RGB to CMYK Conversion

Does the newer version of Photoshop Elements 13 offer the capability of converting/saving files in CMYK mode like the full commercial of Photoshop does? My older version of Photoshop Elements does not.

GEOman73!!
If your program is Photoshop Elements, then you have posted in the wrong forum. Somehow your thread has been posted in the Adobe Premiere Elements Forum (video editing). As far as I know neither Photoshop Elements nor Premiere Elements support still images with the CMYK color profile.
Best re-post your Photoshop Elements thread in the Adobe Photoshop Elements Forum or wait for a moderator here to see your thread here and move it from here to there.
Photoshop Elements
ATR

Similar Messages

RGB to CMYK conversion issue- Pulling my hair out@

Hi there-
I have downloaded a VECTOR image from Shutterstock, and it was built as an RGB file. When I try to convert it to CMYK (File-->Document Mode-->Concert to CMYK), it totally whacks out the image. I have tried everything I know how to do, and can't figure this out. I've tried changing the colors in the palette to CMYK, but it doesn't convert them permanently.
I'm attaching two files (as JPEGS so you can see the problem), one shows the sunshine image nice and smooth. The other is after the conversion to CMYK.
If you have any ideas, or want to see the actual file, please email me at [email protected] and I will send you the actual .eps file.
THANK YOU!
Brent

Original file above.
Select all
Object> Flatten transparency (check preserve alpha transparency with slider to 100 vector)
Change color settings (edit> color settings) to emulate Illustrator 6.
Convert to cmyk mode
Results
There were two main issues converting to cmyk.
Use of screen blending mode and the gradients themselves.
Screen blending mode was described in previous posts.
The gradients look also changed when converting from rgb to cmyk. If the screen blending mode was switched to normal, when converting to cmyk, the gradients would not look the same.
Flattening transparency is not an elegant solution, but it is a quick and dirty one.
Mario described this method in a previous post.
Depending on your color settings, it may yield unwanted artifact colors. Turning off CM, setting to Illustrator 6 emulation, will not yield the artifacts.

RGB to CMYK conversion in Java

Hi All,
I want to take an image maybe in a jpeg or gif format or rgb and convert it to a series of CMYK images (one for each colour). If there an easy way using the API of java 2, or JAI. If not does anybody no an algorithm I can use to implement this conversion.
Cheers,
Adam

The algorithm is fairly easy..
For RGB with components ranging from 0-255...
K=255-(max(R,G,B));
C=((255-R)-K)/(255-K);
M=((255-G)-K)/(255-K);
Y=((255-B)-K)/(255-K);
Thats the quick simple conversion. You may alos do more complex conversions based on how pur the magenta, yellow, and cyan colors are.
A decent overview is here:
http://research.microsoft.com/~hollasch/cgindex/color/cmyk.html

Who should do rgb-CMYK conversion - designers or printers?

