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J
Jonas27502917btdr
Participant
March 28, 2023
Question

Total ink coverage plug-in for InDesign

  • March 28, 2023
  • 5 replies
  • 5520 views

Hi! New upcoming EU legislations require that all packaging materials made of plastic only has an overall print coverage of a maximum of 60%. Does anyone know if there is a useful plugin for InDesign (or Acrobat) that can measure the overall color/print coverage of a packaging design? Also if it within that potential solution would be possible to exclude colors when measuring, e.g. to exclude transparent (greyed out areas) or white (paper/plastic)? Thanks.

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5 replies

A
Agnieszka34999907u1iq
Participant
January 24, 2024

hi, can you tell me more about this upcoming legislations? Is it be only about plastic packaging materials?

P
Pickory
Legend
March 28, 2023

If a snap shot of the page was created as a png it might be possible to count the dots.

 

Edited.... Hmm, I like this idea. I going to write it. Not sure if it really fits the OP question.

Robert at ID-Tasker
Robert at ID-Tasker
Legend
March 28, 2023

From a quick Google search - there are tools to count pixels in the image 😉 

 

But maybe Photoshop's Histogram can be used as a counter??

 

P
Pickory
Legend
March 31, 2023

Counting the pixels.

    E
    Community Expert
    Eugene TysonCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    March 28, 2023

    I believe this is similar to your issue
    https://community.adobe.com/t5/acrobat-discussions/can-acrobat-tell-me-the-ink-coverage-of-a-pdf/td-p/10393842

     

     

    Robert at ID-Tasker
    Robert at ID-Tasker
    Legend
    March 28, 2023

    I think it's still just how many cans of ink you will use - rather than area? 

     

    Robert at ID-Tasker
    Robert at ID-Tasker
    Legend
    March 28, 2023

    Should be doable... either directly in the InDesign or by using Photoshop to rasterize PDFs and checking black areas... 

     

    J
    Jonas27502917btdrAuthor
    Participant
    March 28, 2023

    Hi Robert. Thanks for your reply. How would you do this directly in InDesign? Please also read my reply to Eugene above. Would your recommendation still be to rasterizing the PDFs and checking black areas?

    Robert at ID-Tasker
    Robert at ID-Tasker
    Legend
    March 28, 2023

    I got your problem from the start 😉 

     

    If the objects would be a "simple" elements - like fully filled geometric objects - easy. 

    If we go for cutouts - then we somehow need to calculate what is really covered with ink - in this case the easiest way would be to rasterize PDFs in the Photoshop and "count pixels" 😉 

     

    Of course if you can make some assumptions - text on a white background is 10% of the area - then we could do it directly in the InDesign. 

     

    E
    Community Expert
    Eugene TysonCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    March 28, 2023

    InDesign has an Ink Limit view

     

    Go to Window>Output>Separations Preview

    Change the view to Ink Limit and insert your percentage.

     

    I'm not aware of any plugin, sorry

     

    https://creativepro.com/force-color-images-cmyk-240-ink-limit/

     

     

    J
    Jonas27502917btdrAuthor
    Participant
    March 28, 2023

    Hi Eugune. I'm afraid it is not the ink coverage that I want to know. It is merely a total area coverage. If you have an artboard that measures 100x100 mm and you place a black box measuring 50x100 mm the total area coverage would be 50%. That calculation is farely easy. However take the same artboard and and small images, logos, and texts and then doing the same calculation isn't that easy.

    E
    Community Expert
    Eugene TysonCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    March 28, 2023

    I get you now - sorry for the confusion. 

     

     

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