convert RGB swatches that are using tints to CMYK with InDesign's Swatches panel they will separate ok using PDF/X-1a or PDF/X-4.
Do the task of separation always by exporting to PDF. Or export RGB with PDF/X-4 so that the print service provider can do the separation.

The problem with applied InDesign effects on RGB images or objects with RGB fills cannot be avoided, I think.

Regards,
Uwe

You need to choose the profile the printer needs for output. For raster images keep them in RGB and convert them if necessary not before export to PDF.

I don't have any spot colors, and I have my destination CMYK ICC profile installed in the color settings.

The profile you set in Color Settings isn't necessarily the document's CMYK profile. Check that the assigned profile is correct under Edit>Assign Profiles it could be different than the Color Setting's Working CMYK profile.

The accuracy of the preview of CMYK color depend on two profiles, the assigned document CMYK profile and your monitor profile which is set by the OS during a monitor calibration.

Overprint preview forces any RGB or Lab colors to preview as they will output to CMYK, and would also show the effect of overprinting CMYK colors. OP should not change the appearance of CMYK color that is not overprinting another color.