I have been having a very interesting discussion on a previous thread in response to problems with the colour conversion from rgb to CMYK using InDesign and the resulting unsatisfactory colours in the final magazine delivered by my printers.
This has raised a number of issues and led me to further research. I would like to air these for a wider debate hence this post.
Perceptive readers will note from my spelling of colour, that I am English and indeed I work out of the UK. I am a historian, writer, photographer and editor. These days it is as a full time freelance but for a long time I was part time when I helped my partner publish a specialist sports magazine.
We started it a long time ago, in the days when you sent a typesetter galleys of type and photos and agreed on a layout. Our typesetters migrated to Pagemaker and we went with them. They and we were PC based and we still are, which is a bit of an anomaly in the design world.
Creating the text in Word was easy enough but the images remained a problem before digital cameras. We had a scanner but it was a flat bed scanner and created rgb images. The printers needed they said CMYK images then only available using cylindrical professional quality scanners. So there was a period when we paid the printers to scan the images for us, from the original photos, paying per print.
One of our small amateur publishing team was a well known professional photographer, so we started out with some high quality images but even so the scanned results, as they appeared in print, were patchy. I particularly remember one feature, covering a major international event where we had been supplied with high quality transparencies by a top class sports photographer and we duly passed on to the printers to scan. The results were clearly out of focus and the photographer was enraged and said he would not work for us again.
Of course we got proofs but they were low resolution in general and when we queried the quality of any image, we were invariably told that the proof did not reflect the final quality image as it would be printed. Trouble was it often did.
We ourselves continued to strip out costs from the magazine and eventually one of our team went on a series of Pagemaker courses and got some hands on experience working next to our former typesetter who was coming up for retirement. We took over the design and found a sympathetic new printer, down the road, also familiar with Pagemaker where we could pop over to look at the proofs, and get a second scan if the first was not OK. All went happily along for quite a few years. The sports magazine got sold and then I got a contract to edit a magazine dealing with the historic environment. By now digital photography had come along but we simply supplied hard copy prints (we use a lot of historical images) or digital images to the printers, with the Pagemaker files and they did the conversion. This routine stayed in place for a few more years and then the owner of the printers sold up and retired.
We found a new printers', a short run magazine specialist who agreed to accept our Pagemaker files (by now 6.5) although they were primarily Quark and Apple based. They did have a handful of PC clients and kept one PC for proofing their work. We continued to send the new printers Pagemaker files for printing and included the source images in case they needed to be redone. It quickly became apparent that the new printers worked down to a price rather than up to a quality and a fast turn around was the main aim. Conversations with their chief designer were perfunctory but because we had a lot of Pagemaker expertise we did not need a lot of support. We were under pressure to move to InDesign and it was probably time anyway.
Around two years ago matters can to a head with a font problem. This turned out to be a known issue with Pagemaker but resolving it caused problems with the printers, who said we had to upgrade to InDesign and it would go away. We were also assured that if we did so, and supplied them with a .pdf from InDesign, we could get a guaranteed result. We were told not to send them any more source images for comparison but to provide CMYK images. How we converted them was up to us.
Our designer went on several InDesign courses but they dealt with the design process and differences from Pagemaker. Getting to a .pdf was the target, not balancing colour thereafter. That was considered the role of the printer and his workflow press press processes.
When we needed to export our first .pdf from InDesign, the chief designer called up our designer and talked him through it. The importance of compatible profiles and presets was never raised. We have never been given any written information by the printers on .pdf presets or profiles we might need to set up at our end. As explained in my earlier thread, we are now required to submit all our images already converted to CMYK and this has caused and continues to cause, problems with the colour balance, in general the final result has too much magenta in it. Matters came to a head with the latest issue.
We are in talks with the printers to resolve this but it seems the chief designer has now left and not been replaced. We have asked if they can do the colour conversion to CMYK for us and the answer has been a definitive "No". Approaches to other printers has met witha standard salesman's response that all we need to provide is a .pdf from InDesign and they will do the rest. All require CMYK images.
It seems to me in all this saga, that the printing community has been busy de-skilling and downsizing and putting responsibilities back onto the end user wwho may not be experienced enough in the area of prepress and colour, to understand the issues involved.
So the question then arises, why can't the printers do the rgb to CMYK conversion anymore? Our printers maintain they are not able to accept any work which requires them to do this. But reading around the subject it seems there are printers who are moving to handling the rgb conversions for their customers "late binding rgb workflow" I think it is called. This is a link to a very interesting article about it in Print Media Management (I assume I can put links here). http://www.printmediamag.co.uk/technical-articles/205.aspx
What does anyone else think about this as a concept?

