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Question

Illustrator randomly changing my file's colours while file is open.

Forum|Forum|7 years ago
September 20, 2018
7 replies
26256 views

Hey everyone, I've been having this problem for a while now that I cannot find any information online about it.

For some reason Illustrator will change the colours of an opened file at some random point while I have the file open and everything within the file will look like it's washed out or has some sort of grey overlay over it. Sometimes it'll only do it once a week or so, and sometimes the colour change is not as bad as other times, but it's still brutally annoying when I'm trying to export a file for a client. It's not just the swatches either, photos will become washed out as well.

It isn't an RGB vs CMYK file issue as that setting never changes, this is happening while I'm in the middle of editing the file, adding text, drawing a box etc. I mostly am working on RGB files, and the file will never change from RGB.

Illustrator will say the colour values are identical after the colour change but they obviously are not. When I do change the colour mode over the file ends up looking even more grey and washed out than before. The file will fix itself once I close out of the file, shut down Illustrator and open it back up again, but I don't want to have to do this every single time it happens, as I can't predict when it does.

At first I thought it might just be my display glitching out, but if save the file as a PDF while the colours are washed out, it will appear like that in the PDF, and will stay that way permanently. If I reopen and export the AI file to a PDF when the colours are normal then the PDF will have the normal colours. But illustrator says they are using the exact same colours and colourmodes, I've added a comparison photo in this discussion. You'll notice the colours are way less saturated in the pizza, and when using the eyedropper tool in photoshop, the green and black text show up as slightly different values.

Does anyone know what is causing this issue? or why? and how to fix it?

Thanks,

Justin

This topic has been closed for replies.

M

Marlene Crist32813102lnyb

New Participant

i had the same problem that my colour suddenly changed. i then saw that i havent selected the right mode on ''proof setup'' - always double check if it is on: proof set up internet standard RGB

Chrispy-303

Known Participant

Not sure why this has been marked as correct answer... This is one of the first things I tried and it didnt help. Is this an attempt to sweep this issue under the rug?? Ive moved on to using XD because this issue drove me away from Ai. Just fix the issue Adobe.

Monika Gause

Community Expert

Posts get marked correct when they solved someone's problem. Did you unmark it? That is not nice.

This thread is 6 years old - and one thing that looks the same on your system might need a different cure than on others. So just create a new thread and describe it.

T

Thar Lynn Oo

New Participant

https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/601447-illustrator-desktop-bugs/suggestions/44596797-illustrator-will-automatically-convert-color-codes

I'm having the same issue and apparently, cms is auto converting the values to preserver appearance. Which causes the colors to shift. I've posted my work around in the above link. Please check it out.

Chrispy-303

Known Participant

THANK YOU - I just read your linked post and this sounds almost identical to my issue.. even the global colour stability!

Im going to make these changes and check thoes boxes so Ai stops auto converting colours without warning. Totally agree that this should be the default setting. Legend

Wish I read this 5 months ago haha

D

defaultu2w56z952mn1

New Participant

I had this issue recently, came on this string, and couldn't find an answer so I contacted Adobe. They are aware of this issue and someone changed some files round on my computer and now it works fine. I recommend anyone with issue contacts adobe straight away, they were very efficient.

C

Cassandra5C9D

New Participant

Hi! I just chatted with someone from the Adobe Support Team and this is what they had me do that did the trick! He had me download Bridge and then click on Edit > Color Settings > and then select North America 2 and make sure to check "Show Expanded List of Color Setting Files." I hope this helps something else out there!

davidr29953917

New Participant

Thanks. I take it this only applies to people in North America though, right, or am I being an idiot (very likely)?

Chrispy-303

Known Participant

Hi, Ive been dealing with this issue for about a year+ too. Dont know why the fuk Adobe havnt adressed this issue as colours are a vital part of any brand and one of the major design elements you need to remain stable. massive ::facepalm:: and another reason we need a viable alternative to Adobe.

anyway... ive been using a work around...

Ive been creating global colour swatches for each campaign/job/client - making the swatch a global colour makes the colour stable.

Hope that helps.

R

ryan78

Participating Frequently

Thank you for responding Chrispy. There are only a couple of support threads that chat about this and it just has me going around in circles. This issue is eventually going to cost my clients millions of dollars and me my job.

Ton Frederiks

Community Expert

It is probably not a simple problem, but I have never encountered it.

I have also never seen a file that has this problem.

If someone could share such a file...

Bill Silbert

Community Expert

What operating system and what version of Illustrator are you using?

J

justinb38970088Author

New Participant

I'm using windows 10 and the most recent update for illustrator.

S_Gans

Community Expert

This is a strange one! I can imagine there's be a weird glitch in your graphics card, or somehow, Proof view is being enabled (no clue how it'd do that itself), but that would explain how the colors read one way and view another way, weird as it is.

As for the pdf SHOWING the change... let me ask - which PDF export setting are you using? Have you checked to see if maybe IT got changed to maybe convert to CMYK?

Just spitballing here, since I see nobody else thought of any other ideas....

Maybe some more info on your OS, machine, Illustrator version'd help us answer?

Adobe Community Expert / Adobe Certified Instructor

J

justinb38970088Author

New Participant

What i would do is just resave the Ai file as a PDF, which keeps the PDF as in RGB format. Doing that exact same process when the colours aren't messed up produces them correctly, and when they do get messed up and look washed out the PDF will save and look washed out as well. It's very strange.

I use a Dell XPS 15 9560 with the 4k screen. So it's running on windows and I have the most recent version of illustrator updated.

I was wondering if it was a graphics card glitch as well, but why would it keep those strange colours if i save the file as a PDF when the colours are messed up? Really odd. Plus I can have multiple files open in illustrator and it can happen to one, but not the others that are also open.

Monika Gause

Community Expert

This problem is continueing for me.

Really frustrating to have to double check every single color everytime i save.

Any other leads on this?

I still don't understand when the color does change. So if you leave the file open for a couple hours without touching it the color changes on its own?

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