colour management with images in freehand

[redpen99]

If I import a cmyk (or rgb) image which I have been working with in Photoshop
into Freehand, regardless of whether it is a tiff, jpeg or eps the colours are
never the same. The image in Freehand appears more contrasty, with bright
colours going super bright and dark colours even darker.

When printing out litho, there is no problem, however when printing on a
deskjet or laser printer the image is much darker than it should be.
I have fiddled with the preferences and tried out a few options, even tried to
recalibrate my display colours and it has made no difference.
Is is a Photoshop problem? Should I recalibrate my colours in pshop?

[Judy Arndt]

What version of FH? What is your platform and OS?

If you're on a Mac, try setting up Color Management using ColorSync, with
the inkjet printer's profile selected as composite printer and 'composite
simulates separations' unchecked.

Judy Arndt

redpen99 wrote:

> If I import a cmyk (or rgb) image which I have been working with in Photoshop
> into Freehand, regardless of whether it is a tiff, jpeg or eps the colours are
> never the same. The image in Freehand appears more contrasty, with bright
> colours going super bright and dark colours even darker.
>
> When printing out litho, there is no problem, however when printing on a
> deskjet or laser printer the image is much darker than it should be.
> I have fiddled with the preferences and tried out a few options, even tried to
> recalibrate my display colours and it has made no difference.
> Is is a Photoshop problem? Should I recalibrate my colours in pshop?
>

[redpen99]

Hi Judy

Thank you for your response.

I am currently working on a pc, Windows 2000, with FH9.
I teach design and the problems arise when my students take their disks to
small printshops to have proofs printed out, the results are unsatisfactory.
I have struggled with this particular problem for years, however with jobs
going to high end printing it has never been a problem. I always assumed it was
a post script communication problem between Fh and Pshop.

The colour management settings in FH preferences don't make any difference
either. I have had a look at the import preferences as well, however no luck
there either. I believe this problem is common on both pc and mac platforms.
Have you had problems with the colours of images in FH?

Sandi

[Judy Arndt]

Sandi,

What kinds of colors are the students using in their documents? RGB, CMYK,
Pantone solid?

Are the students taking native FreeHand files, EPS files or rasterized
images to the print shops?

What kind of printers are being used for proofing? Postscript or
non-Postscript? Do they use RGB input and convert to proprietary inks, such
as the Epson photo printers?

Are the print shops printing directly from FreeHand or are they using
another application such as Quark to print from?

If you can define the workflow in more precise terms, then perhaps someone
here can help you with the specifics.

Judy Arndt

redpen99 wrote:

> I am currently working on a pc, Windows 2000, with FH9. I teach design and the
> problems arise when my students take their disks to small printshops to have
> proofs printed out, the results are unsatisfactory. I have struggled with this
> particular problem for years, however with jobs going to high end printing it
> has never been a problem. I always assumed it was a post script communication
> problem between Fh and Pshop.
>
> The colour management settings in FH preferences don't make any difference
> either. I have had a look at the import preferences as well, however no luck
> there either. I believe this problem is common on both pc and mac platforms.
> Have you had problems with the colours of images in FH?

[redpen99]

Hi Judy

The format doesn't seem to alter the problem, whether it is an eps, jpg or
tiff, in cmyk or rgb the problem is consistent. Visually the display on screen
is different between Fh and Pshop. When imported into FH it appears 3 shades
darker.

The printing problem only occurs when printing out on a non postscript
printer. I have the same problem when working in Fh9, Fh10 or MX. The local
printshops that we use all print directly from Freehand.

The workflow is usually to create a composite montage in Photoshop which is
then imported into Freehand as part of a layout. The image is then embedded and
the FH file is taken to print.

Thanks
Sandi

[Danny Whitehead]

redpen99 wrote:

> The colour management settings in FH preferences don't make any difference either.

That's pretty dismissive. What have you tried? The idea is to have your
Freehand CM settings mirror your Photoshop ones as closely as possible.
This is assuming you have decided that Photoshop is set up 'correctly'.
If you're preparing artwork for all kinds of printing at various 'local
print shops', with PS and non-PS, CMYK and RGB output devices, it most
likely isn't, but that's another can of worms.

--


Danny

[redpen99]

Hi Danny

aha, I think we may have something here. Yes it is possible that I haven't set
up my colour management in photoshop up correctly because I haven't done this
at all.

Regarding the FH preferences what I meant is that in the preferences I
systematically went through all the colour preferences to see if there was a
difference with any of the settings and with regard to this specific problem it
made absolutely no difference.

How should I set up the colour in Photoshop to maintain a consistent colour
balance between the 2 applications?

Sandi

[Danny Whitehead]

Here's a screenshot of my Freehand MX and Photoshop CS colour management
settings, side by side:
[url]http://www.bqprint.co.uk/otherstuff/cmsettingsosx.jpg[/url]

Those settings may not be appropriate for you, though. If you're in the
US, then maybe you'd be better off with Photoshop's "US Prepress
Defaults" settings. You'll notice that Freehand requires you to pick a
monitor profile, whereas Photoshop picks it automatically. The first
thing you should do when setting up colour management is profile your
monitor. I use SuperCal, but that's Mac-only. I'm not sure what's
available for Windows.

None of this will guarantee that what comes out of the printer or off
the press will be what you saw on screen, though. For that, you need the
print shops you use to have their CM set up right, and them to supply
you with profiles of their output devices.

--


Danny

[redpen99]

Hi Danny

Thanks for your input. I think this has solved the problem.

The settings I have available in the colour preferences are about half of what
you have and it is probably because I am working in FH9 not MX. I changed the
settings to Kodak Colour and with the monitor simulating a separations printer,
I don't have the option for Euroscale however with these new settings the image
appears accurate on screen, I am just not sure about the printout yet.

thank you so much for your advice

Sandi

[Danny Whitehead]

redpen99 wrote:

> The settings I have available in the colour preferences are about half of what
> you have and it is probably because I am working in FH9 not MX.I changed the
> settings to Kodak Colour and with the monitor simulating a separations printer,

Unfortunately, nothing has changed since FH9 regarding colour
management. ColorSync is only available on a Mac, though, so Windows
users have to use the Kodak CMM, as you have. They both give you the
same options.

> I don't have the option for Euroscale however with these new settings the image
> appears accurate on screen, I am just not sure about the printout yet.

The Euroscale Coated v2 profile is installed by Adobe applications, but
I'm not sure where in Windows. In OS X, you have to move it for Freehand
to see it, but I wouldn't know the locations of profiles in Windows.
Maybe a search for files with the .icc and .icm extensions will help you
find them.

--


Danny