Just after the turn of the century I was working for a large-format output service. ID had just been released, but nobody used it, and Quark 4 was state of the art. Color management was a "new" concept to everyone I knew.
One of our vendors sold us paper with the promise that they could provide profiles for every stock to match our HP plotter (not that I think we would have necessarily, at that point, understood how to use them). They never managed to do that, and we never managed to match color from the same file on glossy and matte papers. Nor were we able to reliably match color that we saw on screen or in a customer's inkjet or laser proof without making test strips and using five or six times the paper in trial and error adjustments as it took to make a single poster the customer ordered. It was ridiculous, and expensive, and it convinced me that I needed to learn at least the basics of color management. Shortly after I left that job and went freelance.
I switched to InDesign partly because it actually handled color management better than Quark in those days (and may still -- I've never looked back and stopped buying upgrades at 6.5), and I read as much as I could (Real World Color Management from Peachpit Press is an EXCELLENT and easy to understand primer). I also found a local printer for offset where the prepress manager understands CM and profiling, and was willing to talk (we're now good friends), and I also found another large format service where the staff was CM literate. I use a colorimeter to calibrate and profile my monitor, I use the output profiles they recommend and the export settings they ask for, and what I see in print from these vendors "matches my screen as close as dammit," to use the OP's words.
The owner of the offset printery said something I found flattering, but a little shocking, the last time I went for a press check -- I supply the best color in files that need the least amount of adjustment on press of anyone they print for. My attitude is if the print is off at make-ready, it means my numbers are off, and that was my fault. I usually complain the reds aren't bright enough, then let the pressman convince me that if I tweak the reds too much I'll lose the blues and to have confidence that things will fall into place when the ink dries because his measure ink density numbers are where they should be. He's always right, by the way.
Is this shop unusual? Maybe a little for my neck of the woods, but there are plenty of them out there with the same dedication to keeping up with technology at the pre-press end, and the knowledge and experience with putting ink on paper and a commitment to quality and service, so you should be able to find someone almost anywhere. And size is not necessarily an indicator -- this printer is a mom-and-pop shop with two presses, a folder, and a half-dozen employees. Dad has been in the print business for about 40 years and knows only what's rubbed off about color management, but he knows about presses and ink and paper and what will work. The oldest son is the prepress tech, and he's a complete geek, and either one of them will talk to anyone, and wish more of their clients would take the time to ask questions about the printing process and file preparation, and how they can improve the quality of both what comes in and what goes back out.

RGB to CMYK to commercial printer

We are using CS2 InDesign and Photoshop 7 on a PC. I am putting together two
large books. One insert section of the first book has color photos. I have
to prepare these color photos for a printer located in China. They want all
images to be CMYK .tiff.
I have an assortment of about 100 images from various sources around the
world, there are .tif, .jpg. .bmp, and .psd. All of them appear to be RGB.
There are images with: 1) no color profile, 2) sRGB IE60966-2.1, and Adobe
RGB 1998. Do all images need to have the same RGB color profile before
converting to CMYK?
I have been converting all of these to .tif (and using a single dpi/pixel
resolution for
all images).
Do I just select/save as color mode CMYK? Or are there special
settings/profiles I need to know about. Is there anything special for China?
The printer's English is not that clear . I was hoping that someone in this
group would be familiar with RGB to CMYK conversion.
Also, it appears that the final PDF pages (with embedded Tiff images) will
be very large. The first complete book for this project (there are two
books) looks like it will be about 20GB. The second book looks like it could
be 12GB. Both books together equal about 1,000 pages and have about 1,000
images. 90% of the images are grayscale. What are the current technologies
for sending large projects like this to a printer?
Thanks
ps, the Photoshop group suggested that I write to this group.

Tech....
In the conversions, are you referring to conversions of B&W or color images? I'll assume color for the moment.
Assuming your monitor is properly calibrated, and assuming you are viewing your color images on your monitor, your conversions should keep "in gamut" colors the same. You will, however, probably see some loss of dynamic range, color, and saturation as you enter CMYK. If the color and dynamic range of the original is all within the destination CMYK gamut, you should see very little, if any, shift. The sad fact is that CMYK on press has limited dynamic range and color, especially compared to a bright monitor. This is generally true, though CMYK can print some colors that lie outside the typical monitor's gamut.
If you have a brightly colored original in RGB mode, then you should experiment with both perceptual and relative colorimetric rendering to see which one looks best. This is an image by image thing. Relative colorimetric will reproduce all "in gamut colors" as accurately as possible, then will take out of gamut colors and bring them to the closest printable color. This can cause loss of detail and 'piling up of colors' as you near the boundaries of the image's color gamut in the destination CMYK space. Perceptual scales ALL colors and preserves the relationships between colors, which sacrifices color accuracy and saturation, but sometimes looks more natural, especially if there are a LOT of out of gamut colors. Pick whichever ones looks best overall.
Then, once in CMYK, make minor curves adjustments to tweak if for CMYK. Just be careful not to push it too far, especially in the deep shadows, since you may push beyond the ink limit of the press. For example, if you convert to US Web Coated SWOP v2, the ink limits are set at 300 total. If you drastically darken the shadow areas, you could end up with an ink limit of 320, 330, 350, etc. Knowing the ink limit of the press will help you stay within those limits. Final tweaking in CMYK is usually a good thing.
How did you determine that the images were dull with too much magenta? Did you print a proof on a calibrated printer, or is this just your screen display? Or is this from a printed image off the press? I have a well calibrated monitor and accurate custom profiles for my inkjet. If I am sending a job to a press that supposedly prints to US Web Coated SWOP, I can proof that file on my inkjet and get a very good match. We need more information to know exactly what you are doing and how you are assessing your images.
Normally, I do the conversion in Photoshop, using the rendering intent that looks best. Then I tweak the image in CMYK to get it looking its best. I usually have the press profile, but sometimes work with a standard profile if no custom profile is available. I leave the image tagged with my conversion profile. Then, I usually place these images into InDesign, with the profile intact (color management turned on in InDesign). I right click on the placed image to be sure that the profile and rendering intent are set to what I want. Then, I can either supply the InDesign file to the printer, or convert to PDF (leave color unchanged) and make sure that all profiles are included. InDesign should export each image to the PDF properly, along with profile and intent. I have never sent to job to press using Photoshop...only InDesign or Illustrator.
BTW, rendering intent is only used when getting an image from one color space to another, such as a conversion from RGB to CMYK. You do that, choosing the one that looks the best. Once it is in the destination CMYK space, rendering intent is no longer needed, since all the colors and tones have already been remapped into the final space. Rendering intent is just used to help us handle those out of gamut colors.
Hope this helps.
Lou

