Help!! I'm new to the forum

[tiflic]

I recently created 4 color layouts in Quark, with imported Illustrator EPS files. I made SURE that the background colors used in the quark file and the illustrator files were of the same values, but when the final pieces came back from the printer, the colors didn't match. However, when I printed them to my fiery before sending them to the printer, I didn't notice any substantial color differences (but the differences were there). Just to be sure, I made a quark eps, opened it it Illustrator and printed, and they were perfect, but when I distilled the files, on screen they were fine, but when I printed them to the fiery, they were WORSE! What is that all about and how in the world can I anticipate and prevent such faux pas? BTW, I built another set of files the same way, and when they came back from the (different) printer, they were perfect...

Please school me OBI WANS...

[PrintDriver]

Use the second print vendor.

Specialization is for insects...

R.H.

[tiflic]

Yeah, I would use them except I don't pick the vendors, the account folks and the clients do, for money saving purposes. So I have no choice but to deal with them occasionally.

My question, though, is still out there. I'd like to know why that happens and how to avoid it for future reference. /emoticons/biggrin.gif

[PrintDriver]

Which versions of Quark and Illustrator were you using?
Did YOU create the pdf files for the print vendors or did they create their own.

I was kinda serious. The first vendor didn't save anybody and money or time and if you didn't create 'print ready' pdf's (and I use that term loosely) then they suck.

Get back to us on the version numbers. If it's colors in versions I can answer. If it's PDF issues, someone else will.

And welcome to the forum!
:)

Specialization is for insects...

R.H.

[tiflic]

Thanks for getting back PD! The answers to your questions are:

I was using Quark 4 and Illustrator CS running on OSX. The printer output the files directly from Quark, not PDF, althought they wanted PDFs because it is easier for them...
I created the PDFs using Distiller 6, press ready option, after saving the quark page as EPS.
The colors were mixed by us so they were not based on spot colors, all cmyk all the way...therefore there should not have been a difference in color appearance when printing the layout from quark to either my fiery, or their printer (no idea what they used, it was kinkos), right?

[Mickey]

AHHHH! Kinkos, that explains it...

I have heard a lot of printers say strange things happen with the new Adobe CS.

http://home.wi.rr.com/mygraphics/konceptcreative.jpg

[PrintDriver]

I'm not up on a pdf workflow. Someone else will jump in if that is where your issue lies.

If you used the same CMYK formulas for quark and Illustrator, you're right, the versions don't matter and the color should have been the same.

However, did you check which color space you were in in Illustrator CS? I think the default is RGB. Try reapplying the colors in the other color space (if you were in RGB, try CMYK). Just changing the color space in Illustrator DOES NOT work. You have to reapply your values.

As an aside, Spot colors will look different in the two programs. Illy CS uses the new pantone values, Q4 uses pre-2000 values. I don't think Illy CS came with a pre-2000 set of colors but you can key in the new values in Q4. Pantone has a support site for that.

All I can say is proof, proof, proof... Always get a color match proof.

[tiflic]

I did check to make sure the Illus Cs files were not RGB. They were cmyk. Unless I did it wrong...how would I check the color space in Illustrator CS?