Same swatch printing differently

[judithm12809063]

I have been working in Illustrator a very long time and I've never had an issue like this:

I have multiple files, all in CMYK. I am using a consistent swatch palette ASE file for the colors in all the files. When I printed the files in our office and ALSO when I received the proofs from the printer, I had the same issue: the blue in only one of the files looked much different. I checked the files and all of the CMYK values were the same, they were all 100% opacity and had a normal blend mode.

I grabbed a blue square from one file and pasted it into the file with the wrong blue, and they looked identical, but when printed there was a big difference. I checked the CMYK value of both spot colors and they were identical!

Has anyone ever had this happen, and does anyone know why?

Thanks!

[Ton Frederiks]

Can you share an Illustrator file with both swatches?

Dropbox, WeTransfer, CC filesharing...

Which Illustrator and OS version are you using?

[Danny Whitehead.]

judithm12809063  wrote

I checked the CMYK value of both spot colors and they were identical!

Will these file be printed using actual spot inks?

If not, don't use spot swatches. The conversion to CMYK that a printers RIP or workflow does, will likely be lead by the name of the spot colour, rather than the CMYK values.

If they will be printed with spot inks, use the same Pantone swatch everywhere, and the printer will use the same ink.

[Joely]

Is it possible that you have a different color Profile in that one single file? See Color settings with this document open…

[Srishti Bali]

Hi Judith,

We have been waiting for your response to this query.

Kindly update the discussion if the issue is resolved or if you need further assistance with it.

Thanks,

Srishti