Hi, cannot convert RGB to CMYK...

I cannot find such an option in the Elements? Can anyone help how can I convert the files to CMYK from RGB using this tool...
Thanks
ansu

Elements can't convert RGB to CMYK. You'd need the full Photoshop.
Otherwise you can google 'RGB to CMYK' conversion to find online or software tools that can do that.
The real question is why do you need CMYK. If it's a request from a printer shop, it's their job and responsibility to do the conversion, since such a conversion can only be properly done when you know the specificity of your printing tools, inks and papers.

Converting RGB to CMYK without flattening

So I made a big mistake and designed something for a client in RGB format Theres only 2 layers out of 14 with colour so how do I go about changing the whole document to CMYK without flattening the document? Or are there any other alternatives?
Thanks

When you choose Image > Mode and check CMYK you will be presented with this optioin:
Having written that, I suggest you check with your client or client's lithographer. He may prefer to do the RGB-to-CMYK conversion himself so that it accommodates his print profile,

Converting RGB to CMYK for printing.

So I went in to the Apple Store yesterday and told the guy that I'd like to design my own DVD cover for a presentation reel. I was about to spring for the teacher's edition of Photoshop, but he convinced me to buy the cheaper one with a Bamboo tablet...which was the same price as buying the program but included the tablet.
Hours later after designing my DVD cover, I find out that elements doesn't use CMYK mode. Ridiculous! This is my first time doing something like this so I wasn't entirely sure how to proceed... I thought.. oh well maybe I just switch modes later and I'm good. I guess this program was designed for less intense designers that print from a desktop at home, but I had other plans from the start. Anyways, what would you do? Here are my questions:
Should I take back the program/tablet and exchange it for one with CMYK capabilities? If I do this, will the document that I've used in elements be able to work in CMYK mode so I can send it to a printer? ...or do I make a really good print to a desktop printer and then just duplicate those for my cover?
Thanks for the help.

I came across a great web site where you can perform free RGB to CMYK conversions on your image files (up to 5mb). They offer a choice of numerous CMYK profiles. For U.S. commercial offset printing of your DVD cover, I'd recommend choosing GRACoL2006_Coated1v2.icc
http://www.rgb2cmyk.org/

