Adobe InDesign CS4 - Manual (Page 444)

436 USING INDESIGN CS4
Color
About process colors
A process color is printed using a combination of the four standard process inks: cyan, magenta, yellow, and black
(CMYK). Use process colors when a job requires so many colors that using individual spot inks would be expensive or
impractical, as when printing color photographs.
Keep the following guidelines in mind when specifying a process color:
• For best results in a high-quality printed document, specify process colors using CMYK values printed in process
color reference charts, such as those available from a commercial printer.
• The final color values of a process color are its values in CMYK, so if you specify a process color using RGB (or LAB,
in InDesign), those color values will be converted to CMYK when you print color separations. These conversions
differ based on your color-management settings and document profile.
• Don’t specify a process color based on how it looks on your monitor, unless you are sure you have set up a color-
management system properly, and you understand its limitations for previewing color.
• Avoid using process colors in documents intended for online viewing only, because CMYK has a smaller color
gamut than that of a typical monitor.
• Illustrator and InDesign let you specify a process color as either global or non-global. In Illustrator, global process
colors remain linked to a swatch in the Swatches panel, so that if you modify the swatch of a global process color,
all objects using that color are updated. Non-global process colors do not automatically update throughout the
document when the color is edited. Process colors are non-global by default. In InDesign, when you apply a swatch
to objects, the swatch is automatically applied as a global process color. Non-global swatches are unnamed colors,
which you can edit in the Color panel.
Note: Global and non-global process colors only affect how a particular color is applied to objects, never how colors
separate or behave when you move them between applications.
Using spot and process colors together
Sometimes it’s practical to use process and spot inks in the same job. For example, you might use one spot ink to print
the exact color of a company logo on the same pages of an annual report where photographs are reproduced using
process color. You can also use a spot color printing plate to apply a varnish over areas of a process color job. In both
cases, your print job would use a total of five inks—four process inks and one spot ink or varnish.
In InDesign, you can mix process and spot colors together to create mixed ink colors.
See also
“ Mixing inks ” on page 457
Comparing colors in InDesign and Illustrator
Adobe InDesign and Adobe Illustrator use slightly different methods for applying named colors. Illustrator lets you
specify a named color as either global or nonglobal, and InDesign treats all unnamed colors as nonglobal, process
colors.
The InDesign equivalents to global colors are swatches. Swatches make it easier to modify color schemes without
having to locate and adjust each individual object. This is especially useful in standardized, production-driven
documents like magazines. Because InDesign colors are linked to swatches in the Swatches panel, any change to a
swatch affects all objects to which a color is applied.
Updated 18 June 2009