spot colors

K
Posted By
KatWoman
Aug 29, 2005
Views
303
Replies
7
Status
Closed
I have been asked to make a presentation folder design to be printed in 5 color.
The background will be a specific spot color
I have to add a photo on top and some text with drop shadows.

They are asking for the file to be in PhotoShop format. I thought they would ask for Illustrator but did not. Good because I know PS better than Illy.

My question is, do I have to do anything special to the artwork other than indicate the spot color for the background?
Should the photo be placed upon the spot color or leave white behind it? does it matter?
Will I have problems with he drop shadow of the text?
I am thinking the text will be embedded as a graphic, it has a lot of effects layers on it.

This is what I received as instructions
Here are the answers to your other questions. We do not have any set computer specs. We turn them off so when we get your files our system will work from however your document is set up. As I told you on the phone the best way to set up your pocket folder is 18 x 16. You would have a fold at 9" vertically, and one 12" down, horizontally. You do not need to mark those folds in any way. We already know. You do not need to put crop marks. If you would like to include bleeds, we prefer 1/8th" on all 4 sides. Since the border is going to be a solid color you could do this easily. If you don’t, we can.

This is how to chose your select your desired spot color in PhotoShop and get it to convert to CMYK.

1. Double click on your foreground/background color tool in your toolbar. this will open a dialog box for color selection.

2. Select Pantone Solid Coated.
from here you can scroll down through the colors until you get to your desired color (PMS 311, or whatever you choose).

3. Press OK
the color will then be the foreground color on your
foreground/background button in your toolbar.

4. You can open your color swatches tool. At the bottom of the swatches window the is a button that says "Create A New Swatch to Foreground Color". Press this button and it will save your selected PMS color in the swatches. It will be in CMYK.

I hope that wasn’t too technical. I am sure your designer will know what I’m talking about.

You can save the finished document as a .psd file, PDF is actually preferable. If saving as a PDF you might want to convert the text to outlines and flatten the image.

Let me know if you have any more questions.

Master Retouching Hair

Learn how to rescue details, remove flyaways, add volume, and enhance the definition of hair in any photo. We break down every tool and technique in Photoshop to get picture-perfect hair, every time.

T
Tacit
Aug 30, 2005
In article <EIIQe.17655$>,
"KatWoman" wrote:

I have been asked to make a presentation folder design to be printed in 5 color.
The background will be a specific spot color
I have to add a photo on top and some text with drop shadows.
They are asking for the file to be in PhotoShop format. I thought they would ask for Illustrator but did not. Good because I know PS better than Illy.

What? Who is "they"? Anyone asking for a final piece designed completely in Photoshop is being foolish. They should be asking for the final layout to be done in a page layout program, with the vector elements done in Illustrator and photographs done in Photoshop.

My question is, do I have to do anything special to the artwork other than indicate the spot color for the background?

You must make the spot color as a spot channel.

Should the photo be placed upon the spot color or leave white behind it? does it matter?

If you do not make a white knockout for the photograph, the spot color will print right over the photograph. It will look OK on your screen but will not print OK on press.

Will I have problems with he drop shadow of the text?

The drop shadows will be fine provided they are set to "multiply," which will make them overprint the spot color.

I am thinking the text will be embedded as a graphic, it has a lot of effects layers on it.

If it is not set as text, it will be rasterized (broken up into pixels) and will not print smoothly.

This is what I received as instructions
Here are the answers to your other questions. We do not have any set computer specs. We turn them off so when we get your files our system will work from however your document is set up. As I told you on the phone the best way to set up your pocket folder is 18 x 16. You would have a fold at 9" vertically, and one 12" down, horizontally. You do not need to mark those folds in any way. We already know. You do not need to put crop marks. If you would like to include bleeds, we prefer 1/8th" on all 4 sides. Since the border is going to be a solid color you could do this easily. If you don’t, we can.

This is how to chose your select your desired spot color in PhotoShop and get it to convert to CMYK.

1. Double click on your foreground/background color tool in your toolbar. this will open a dialog box for color selection.

2. Select Pantone Solid Coated.
from here you can scroll down through the colors until you get to your desired color (PMS 311, or whatever you choose).

3. Press OK
the color will then be the foreground color on your
foreground/background button in your toolbar.

4. You can open your color swatches tool. At the bottom of the swatches window the is a button that says "Create A New Swatch to Foreground Color". Press this button and it will save your selected PMS color in the swatches. It will be in CMYK.

If you do this, your job will be 4 color, not 5 color. The job will NOT print with a spot color.

I hope that wasn’t too technical. I am sure your designer will know what I’m talking about.

You can save the finished document as a .psd file, PDF is actually preferable. If saving as a PDF you might want to convert the text to outlines and flatten the image.