Distiller X vs. Distiller 8/9 RGB - CMYK conversion

1) I have a simple EPS file (that I created in CorelDraw, but I get the same results with other software, too) that contains a single RGB red (r = 255, g = 0, b = 0) square.
2) I open Acrobat Distiller, set it to use the PDF/A-1b:2005 (CMYK) joboptions, and then open and convert the EPS to PDF.
3) I now open the resulting PDF in Acrobat and use Output Preview to see what the RGB -> CMYK conversion did, using the U.S. Web Coated (SWOP) v2 profile.
If I do the above with Acrobat 8.3.1 on a Windows XP system, the result is 0% C, 99% M, 100% Y, 0% K.
(I don't currently have a computer with 9.x installed, but a friend who does gets the same results.)
If I do the above with Acrobat 10.1.3 on a Windows 7 system, the result is 0% C, 96% M, 95% Y, 0% K.
Using Acrobat 10.1.3, if I open the EPS file directly (so that the conversion to PDF is performed automatically), and then use Convert Colors to convert to CMYK, I get the same results that Distiller 8.3.1 gives me.
What is going on? I cannot find anything to explain why Distiller 10 behaves differently from Distiller 9 and earlier.
-Steve

Hi
"I'm sorry, is not enough to English"
This problem for correct "primarily RGB color space add document"
I am prepared add video lesson... wait me

Conversion formulas from RGB to CMYK

Hi,
I've been writing a Colour swatch tool (in excel! hell yeah!) which allows me to pick a bunch of colours, generate complimentary colours from them, blend between 2 colours in a set number of steps and a whole bunch of other cool stuff, and then output this as a photoshop or illustrator swatch file.
As part of this tool I want to be able to covert the rgb values to cmyk. There is very little information on this on the web and what there is is fairly inaccurate.
For example,
RGB:50,128,128
Converts to CMYK 61,0,0,50 (%) using the formula found at easyrgb.com (this formula is the most prevalent one on the web/web forums)
Photoshop converts these RGB values as CMYK: 80,33,48,8 (%)
While these two colour values are *similar* the ones generated by the easyrgb formulas are nowhere near the photoshop values.
See? stupid useless formulas. (I am aware of the differences and overlap of the two gamuts)
Whilst I know that the conversion done in photoshop is done using ICC templates, and that often these conversions are device dependant, there must be a more realiable way of converting from one colour space to another using good old reliable cold hard maths.
Does anyone know what that might be? you guys at Adobe: I AM LOOKING AT YOU.
Hope you guys can help,
~silvery~
For reference I have included and commented the easyrgb formulas:
First: RGB -> CMY
C = 1 - ( R / 255 )
M = 1 - ( G / 255 )
Y = 1 - ( B / 255 )
Second: CMY -> CMYK
var_K = 1
Initally sets var_K as 1, although this is dependant on variables below
if ( C < var_K )   var_K = C
if ( M < var_K )   var_K = M
if ( Y < var_K )   var_K = Y
This bit finds the smallest value from the CMY range and sets this value as var_K
if ( var_K == 1 ) { //Black
    C = 0
    M = 0
    Y = 0
If var_K (the value that K is calculated from) is 1, then all the CMY values are reset to 0
else {
    C = ( C - var_K ) / ( 1 - var_K )
    M = ( M - var_K ) / ( 1 - var_K )
    Y = ( Y - var_K ) / ( 1 - var_K )
If the value of var_K is anything other than 1 then use the smallest value from the CMY range
K = var_K
The value of K as filtered out from the conditions above

