CYMK questions - Roland VersaCAMM

[octongue]

Hi Guys,
I just started a new position which is essentially built around the company's purchase of a Roland VersaCAMM 540 wide format inkjet plotter/cutter. It was purchased to run vinyl graphics through.
Now, the owner wants to run "wallpaper" like substrates through the machine, and hang murals (of my design) in clubs that he owns around the country.
To cut to the chase, he's not been happy with the output of the printer, because of the lack of pop that bright colors should have.
I come from the screen printing industry, and have a pretty good knowledge of CMYK color correction for that genre of printing, but am wondering if there's something I should know or a guideline to producing colors that are vibrant like they show in RGB. I am also aware that the RIP software uses some sort of conversion for going from RGB to the CMYK output, but I am unfamiliar with that.

Any one have any insight?
Thanks!

[CkretAjint]

Design in CMYK. Problem solved.

CMYK doesn't cover the color spectrum that RGB does. You will never get those BRIGHT popping colors unless you go to another printer and print offset using PANTONE spot colors.

[Drazan]

Talk to your Roland Rep about different profiles you can run with the different substrates.

With different profiles, I can actually produce that bright red or royal blue. The same file printed with the wrong profile can turn that candy red into a mud brown.

As Ckret said, the RGB palet is far greater than the CMYK palet and you'll definitely see a difference in bright colors.

Depending on the rip you can rip RGB and let the rip convert your files. MUST do a test print on this because sometimes it turns out very very bad. However when it does work the colors can be a tad brighter or richer than the same file in CMYK usually it's only 5% or so but sometimes that's just enough to make it work.

Jade

[octongue]

I realize I won't ever replicate the RGB gamut. And from my experience I know that it's a matter of cleaning up the color to get the best from it (i.e. take low levels of Cyan out of yellows). Most effects in Photoshop are unavailable in that color space. Plus, I've seen some pretty rich photographs printed from CMYK files, including bright blue skies and purples, pinks, and greens. So there's got to be a way to at least maximize what's there.

The RIP is a Roland brand, VersaWorks. I've only ever used Wasatch and Xitron Navigator - this one seems a bit less robust (a lot actually)

[steve2112]

We have a summa dc3. I can print cmyk and unlimited amount of spot color as well as blends of all of the. It prints on vinyl only but it might work for what you need. Check to see if you have a printer with a machine like that. The dc3 even prints gold and silver foil.

steve

[doubting_thomas]

Seems to me that I've heard a lot about use of the RGB color space in
large format instead of CMYK. I don't do a lot of wide format here,
but that's what I use when I'm printing posters for our clients.

[octongue]

yeah it seems that leaving the files in RGB and having a good rip to translate is best. I am figuring it out slowly but it seems that a good color workflow (in RGB) and then translating just before is the way to go.