Adding touch plates to images

RP
Posted By
Rick_Pusey
Oct 20, 2006
Views
683
Replies
8
Status
Closed
I wanted some insight on adding PMS touch plates to color images for print production. This is a step by step process, I’d like to know if I could expect this to work, or if other methods may work better:

1. Start with a Lab image.

2. Duplicate the background layer.

3. Turn on gamut warning.

4. Select an out of gamut color.

5. Map this to a Pantone color. Sometimes a color one step darker may provide a better working selection, since the actual PMS used will be overprinting and therefore darkening the process colors.

6. Color range (amount varies, usually higher). This will be the spot plate. Name the layer with the PMS number used for the selection, and the color range amount. This is important in case it needs to be redone.

7. Make a new layer with mask, revealing the selection. Fill layer with white. The layer opacity varies but will never be 100, so no complete knockout. Group the layer with the background copy.

8. Add layer mask as a spot channel (invert, solidity 0).

9. Preview CMYK.

10. If layer opacity is lowered much, a PMS color be should one or even two steps lighter than the layer PMS number. Bright out of gamut Pantones work best. Bolstering the high end of the spot channel with a curve may also help, to provide more chroma.

11. Compare the result to the original (background). It should match closely. Watch for posterization or weird looking color transitions, the image will look fake. The touch plate should mix with low percentages of CMY to maintain a natural look.
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L
Lundberg02
Oct 23, 2006
Yeah, sure, that’ll work. What’s a touch plate?
E
eltee
Oct 23, 2006
Lots of problems, but it’s late night here, almost time for bed.

Make your spot channels with calculations in RGB.
(I think I do better by combining copied channels as layers of a new grayscale document and paint, dodge, burn and blend them; for Orange, I start with the negative of Yellow (Blue) with a positive of the Red (Green) on top in Multiply mode or Darken…)

Instead of lowering the opacity, make a mask from the spot and reduce the other colors.
JS
John_Slate
Oct 23, 2006
and print at least the spot plate stochastic. Too many screen angles.
AR
alan_ruta
Oct 23, 2006
"and print at least the spot plate stochastic. Too many screen angles. "

Excellent (or the correct) advice, but many RIP charge quite a bit for a stochastic screen option. I have demoed a color separation program called "ICISS" by Aurelon. IMHO it is hands down the best program for doing out of gamut color on tradition (4 and 5 color presses). For instance if a red Ferrari was being printed instead of using CMYK an LAB calculation is done and perhaps the job might be printed C, Pantone 804, Y, K. It is really an amazing program–there are density and gray balance issues I’ve had with touchplates.

Of course it costs a fortune.

alan
P
PeterK.
Oct 23, 2006
Does it actually create the pantone sep too?
AR
alan_ruta
Oct 23, 2006
Its a truly remarkable program. The way it works (in a broken nutshell) is this: Lets say you have a shot of a butterfly that has brilliant blues (reflex type) but you only have a 4c press.

You take a reading of those out of gamut areas and then find a Pantone color that closely matches those values in HSB or Lab (I forget now).

Then you navigate (there is a bit of a learning curve) thru a series of dialgues/stock graph looking charts that ensure that the gray balance and separation will be good.

Its possible that the job could be printed Reflex Blue M Y K (then you can use traditional screening). Or maybe it will have to be C Reflex M Y K. Even if it requires 5 plates they are five balanced separations.

I think it is much better than touch plates or any of the HiFi color options–its a really full wide gamut.

alan
E
eltee
Oct 23, 2006
full wide gamut? : )
HiFi claims "larger than CMYK"
(that’s reasonable)

Thanks for the heads up on Aurelon.
AR
alan_ruta
Oct 23, 2006
Full wide? I guess I was mixing metaphors a bit.

HiFi has 2 drawbacks for me although I haven’t seen much in a long time so I could simply out of date. I found taht even with its wider gamut it still wasn’t/isn’t always wide enough–but thats a lesser issue.

The larger problem is the press and screen requirements. If you want to do a HiFi job with Spot (dual varnish) varnish you need a 7 or 8 color press. With Aurelon chances are you could get by with 4 color plates and 2 varnish, or a 6-color press.

Drawbacks: Price. Learning curve. Since it is an expensive product however, if you are serious you can get a very extensive demo, tutorial–I’m not sure what to call it. I’m not sure what you would call it–a guy came over from England and spent 2 days with 2 of our color people and had use work thru images, seps, the whole gamut (hehe).

Our company loved the product but wasn’t able to ensure the work to cover the cost. I wish we had the sales people to sell the services but the way the company at the time worked was to first get the work (and farm it out until it was substantial enought) and then purchase the software.

I think I could have really enjoyed working with this product and creating seps with it.

alan

How to Master Sharpening in Photoshop

Give your photos a professional finish with sharpening in Photoshop. Learn to enhance details, create contrast, and prepare your images for print, web, and social media.

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