Oliver,
I'm not sure what you mean by the term 'meta' color profiles, but I'll take a stab at what I "think" you are asking. There are some fairly widely accepted "standards" out there for both RGB and CMYK.
In the RGB world, for example, sRGB, Adobe RGB (and to some extent, ProPhoto RGB) have a fairly wide following. These are all ICC profiles, which nail down the boundaries of the color gamut and the definitions of any tri-stimulus combination of red, green and blue. Basically, they are matrix profiles that establish the positions of the Red, Green and Blue primaries, and these positions define the outer limits, or color gamut, of the color space. sRGB is a relatively small color space, so some viewable and printable colors get clipped (sRGB is the general internet, email standard and is widely assumed for many non-color managed appplications, printers, etc). sRGB can handle a fairly wide range of colors, but does clip some colors in brightly colored originals. It has the advantage of being the most widely adopted standard, plus the steps between colors are very close together. I use sRGB for average images, most people pictures, etc. Adobe RGB spreads the primaries further apart, so it describes a wider color gamut. Because the primaries are further apart, the steps are slightly larger from one color to the next, but marginally so. I use Adobe RGB for most of my brightly colored images that will get clipped in sRGB. Adobe RGB is also generally a good choice for images that will ultimately go to a printing press or inkjet. ProPhoto RGB pushes the primaries WAY apart, so it describes a HUGE color gamut...in fact, many of the colors that can be defined in ProPhoto fall outside human vision, and certainly monitors and printers.Due to the wide spacing of steps in ProPhoto RGB, images should be worked in in 16 bit, otherwide you may see some banding and posterization if large edits are made.
In the CMYK world, certain "standards" have been established, mainly for commercial offset printers (both web and sheetfed presses). By creating a standard, they are trying to establish the ink limit, densities, color gamut, dynamic range, gray balance, etc, of a "generic" sheet of commercial printing paper on the average well-maintained press using standard ISO inks, using good process control, mesurements, etc. By it's nature, this process has to encompass a wide cross section of presses, so it may act as a limitation on what some modern presses are capable of, but that's what standards usually do. If a good printer, with a modern press and great process control decides to sidestep the standard, they can probably extend color gamut, dynamic range, etc, but at the cost of no longer being "standardized". If commercial printers are "truly" trying to meet the standard, they will run tests, take measurements, and adjust their entire workflow so it matches the standard, within acceptable tolerances. Lots of shops "claim" to adhere to SWOP or GRACoL standards, but the majority of them don't. Standards for presses make some sense, because blending CMYK inks together (especially if they use ISO standard inks) on paper usually has a reasonably narrow range that works, though the paper makes a huge difference. (the same cannot be said for inkjets, monitors and many other processes, so they generally do not have standards). So for presses, there are standards for matte and coated papers, web presses, sheetfed presses, newsprint, etc. Each of these standards has its own ICC profile (or a family of profiles) that establishes ink limits, color gamuts, etc.
All ICC profiles have the necessary tags and data to comply with the ICC specification. One of those requirements is a "profile connection space", which is usually L*a*b* or a variant. So, an file on your computer may be tagged as an Adobe RGB file, and if you wish to prepare it for a sheetfed press using glossy stock, you could convert the file to GRACoL2006_Coated1v2.ICC (an industry standard profile for No. 1 coated stock on a sheetfed press). Since both files have the ability to "speak Lab" a translation can be made from one color space to the other. The numbers in the Adobe RGB file will be converted to L*a*b* (the universal translator), and then the L*a*b* numbers will be converted to CMYK, specifically GRACoL2006_Coated1v2.ICC. So, now you have a file in CMYK space with new numbers. It is worth noting that RGB has only three colorants to define colors, but CMYK has four. So, while in RGB there is only one way to define a specific color, in CMYK, there are many possible combinations that can generate many colors. This adds complexity to the equation. The CMY colors are called subtractive primaries, and are opposites of RGB (additive primaries). The "K" (black ink) is added for text, line art, neutrality, extra Dmax, and because the CMY inks are not pure and don't deliver a true black all by themselves. If the inks and paper were perfect, you could theoretically get away with CMY all by themselves, except for registration issues, text, line art, etc. Also, the additional "K" ink can help reduce the total ink limit, save ink, reduce costs, and improve quality.
Sorry for the book. This is not a simple subject, and we have only touched the surface.
Lou

Choosing profiles for forced RGB to CMYK color conversion

When a mixed RGB/CMYK PDF is opened in Illustrator CS6, Illustrator forces a conversion to one color space or the other. See this screenshot: http://imgur.com/sK8iEdn
I assume this is a limitation of Illustrator and there's no way to keep both color spaces. Under that assumption, Is it possible to choose the profiles used for the conversion from RGB to CMYK? Can Illustrator be made to use the RGB and CMYK profiles defined in its Color Settings to make this conversion?

I did some experiments with Illustrator CS6 and the MacBeth RGB test chart and verified my results with Photoshop CS6. I discovered Illustrator is (mostly) doing what it should be doing, within a 1% error (probably rounding) on the output CMYK values. Here's a summary, in case anyone else needs this info:
Assuming the source file's elements are all untagged, when a mixed RGB/CMYK PDF is opened in Illustrator and CMYK mode is
chosen, Illustrator will use the profiles and rendering intent defined in
Color Settings to make the color conversions from RGB to CMYK. Thus, we
have control over the profiles used for this conversion.
If the RGB elements in the PDF file have embedded ICC profiles,
Illustrator will use the embedded ICC profile instead of the RGB profile
defined in Color Settings. This ONLY happens, however, if the PDF file
also includes the correct CMYK output intent profile.
If the PDF doesn't contain a CMYK output intent, Illustrator will fall
back on the Color Settings RGB profile for RGB->CMYK conversion. I believe it
would be more correct for Illustrator to use the embedded RGB profile and
the CMYK profile defined in Color Settings, but that's not how it seems to work.
If the PDF contains the incorrect CMYK output intent, Illustrator will
ignore the Color Settings and respect the embedded RGB and CMYK profiles
for the conversion, as might be expected.