Let me know if you have any more questions.

Wow. You’re dealing with a SFUP. That explains a lot… 🙂


Art, photography, shareware, polyamory, literature, kink: all at http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html
K
KatWoman
Aug 30, 2005
"tacit" wrote in message
In article <EIIQe.17655$>,
"KatWoman" wrote:

I have been asked to make a presentation folder design to be printed in 5 color.
The background will be a specific spot color
I have to add a photo on top and some text with drop shadows.
They are asking for the file to be in PhotoShop format. I thought they would
ask for Illustrator but did not. Good because I know PS better than Illy.

What? Who is "they"? Anyone asking for a final piece designed completely in Photoshop is being foolish. They should be asking for the final layout to be done in a page layout program, with the vector elements done in Illustrator and photographs done in Photoshop.

My question is, do I have to do anything special to the artwork other than
indicate the spot color for the background?

You must make the spot color as a spot channel.

Should the photo be placed upon the spot color or leave white behind it? does it matter?

If you do not make a white knockout for the photograph, the spot color will print right over the photograph. It will look OK on your screen but will not print OK on press.

Will I have problems with he drop shadow of the text?

The drop shadows will be fine provided they are set to "multiply," which will make them overprint the spot color.

I am thinking the text will be embedded as a graphic, it has a lot of effects layers on it.

If it is not set as text, it will be rasterized (broken up into pixels) and will not print smoothly.

This is what I received as instructions
Here are the answers to your other questions. We do not have any set
…snip>

Wow. You’re dealing with a SFUP. That explains a lot… 🙂

yeah think this is gonna be a messy one
I should do this in ILLY and then PDF it but so far I only made one job for print in Illy and the photos came out with too much black, so I am nervous about it.
Dammit I am not an AD and this may be beyond my expertise.
K
KatWoman
Aug 30, 2005
"KatWoman" wrote in message
"tacit" wrote in message
In article <EIIQe.17655$>,
"KatWoman" wrote:

I have been asked to make a presentation folder design to be printed in 5
color.
The background will be a specific spot color
I have to add a photo on top and some text with drop shadows.
They are asking for the file to be in PhotoShop format. I thought they would
ask for Illustrator but did not. Good because I know PS better than Illy.

What? Who is "they"? Anyone asking for a final piece designed completely in Photoshop is being foolish. They should be asking for the final layout to be done in a page layout program, with the vector elements done in Illustrator and photographs done in Photoshop.

My question is, do I have to do anything special to the artwork other than
indicate the spot color for the background?

You must make the spot color as a spot channel.

Should the photo be placed upon the spot color or leave white behind it? does it matter?

If you do not make a white knockout for the photograph, the spot color will print right over the photograph. It will look OK on your screen but will not print OK on press.

Will I have problems with he drop shadow of the text?

The drop shadows will be fine provided they are set to "multiply," which will make them overprint the spot color.

I am thinking the text will be embedded as a graphic, it has a lot of effects layers on it.

If it is not set as text, it will be rasterized (broken up into pixels) and will not print smoothly.

This is what I received as instructions
Here are the answers to your other questions. We do not have any set
…snip>

Wow. You’re dealing with a SFUP. That explains a lot… 🙂

yeah think this is gonna be a messy one
I should do this in ILLY and then PDF it but so far I only made one job for print in Illy and the photos came out with too much black, so I am nervous about it.
Dammit I am not an AD and this may be beyond my expertise.

I tried opening the PDF template in Illy and pasting the text from PS but it only shows an empty box.

I went to PS and opened the template, put a photo and some text layers with effects layers on those.
made a selection around the photo leaving a bit of overlap of spot color over the photo. But now the spot color covers the text.
I saved them as PDF in layers the files are 45 MB. So I tried flattening the whole and it’s about 12 MB. If I open the PDF in PS or Acrobat it looks perfect. In Illy the colors are disastrous!!!! All the turquoise spot color is aqua, the flesh is pinkish in the photo. The extremely weird part is the swatch in the PDF file opened in Illy looks exactly as it should and does not match it’s own file on the screen. I can’t find any color management tools in ILLY. When the file opens it only allows convert or cancel. The files are already in CMYK. (default pre press PS 5? I think)

so now I’m totally confused………….
P
PH
Aug 30, 2005
KatWoman wrote:
"KatWoman" wrote in message
"tacit" wrote in message
In article <EIIQe.17655$>,
"KatWoman" wrote:

I have been asked to make a presentation folder design to be printed in 5
color.
The background will be a specific spot color
I have to add a photo on top and some text with drop shadows.
They are asking for the file to be in PhotoShop format. I thought they would
ask for Illustrator but did not. Good because I know PS better than Illy.

