What’s neutral gray?

A designer is working with one of my photographs, laying it out as a poster. His typeface below my image is supposed to be a pale neutral gray. However, what he’s showing me in the proof is a reddish gray. He says it’s composed equally of 6% cyan, 6% magenta and 6% yellow. When I do type here with those units of cyan, magenta and yellow it looks reddish on my calibrated monitor.

In fact the spectrum in the Photoshop Color Picker just to the right of the grays is reddish with those units until the cyan is upped to 9%. At that point the colors to the right of the grays jumps to blues on the color picker. There is a dramatic shift in the spectrum just by going from 8% to 9% cyan. That appears to be the crossover point. When I use 9% cyan, 6% magenta and 6% yellow the type looks decidedly more neutral.
I have noticed that in the Color Picker if you check the box Web Only Colors the grays shown there always have more cyan than magenta or yellow and yet, they always look neutral.

The designer says that he can see no difference in his japanese color swatches between 6C+6M+6Y and 9C+6M+6Y. Nor can he see much difference on screen. I sure can!!!! He says the difference is imperceptable and that adding 3% cyan is so tiny an amount that it’s neglible. Excuse me but the difference between 6% and 9% appears to be 50%. That’s not negligible. Who’s wrong here?

Why do neutral grays require more cyan? Or do they?

How much difference would there be when I go to press using high quality offset? Isn’t there still going to be a perceptable difference?
I opted for light gray, by the way so my name under the image wouldn’t distract from the image, itself. The lettering had been vibrant blue before I protested.

A designer is working with one of my photographs, laying it out as a poster. His typeface below my image is supposed to be a pale neutral gray. However, what he’s showing me in the proof is a reddish gray. He says it’s composed equally of 6% cyan, 6% magenta and 6% yellow. When I do type here with those units of cyan, magenta and yellow it looks reddish on my calibrated monitor.

In fact the spectrum in the Photoshop Color Picker just to the right of the grays is reddish with those units until the cyan is upped to 9%. At that point the colors to the right of the grays jumps to blues on the color picker. There is a dramatic shift in the spectrum just by going from 8% to 9% cyan. That appears to be the crossover point. When I use 9% cyan, 6% magenta and 6% yellow the type looks decidedly more neutral.
I have noticed that in the Color Picker if you check the box Web Only Colors the grays shown there always have more cyan than magenta or yellow and yet, they always look neutral.

The designer says that he can see no difference in his japanese color swatches between 6C+6M+6Y and 9C+6M+6Y. Nor can he see much difference on screen. I sure can!!!! He says the difference is imperceptable and that adding 3% cyan is so tiny an amount that it’s neglible. Excuse me but the difference between 6% and 9% appears to be 50%. That’s not negligible. Who’s wrong here?

Why do neutral grays require more cyan? Or do they?

How much difference would there be when I go to press using high quality offset? Isn’t there still going to be a perceptable difference?
I opted for light gray, by the way so my name under the image wouldn’t distract from the image, itself. The lettering had been vibrant blue before I protested.

If R=G=B=X for all values of X do not result in neutral gray, you may be using a color gamut which is
not gray balanced, or your monitor may not be profiled correctly.

Why do neutral grays require more cyan? Or do they?

A designer is working with one of my photographs, laying it out as a poster. His typeface below my image is supposed to be a pale neutral gray. However, what he’s showing me in the proof is a reddish gray. He says it’s composed equally of 6% cyan, 6% magenta and 6% yellow. When I do type here with those units of cyan, magenta and yellow it looks reddish on my calibrated monitor.

In fact the spectrum in the Photoshop Color Picker just to the right of the grays is reddish with those units until the cyan is upped to 9%. At that point the colors to the right of the grays jumps to blues on the color picker. There is a dramatic shift in the spectrum just by going from 8% to 9% cyan. That appears to be the crossover point. When I use 9% cyan, 6% magenta and 6% yellow the type looks decidedly more neutral.

I have noticed that in the Color Picker if you check the box Web Only Colors the grays shown there always have more cyan than magenta or yellow and yet, they always look neutral.

The designer says that he can see no difference in his japanese color swatches between 6C+6M+6Y and 9C+6M+6Y. Nor can he see much difference on screen. I sure can!!!! He says the difference is imperceptable and that adding 3% cyan is so tiny an amount that it’s neglible. Excuse me but the difference between 6% and 9% appears to be 50%. That’s not negligible. Who’s wrong here?

Why do neutral grays require more cyan? Or do they?

How much difference would there be when I go to press using high quality offset? Isn’t there still going to be a perceptable difference?

I opted for light gray, by the way so my name under the image wouldn’t distract from the image, itself. The lettering had been vibrant blue before I protested.

Boy, have these replies been helpful!!!! Thank you!

Hmmmm. Now how to present this to the art director?