Conversion rgb in cmyk

Hello everybody,
i use kuler first time - cool tool!
I have a questions about conversion rgb in cmyk.
In Photoshop or Illsutrator i get complete different values
for the same color.
I try to change the color profiles adjustment, but never i
get the same color values
like kuler. For example: in kuler the cmyk color 0/60/100/0
would translate in rgb 255/102/0.
In PS i get 235/136/14 (in depends what profile i used).
Which color conversion engine or profile use kuler? Can i get
the same profile for PS or IL?
Regards, Lars

Hello, kuler color conversions should be consistent with
Illustrator CS3, since kuler is a subset of the Illustrator CS3
Live Color feature. Generally speaking, it's best to create your
kuler theme in the color space you want to use.
More on color management
here.
Hope this helps!
Sami

Conversion from RGB to CMYK

Hi,
I would be so grateful if someone could help! I need to submit a PDF of a book I have written to the printers. They tell me that they are printing in CMYK. My book has many paintings inside and two use RGB mode (others are CMYK). I have tried converting these to CMYK however they loose their colour variations and brightness. It is important that the colours remain the same. Is it necessary that I convert these to CMYK (my printer said he would try printing samples of the PDF's I've sent in RGB mode and see what happens). I am worried since when I export the book to PDF I get a big exclamation mark warning me not to proceed since all is not in CMYK. Is this simply a caution or is there any reason for real concern. Help!
Thank you, Rachel

There's no way to tell what the settings are from what you've posted. This is a modification of the [High Quality Print] predefined preset, which DOES NOT convert colors to CMYK, but without going through the panels there's no way to know what was modified.
Whatever settings you end up using, you must look at the "output" panel and check what it says under color. If you are expecting the output to convert RGB to CMYK you must set that field to one of the "Convert to Destination" settings, and under destination you must choose the correct profile for your printer conditions.
Choosing "Convert to Destination" and a profile that doesn't match your document CMYK working space will result in the appearance of colors being preserved, but all of your native CMYK elements, including your black type, will be converted tot he new color space, and more than likely your type will now be a four-color rich black instead of K only, which is a printer's nightmare.
Choosing "Convert to Destination (Preserve Numbers)" will keep the CMYK values for native elements, which will preserve your solid blacks, but will result in some color shifting as the numbers are re-interpreted in the new space. This is roughly equivalent creating a document in one working space, then ASSIGNING a new working space before export.
Peter

I can convert almost things multiple times at the same time including CMYK to RGB (or sRGB), but not RGB to CMYK and not brighten/contrast. How?

I can convert almost things multiple times at the same time including CMYK to RGB (or sRGB), but not RGB to CMYK and not brighten/contrast. How?

If you want a relevant answer you may have to elaborate on what you actually mean. Posting screenshots might help, too.
In any case multiple conversions of an image are not advisable in general.

RGB to CMYK problem

I have just started using Photoshop CS3 amending photos and adding text & graphic for printing. The photos start off in RGB but when I get them printed in CMYK they look dark and terrible! Can anyone offer me guidance on how to handle the transition of photos from RGB to CMYK and how to avoid making them darker/destroying the quality?
Thanks!

Are your source RGB files tagged? Are you sure the profile is correct? What's the output CMYK profile? Is your monitor calibrated and profiled?
If you have a good source profile on the files, and you know the CMYK target profile, you should do the RGB-CMYK conversion in Photoshop yourself, then tweak the colors using softproof. (Make sure you save the CMYK conversions and edits as SEPARATE files - don't save them over your source RGB files!)
The resulting files should reproduce much better on the press. If not, chances are good the printer isn't honoring your embedded profile or is doing another CMYK conversion without telling you.

RGB to CMYK Conversion

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