posted
I was considering doing a step by step on "how to match vinyl colors between your design program and printer." And was wondering if this is something that many of you would be interested in seeing.
While working in the screenprint industry as a designer, my employers were very picky that the colors on the printouts matched as closely as possible the vinyl colors they were intended to represent.
I don't know if signmakers are interested in being able to match printouts to actual colors, so am asking up front to find out.
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Don, I think that would be great.. I fear that it might not be shown in my program format (corel d 9), but is the method versatile to all drawing programs? One other question.. I find that jpg or bitmaps produce much wider and pleasing color ranges than color available in drawing programs. (i.e.... maroon on a jpg is great, where maroon on a printed corel spot color is awful, in rgb or cymk. Is this because they are singlular spot colors and the bitmaps are in conglomerated bits or groups of colors? Many of the pallates in Corel draw, will get no where near what I need to accomplish. I can only assume this is true with all drawing programs. The screen presentation is bad enough, but the printer, (and I have a good inkjet 952c ) is much worse on its rendition. Have I missed something important? Thanks for any input.... Jack
-------------------- "Don't change horses in midstream, unless you spot one with longer legs" bronzeo oti Jack Davis 1410 Main St Joplin, MO 64801 www.imagemakerart.com jack@imagemakerart.com Posts: 1549 | From: Joplin, MO | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
I'd sure like to see a step by step on that topic too. I was noticing that in my demo copy of Vinylmaster Pro, they have pallets matching many of the vinyl maufacturers, and that seemed like a major selling point for that program. Also I always wondered about making a color palette to match one shot. How difficult is that? Lots of us do sketches for painted stuff.
-------------------- Jeff Ogden 8727 NE 68 Terr. Gainesville FL, 32609 Posts: 2138 | From: 8827 NE 68 Terr Gainesville Fl 32609 | Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
Don, I think it would make a great step by step.
Jeff, In case you are intersted we have a CorelDraw 7 palette for Epson Colour Stylus 500 featuring 32 1Shot paint colours on our website that you can download. It also comes with a color chart file.
posted
Thank you for the responses. The only signshop I've ever worked in was my own, and that was pre computer....so it was a shot in the dark as to whether this was something a sign shop would be interested in. I'll put something together in the near future and put up a new post when it's online.
Jack, the process will be the same on Corel. I'll write the step by step for Illustrator and you should be able to go from there fairly easily. The primary drawing program function required is a blend too, which I am fairly sure is common to any drawing program.
As far as raster vs vector color, one thing to look at is if you're looking at cmyk on one and then rgb on the other. Your printer is cmyk and your monitor is rgb. Also, your monitor may not be calibrated (I know that mine isn't hahahaha) At the screenprint shop, we had all the monitors calibrated. To do it right requires a colorimeter and software, which start out at about $400 on up. I'm not quite that anal. (can we say anal here, Steve?)
Well, I've got work to do now, but will get on that step by step this week.
Posts: 4084 | From: ... | Registered: Nov 1998
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