problem with colors when print to pdf in FM9

Report · Apr 30, 2010

Hi,

we have some problems with printing colors to pdf with FM9.

The FM document contains (1) eps file with a green box and (2) a rectangle created with FM graphic tools, filled with the same green color values (91/0/60/44)

In FrameMaker the two colors really looks different, but so what, in the PDF both colors (eps) and rectangle got the same correct green color.

Ok, the were different in creation, so they were CMYK and RGB, but your print shop could manage that.

Now in FM 9:

(1) If I do a "save as PDF" and switch OFF "convert CMYK to RGB" the resulting PDF is the same as from FM8 (correct)

(2) If I print to PDF via distiller and define the job options to "convert all colors to CMYK" the resulting rectangle green is very different from the eps green.

I tried different job options, the best result was "convert all colors to CMYK", other options just very more ugly.

Does someone of you know a solution for your problem? Help is very appreciated. I could send example files if necessary.

Thanks in advance.

PK

Report · Apr 30, 2010

FrameMaker outputs only in RGB, except color that is contained in eps files (which is passed straight through to the printer as is). If you specify a CMYK color in FrameMaker, it uses a very simple formula to convert it to RGB; this formula is not the same as used by Photoshop, Illustrator, etc. I suggest using Photoshop or Illustrator to convert your CMYK color to RGB. Then use that RGB formula to create the color in FrameMaker. See if that works.

THere is probably a better explanation of all this somewhere in this forum. Try searching on color.

Report · May 01, 2010

Hi,

our problem is not that FrameMaker converts colors to RGB. We had a "workaround" for that problem in FM8:

Defining the colors in correkt CMYK (91/0/60/44) in FrameMaker, create a (RGB)-PDF and let the printshop convert the "wrong" colors to correct CMYK. This worked in both ways: save as PDF, and print to PDF.

Our problem occurs after switching to FrameMaker 9: The colors of the PDFs, created from the same FrameMaker files as in FM8, now looks VERY different than they did in FM8. But they only look different, if we use the "print" option. If we use the "save as PDF" option the colors look the same as in FM8 - exact as we expect them to look like.

But we want to use the print option, using the distiller.

Regards,

Pia

Report · May 04, 2010

PK-ulm wrote:
But we want to use the print option, using the distiller.

Pia,

this last sentence needs some explanation, I think. Why do you want to use the print option?

Using the print option, you still go the same route as FrameMaker Win always did, which is using the RGB-only Windows postscript driver. Now, with FM9, you have the option to get CMYK colors directly to PDF, as defined, without any color conversion. And it *does* work, as long as you restrict your documents to either CMYK colors or spot colors coming from the FM libraries.

So, again: why do you want to use the print option?

On a sidenote: I'm not sure if I interpret your username correctly, but if you are able to understand German, you'll find some in-depth color tests made with FM9 here: http://www.hilfdirselbst.ch/foren/FM_9_und_Farben_in_PDFs____getestet_P387800.html

Bernd

Report · May 05, 2010

Bernd,

thank you for your answer. Finally I understand, that only "save as pdf" creates CMYK.

Currently we have been refusing the "save as" options, because we had problems with it in the past (the page size of your documents is very large, and "save as" only produced empty pages). Additionally I read about many font problems with "save as" in FrameMaker9.

Therefore, as we have a large amount of FM files in a CMS, created by many users worldwide, we are "a little bit" afraid of changing the current workflow, not being sure if it will work correctly.

Thanks for the link tip!

Regards, Pia

Report · May 07, 2010

You might also try the GetLibraryColorRGBFromCMYK=None setting in maker.ini

to see if it helps.