What? Who is "they"? Anyone asking for a final piece designed completely in Photoshop is being foolish. They should be asking for the final layout to be done in a page layout program, with the vector elements done in Illustrator and photographs done in Photoshop.

My question is, do I have to do anything special to the artwork other than
indicate the spot color for the background?

You must make the spot color as a spot channel.

Should the photo be placed upon the spot color or leave white behind it? does it matter?

If you do not make a white knockout for the photograph, the spot color will print right over the photograph. It will look OK on your screen but will not print OK on press.

Will I have problems with he drop shadow of the text?

The drop shadows will be fine provided they are set to "multiply," which will make them overprint the spot color.

I am thinking the text will be embedded as a graphic, it has a lot of effects layers on it.

If it is not set as text, it will be rasterized (broken up into pixels) and will not print smoothly.

This is what I received as instructions
Here are the answers to your other questions. We do not have any set
…snip>

Wow. You’re dealing with a SFUP. That explains a lot… 🙂

yeah think this is gonna be a messy one
I should do this in ILLY and then PDF it but so far I only made one job for print in Illy and the photos came out with too much black, so I am nervous about it.
Dammit I am not an AD and this may be beyond my expertise.

I tried opening the PDF template in Illy and pasting the text from PS but it only shows an empty box.

I went to PS and opened the template, put a photo and some text layers with effects layers on those.
made a selection around the photo leaving a bit of overlap of spot color over the photo. But now the spot color covers the text.
I saved them as PDF in layers the files are 45 MB. So I tried flattening the whole and it’s about 12 MB. If I open the PDF in PS or Acrobat it looks perfect. In Illy the colors are disastrous!!!! All the turquoise spot color is aqua, the flesh is pinkish in the photo. The extremely weird part is the swatch in the PDF file opened in Illy looks exactly as it should and does not match it’s own file on the screen. I can’t find any color management tools in ILLY. When the file opens it only allows convert or cancel. The files are already in CMYK. (default pre press PS 5? I think)
so now I’m totally confused………….

I am not a Color Management expert…..by far I am, that is why I am so happy with CS2. It is all so well organized.

In your case (I am on Illy 10) look under Edit >> Color Settings.

Make sure they are set the same as in Photoshop.

What you really need to do is what has been said: use a page lay out program. Edit the photo in Photoshop, make whatever you need in Illustrator (for instance the drop shadow) place it in InDesign or Xpress or Pagemaker (why not) and there you should place the spot background and lay out the text.

But OK. I read your posting (thats why I did not cut any). You need to set the photo in PS to kick out the background (the spot color). Forget about the overlap of the spot color on the photo, that is not the way and I do not think it is important in this case.

You might do it all in Illustrator, but maybe I do not
follow you?
Import the photo in Illustrator, give it a background and add the text? But make sure the color settings are the same as in PS. And import the Photo as an EPS.

After you are done (whether in a page lay out program or in Illustrator) save it as a PDF. If you can not do that
directly, print it as a Postscript file to your HD and then Distill it to PDF. The last method gives you a much smaller file. —
steg
T
Tacit
Aug 31, 2005
In article <Wx0Re.18965$>,
"KatWoman" wrote:

yeah think this is gonna be a messy one
I should do this in ILLY and then PDF it but so far I only made one job for print in Illy and the photos came out with too much black, so I am nervous about it.

You mean that you placed a Photoshop photo in Illustrator, and it came out too dark in print?

When you placed the image from Photoshop, was it RGB or CMYK?


Art, photography, shareware, polyamory, literature, kink: all at http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html
K
KatWoman
Aug 31, 2005
"tacit" wrote in message
In article <Wx0Re.18965$>,
"KatWoman" wrote:

yeah think this is gonna be a messy one
I should do this in ILLY and then PDF it but so far I only made one job for
print in Illy and the photos came out with too much black, so I am nervous
about it.

You mean that you placed a Photoshop photo in Illustrator, and it came out too dark in print? YES

When you placed the image from Photoshop, was it RGB or CMYK? CMYK

Art, photography, shareware, polyamory, literature, kink: all at http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html

I was using Illy to check the PDF’s I was making from PSD files. they looked good in Acrobat reader and PS and totally different in Illy I also realized that as I was creating the PDF’s I had left the spot channel and a color background as a layer.
I do need to check the Illy color settings.

On the previous and only job I created in Illy, I was placing CMYK photo from PS. It looked matching on the monitor and in print was way too much black. Could just be a cheap/bad printer. I was using their template and it still printed off register too, the sides of the package did not meet up at the seams.

