Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
examine output from HiFi printing, you'll see that it is impressive and
usually reserved for very high-end print jobs. MonacoPROFILER and
GretagMacbeth's ProfileMaker Pro are two products discussed that can
produce n-Color ICC profiles.
When Not to Embed an ICC Profile
I believe ICC profiles should be embedded in documents since receiving
an untagged document, especially in an output space, can be especially
difficult to deal with. However, there are occasions where creating doc-
uments without an embedded profile can make sense. Suppose you
are sending a service bureau a large number of images in output
space, ready to be printed. It's not uncommon for CMYK output profiles
to add well over 1 mb in the resulting file size. By sending someone
300 CMYK images for output, you'll need 300 MB of extra storage
space. The service bureau is going to send the documents as is to the
output device; the numbers in the documents are correct for the print
condition.
There is little reason to waste 300 MB of storage space with embed-
ded profiles. Unless someone will open and view the images for editing,
or worse in this scenario, convert the data into another print/output
space, the embedded profiles serve no purpose. Some older RIPs will
choke on documents with an embedded profile. Therefore, if you know
for a fact that the documents will be untouched by human hands and
sent directly to the contract proof or press, feel free to send untagged
files. If someone might want to view the image, you can always send the
output profile so that user can assign it to this untagged document.
Always send tagged RGB documents. If someone intends to conduct a
CMYK conversion, the source color space needs to be defined. The
working space profile is critical, even if the user has no idea about ICC
color management.
Prepping Files for Clients and Printers
There are so many file formats, and options within file formats, that
unless you know what a printer expects, keep everything simple. An 8-
bit TIFF file with no layers, alpha channels, annotations, and other non-
image forming data is safest. Your client may wish to add clipping paths
to images for producing effects in their page layout application. Although
Photoshop can produce a myriad of options for saving TIFF files, if in
doubt, make sure the TIFF has no compression, layers, and anything
other than an embedded profile. It's a good idea to name the files with
a file extension such as TIFF.
EXIF data in images should present no issues so by all means, add
your copyright and any other pertinent data into these image files. If the
client places your color-managed TIFFs into a page layout application,
