CMYK color wheel does not look like CMYK color wheel

[Fraglessina]

Hi! I wanted to use a color wheel at Adobe Color site. I needed a color palette in CMYK. I set CMYK in Adobe Color in the lower left corner on the site. But the color wheel on the site looks nowhere near like CMYK. Colors are vibrant like in RGB, not faded as in CMYK. How to see this color wheel in CMYK colors? I don't want to see those CMYK colors only after importing to PS or AI. I want to see it at Adobe Color site to match my colors better, because this site is very useful. Do you have any idea how to do this?

In the first attachment it is a screenshot of the color wheel in Adobe Color described as CMYK with too vibrant colors to be the real CMYK. In the second attachment, in comparison, it is a a screenshot from the CMYK color wheel in Adobe Illustrator, with faded shades as I would like to see in Adobe Color, but sadly I don't...

[Test Screen Name]

I think it's clear that the coders who make Adobe Color had no clue about CMYK. Any CMYK tool which doesn't allow or report what ICC profile in use is a bad joke. There are many very bad CMYK selectors on the web, because most programmers have no actual clue about color science, but it's very disappointing to see Adobe among them. No Adobe person has ever acknowleged that Adobe Color has any kind of problem so far as I know. But I notice the integration with Adobe apps has been removed; maybe the other programmers were embarrassed at the association.

[Fraglessina]

I still hope that I can set it somewhere... I choose beautiful colors in Adobe Color and "surprise" - this so called CMYK is converted to the real CMYK in Illustrator and it turns out that colors that I picked does not match with each other, but they have looked like matching in Adobe Color 😞 For example light green from Adobe Color set on CMYK, is in CMYK file in Illustrator a really dark green, and vibrant orange is a chocolate brown... it's not a small difference in colors, this is a huge difference and I don't know why I can't set in Adobe Color to see only CMYK colors because we all know the huge differnce between CMYK and RGB... Why I can choose CMYK in Illustrator and it works great, but in Adobe Color not...

[Bob_Hallam · Accepted solution]

The CMYK values are not going to be viable in this application.  They are not based on any standard print proceess, and should not be used.   Instead set up the color you want as a spot color in InDesign or Illustrator, then convert them to CMYK using the correct profile on export to PDF.  

[Test Screen Name]

It's sad. Adobe were leaders and pioneers in the development of accurate colors, and tools for checking and creating them. This looks instead like a student project that somehow ended up under their corporate name, without any quality checking or validation. Just "hey, we've got a color wheel". Does anyone know (and can tell) the actual history of how this shameful state came about?

[Fraglessina]

oh, okay 😞 I really had a hope that this wheel will be multifunctional 😕 I think I am closing this topic for now... Maybe it is not solved, but as I understood it is not possible in the form like I described 😞 Time to learn about ICC for me...

[rob day · Accepted solution]

Hi @Fraglessina , in case you are still following this thread, the reason for Adobe Color’s limited color management is that it is a web based app and browser color management is very limited.

If you want to accurately color manage your themes, set their color mode to Lab and let the Adobe app make the conversion to your CMYK output profile. For example here I’ve made a theme named Compound 3 in Lab mode, and in InDesign I’ve added the theme to my Swatches panel.

My document’s CMYK profile assignment is Coated GRACol 2006 and InDesign’s Separation Preview shows the color managed GRACol output numbers while maintaining the theme’s original color appearance.

Browsers and HTML  have no Overprint or Color Proofing capabilities, so your only choice for out-of-gamut color is to bring the theme into an Adobe app and turn on Overprint Preview to see the CMYK gamut clipping.

[Fraglessina]

Thank you very much!

[jahnemichael]

Nearly 10 years, and Adobe Kuler ( which has now become Adobe Color CC ) - still fails to understand how to simulate CMYK - that is simply silly. Adobe certainly knows how to do that in its Design apps.

[rob day]

still fails to understand how to simulate CMYK - that is simply silly

Hi @jahnemichael , Because of the limitations of HTML code displayed in a browser, it’s not a problem Adobe can likely solve in a Web application. There are no color management or profiling options for HTML color—an image can have an embedded profile, which the most browsers will honor, but there are no CSS or HTML properties for assigning CMYK profiles or color managing CMYK color conversions.

