こんにちは Chris!
私は2週間の休暇で日本に来ていますが、時間を見つけてこのメールを書き上げて送信しました。
I’m in Japan right now and figured this email needed to have something Japanese. Our first stop on the tour was to check out Mt. Fuji, and the photo at the left was the best photo I could get of it. (Taken from the beach at Miho no Matsubara.) According to the tour guide less than 20% of the tours they lead get a clear shot of Mt. Fuji in the summer so we should consider ourselves lucky! Noted.
If you’ve been following along with each TwinPro Update you may be piecing together that something larger is going on around our office, and with our business. Next month we’ll make the news official but it’s all very positive for everyone who in any way is a part of the TwinPro family – clients, suppliers and all our amazing staff. Our plan was to have everything official and sorted out before my family vacation but sometimes things like this don’t always happen to your desired timeline. 🙂
PMS conversion to Process
Last month we talked about RGB vs CMYK. This month it’s PMS vs CMYK. Much like with RGB, there was a time where you really had to go with PMS when you wanted a specific colour because the Process converted colour just didn’t match. Nowadays I’d say that the majority of PMS colours can be very accurately reproduced out of the four process colours. But thee are still many colours that absolutely need to be run as PMS, and there are also some times where using a PMS colour, although it will increase the cost, it is needed to achieve the printed result you want.
So what is PMS?
PMS is an acronym for Pantone Matching System, a system of specific ink colours created a company named Pantone. The system includes books of colour swatches and then instructions for how to mix that custom colour. In theory this would allow you to ensure that everything printed in that PMS colour will be your exact specific colour. I say “in theory” because just like when printing in Process the final colour relies on a skilled Ink Technician to mix the ink, quality base ink ingredients, and a press operator with a well-maintained press. We regularly see projects printed as a PMS that absolutely do not match the PMS colour they are supposed to be.
Should you go with PMS or Process?
Without seeing your complete artwork we cannot say if one will be better than the other but it is becoming a rare occasion that we run a project with PMS inks. Improved prepress colour conversions, better press technology, and the change of PMS to a subscription service and being removed from the Adobe CC Suite all contributed to this reduction. The great thing is that you can build your project with the PMS colours you want, send us the file for review and if we suggest running it as Process we can very easily manage that conversion in our prepress system meaning you do not need to send a new file.
Making proofs of projects that include PMS colours
All of the proofs that we make are considered to be out of Process. In reality they are made with four, six or up to 13 ink colours all to replicate the specific colours in your project. And the really great thing about these proofs is that they are fingerprinted against our presses meaning that if it can be achieved in our proof it can be achieved on press when printed!