Color-managing pdfs for printing – Adobe Illustrator CS3 User Manual
Page 146
ILLUSTRATOR CS3
User Guide
140
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Purchase a profile for your specific printer and paper. This method involves printing a profiling target on your
printer and paper, and providing that target to a company that will create a specific profile. This is more expensive
than purchasing a standard profile, but can provide better results because it compensates for any manufacturing
variations in printers.
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Create your own profile using a scanner-based system. This method involves using profile-creation software and
your own flatbed scanner to scan the profiling target. It can provide excellent results for matte surface papers, but
not glossy papers. (Glossy papers tend to have fluorescent brighteners in them that look different to a scanner than
they do in room light.)
•
Create your own profile using a hardware profile-creation tool. This method is expensive but can provide the best
results. A good hardware tool can create an accurate profile even with glossy papers.
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Tweak a profile created using one of the previous methods with profile-editing software. This software can be
complex to use, but it lets you correct problems with a profile or simply adjust a profile to produce results more to
your taste.
See also
“Install a color profile” on page 143
Color-managing PDFs for printing
When you create Adobe PDFs for commercial printing, you can specify how color information is represented. The
easiest way to do this is using a PDF/X standard; however, you can also specify color-handling options manually in
the Output section of the PDF dialog box. For more information about PDF/X and how to create PDFs, search Help.
In general, you have the following choices for handling colors when creating PDFs:
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(PDF/X-3) Does not convert colors. Use this method when creating a document that will be printed or displayed
on various or unknown devices. When you select a PDF/X-3 standard, color profiles are automatically embedded
in the PDF.
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(PDF/X-1a) Converts all colors to the destination CMYK color space. Use this method if you want to create a
press-ready file that does not require any further color conversions. When you select a PDF/X-1a standard, no
profiles are embedded in the PDF.
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(Illustrator and InDesign) Converts colors that have embedded profiles to the destination color space, but
preserves the numbers for those colors without embedded profiles. You can manually select this option in the
Output section of the PDF dialog box. Use this method if the document contains CMYK images that aren’t color-
managed and you want to make sure that the color numbers are preserved.
Note: All spot color information is preserved during color conversion; only the process color equivalents convert to the
designated color space.
See also