Oh well, after figuring out the spot channel (I learned how to at least) I get this email from the salesman

I would appreciate if you could send us the unflattened PhotoShop file. Not eh PDF, but the PSD file. We can probably get the file to look how you want it. We are going to print this in CMYK, without the spot PMS 3115. We would use the CMYK equivalent to that PMS color. I noticed that you had something similar to that color in the file, but not quite. Do you want us to use the CYK values that you had selected for the background color? Please le me know.

So now they are going to mess with it from my PSD format file. I will wait for a proof and hope for the best.
K
KatWoman
Aug 31, 2005
"steggy" wrote in message
KatWoman wrote:
"KatWoman" wrote in message
"tacit" wrote in message
In article <EIIQe.17655$>,
"KatWoman" wrote:

I have been asked to make a presentation folder design to be printed in
5
color.
The background will be a specific spot color
I have to add a photo on top and some text with drop shadows.
They are asking for the file to be in PhotoShop format. I thought they
would
ask for Illustrator but did not. Good because I know PS better than Illy.

What? Who is "they"? Anyone asking for a final piece designed completely
in Photoshop is being foolish. They should be asking for the final layout to be done in a page layout program, with the vector elements done in Illustrator and photographs done in Photoshop.

My question is, do I have to do anything special to the artwork other than
indicate the spot color for the background?

You must make the spot color as a spot channel.

Should the photo be placed upon the spot color or leave white behind it?
does it matter?

If you do not make a white knockout for the photograph, the spot color will print right over the photograph. It will look OK on your screen but
will not print OK on press.

Will I have problems with he drop shadow of the text?

The drop shadows will be fine provided they are set to "multiply," which
will make them overprint the spot color.

I am thinking the text will be embedded as a graphic, it has a lot of effects layers on it.

If it is not set as text, it will be rasterized (broken up into pixels)
and will not print smoothly.

This is what I received as instructions
Here are the answers to your other questions. We do not have any set
…snip>

Wow. You’re dealing with a SFUP. That explains a lot… 🙂

yeah think this is gonna be a messy one
I should do this in ILLY and then PDF it but so far I only made one job for print in Illy and the photos came out with too much black, so I am nervous about it.
Dammit I am not an AD and this may be beyond my expertise.

I tried opening the PDF template in Illy and pasting the text from PS but it
only shows an empty box.

I went to PS and opened the template, put a photo and some text layers with
effects layers on those.
made a selection around the photo leaving a bit of overlap of spot color over the photo. But now the spot color covers the text.
I saved them as PDF in layers the files are 45 MB. So I tried flattening the
whole and it’s about 12 MB. If I open the PDF in PS or Acrobat it looks perfect. In Illy the colors are disastrous!!!! All the turquoise spot color
is aqua, the flesh is pinkish in the photo. The extremely weird part is the
swatch in the PDF file opened in Illy looks exactly as it should and does not match it’s own file on the screen. I can’t find any color management tools in ILLY. When the file opens it only allows convert or cancel. The files are already in CMYK. (default pre press PS 5? I think)
so now I’m totally confused………….

I am not a Color Management expert…..by far I am, that is why I am so happy with CS2. It is all so well organized.
In your case (I am on Illy 10) look under Edit >> Color Settings.
Make sure they are set the same as in Photoshop.

What you really need to do is what has been said: use a page lay out program. Edit the photo in Photoshop, make whatever you need in Illustrator (for instance the drop shadow) place it in InDesign or Xpress or Pagemaker (why not) and there you should place the spot background and lay out the text.
But OK. I read your posting (thats why I did not cut any). You need to set the photo in PS to kick out the background (the spot color). Forget about the overlap of the spot color on the photo, that is not the way and I do not think it is important in this case.

You might do it all in Illustrator, but maybe I do not
follow you?
Import the photo in Illustrator, give it a background and add the text? But make sure the color settings are the same as in PS. And import the Photo as an EPS.

After you are done (whether in a page lay out program or in Illustrator) save it as a PDF. If you can not do that
directly, print it as a Postscript file to your HD and then Distill it to PDF. The last method gives you a much smaller file. —
steg

thanks for your help and advice
see my latest post, the print place says they can handle it from my psd file. I also sent them the fonts and the photo files in case they have to make it for me from the layout.

I seem to have not exactly described the layout
background color to match the CMYK spot color (I thought it had to actually be a spot color but I was mistaken)
on top of that I had one photo with stroke and outer glow then the text (with effects and outer glow) had to be overlap the photo with the rest above the "spot" color.

Must-have mockup pack for every graphic designer 🔥🔥🔥

Easy-to-use drag-n-drop Photoshop scene creator with more than 2800 items.

Related Discussion Topics

Nice and short text about related topics in discussion sections