If you want to accurately color manage themes, try working in Lab and make the CMYK conversions in your Adobe app—see my previous post.

[jahnemichael]

Hi Rob Day,

You wrote

"Because of the limitations of HTML code displayed in a browser, it’s not a
problem Adobe can likely solve in a Web application."

That is simply not correct.

This can be done. Adobe - for whatever reason - is simply not doing that
with this Adobe Color CC - search Google for "color management in a
browser" - plenty of examples. Print condition simulation is possible.

One example;

https://www.benq.com/en-us/knowledge-center/knowledge/web-browsers-color-management.html

Respectfully,

*Michael Jahn*
Simi Valley, CA 93065

[rob day]

The article you linked to is referring to how browsers color manage and display images with embedded profiles—an image with an embedded profile will display in the embedded space in most browsers.

But, there are no images to profile in the Adobe Color site, the displayed swatches are HTML DIVs with background color values defined as RGB. In general modern browsers display CSS coded color as sRGB via the monitor profile. There isn’t a CSS code option to assign an RGB profile to an HTML DIV or display a CMYK color with an assigned profile—everything is sRGB.

If you look at the source code for an Adobe Color page, you can see the swatch CSS background values are defined as an rgb(N,N,N) even when the color mode is set to CMYK. No profile embedding can happen in the CSS coding:

You might argue that Adobe could port over some part of their color mangement code via something like JavaScript where there would be an equivalent of a Color Settings dialog built in to the page, and the Javascript handles the complex color conversions into sRGB for the HTML display. I’m guessing the task would be enormous, and the results unreliable because of browser differences.

[Test Screen Name]

Adobe should feed "CMYK colour values" through a CMM, which converts profile-to-profile. Or remove CMYK "support". It's shameful that there is not even any acknowledgement of the problem; clearly those responsible really don't understand or are forbidden from commenting.

[jahnemichael]

I don't know about shameful but I will say if you're going to offer CMYK
should do a little better job of simulating it.

[rob day]

Adobe should feed "CMYK colour values" through a CMM

How would you do that in a web environment? For color conversions Adobe would have to port their entire Color Management code into an HTML page via something like JavaScript where it would likely become open source.

There are proposals to expand the CSS color property—currently you can’t even set a DIV to a CMYK color or assign a profile:

https://www.w3.org/TR/css-color-4/#introduction

Even if CSS is expanded to include CMYK with a profile display, Adobe would still have to bring a Color Settings like dialog and CMS into the page—even if that’s possible, it’s hard to imagine it would be reliable as different browser versions break the code.

The easy solution is to work in Lab and make your CM’d conversions in the CC apps, or let it happen at Export or output.

[Test Screen Name]

So, what you're saying seems to be: if Adobe's programmers find doing colour management difficult, then they can convert to CMYK using some random algorithm, and that's fine? No, it isn't. I stand by "shameful". The world is full of web sites made by people who don't understand colour management and use some random CMYK algorithm. The numbers they give confuse users - or worse, lead to expensive blunders - and they complain that Adobe's colour managed conversion is faulty. It is utterly shameful that Adobe do this, despite being among the world pioneers in  the field of accurate colour. Their silence speaks loud and clear - they don't understand enough to even be ashamed.

It isn't as hard as you make out. Since Adobe Color uses a fixed RGB it can use a fixed (and clearly specified) CMYK too. A device link profile will give a look up table. I could implement lookup table conversion with interpolation in a couple of days with C, and a competent JavaScript programmer could do the same.

[rob day]

So, what you're saying seems to be: if Adobe's programmers find doing colour management difficult, then they can convert to CMYK using some random algorithm

No I’m saying there up against the limitations of the CSS color properties. Currently the only CSS color option is sRGB, so if you limit the conversions from an sRGB source to something random like US Web Coated SWOP, that’s not much of an improvement—I might need CMYK for US Sheetfed Uncoated.

I can get that if I save the theme as Lab—it would be helpful if Adobe had instructions on the site for color managing Lab based themes in their desktop apps.