color inconsistency between my PC and the commercial printer

[danna]

I have created a nice flier in Publisher. Loved the colors I had selected.
Looked great in preview and printed nicely on my office printer. I e-mailed
the Publisher file to my local commercial printer who works with Publisher on
a regular basis. A couple of days later when I went to do a color check, I
was amazed that the colors could be so "off" (reds were pinks, blues were
purple). What could be causing the color variation from my desktop to the
printing service? Is there something I can do on my end to make sure the
final product matches my original document colors?

 

[danna]

Okay, so I read a little further and I understand about light reflecting and
inks and all that. HOWEVER, I still want my blue to be blue and red to be
red. Am I to understand I can't get there from here?

 

[MesPress]

Danna,
I work for a offset Printer and we deal with Publisher files all the time. I
am 99% sure that your printer does not know how to handle the files.
Publisher deals all with RBG and printers print CMYK. a normal coversion from
one to another is horrific. We use Quite a Box of Tricks to take a PDF file
made from Publisher to do the coversion. It does quite a good job. There are
pressets for certian print settings. We use the US Sheetfeed Coated. If you
have the capabilities to print PDF from your publisherfile with all fonts and
images embedded I feel it would be benificial for your printer and to you.

 

[Terje M]

This makes me a bit scared.
You work for a printer that deals with Publisher all the time?
And you still do not know that Pub 2003 is able to work with RGB, or CMYK,
or spot, or CMYK and spot?
BTW, some of the best conversion from Publisher RGB to CMYK I have seen is
done by Acrobat 7.0 prof using the PDF-X1/A spesification.

Regards Terje

 

[Chris Griffiths]

We're also a printer and deal all the time with Publisher files. Now we know
that Publisher 2003 will handle CMYK and spots (although has some trouble
writing composite CMYK PostScript), but our customers certainly don't know
this, or generally care. So it is usually far simpler to accept the files in
RGB and do the colour conversions ourselves. We always go via PDF and I
would agree that Quite a Box of Tricks does a pretty good job of RGB->CMYK.

As to the OP's question, there is no magic solution. If a job is to be
printed 4-colour, it needs to be created with that in mind. It is pointless
to specify colours that can't re reproduced by the chosen process. Get a
swatch book, such as a Pantone Process guide (NB Process, not the spot
colour Formula Guide) and specify your colours as the CMYK values shown.
Your printer should then be able to reproduce what you have designed.

 

[MesPress]

We do have the latest publisher 2003 for prepress with the CMYK and all the
conversions. But, it still looks really crappy. Quite a Box of tricks has
been the far best for Coversion of RGB to CMYK. But this is for our Apogee
work flow and the 6 color press. I didnt say it was perfect for everyone but
the most widely used. Don't get scared. Your paranoid

 

[Terje M]

Not paranoid, but you say "Publisher deals all with RBG " and that is
definitely wrong!
And saying that as the professional printer you are makes me scared!
Shivering (but may be the cold in Norway that makes me do that).

Regards Terje