Specifications

The Digital Fine Print Course

Creating a Fine Print

Multi-Colour Printing

Careful examination of CMYK and CcMmYK(k) prints reveal significant differences in the

highlight regions. Highlight resolution is markedly improved when printed with a light

cyan (c), light magenta (m) and light black (k), especially at the highest printer dpi,

because compared with a ‘traditional’ CMYK inkset, more drops of the light ink will be

deposited to produce the same highlight density which also preserves highlight detail.

A light yellow ink is not required because yellow ink is already very transparent and tends

to only colour correct the image with little effect on the overall print density. Some man-

ufacturers include two more additional pigments, mid magenta and mid cyan in eight

colour printers. This further improves the smoothness of the print's tonal transitions.

Other printer configurations print with eight colours, but substitute Orange and Green

or Red and Blue (Hexachrome printing) for the mid cyan and mid magenta. This produces

an expanded colour gamut with more saturated colours than can be reproduced in CMYK.

Print Dimensionality

Shifts in local contrast or variable edge definition are very effective in creating a sense of

spatial dimensionality in a print. For example, increasing the local contrast of an object

tends to bring it forward in pictorial space while decreasing local contrast moves it back.

Local contrast can be modified by local changes to the shape of an image curve that is

blended on Luminosity. Small differences between the gradients of each colour curve

blended on Color will introduce subtle local hue/saturation shifts that can also increase

the print's dimensionality. This is very effective in uniform but textured areas like foliage.

Local contrast or edge definition can be modified through the selective use of sharpened

or blurred duplicated image layers in Photoshop. However over-use of these techniques

can also create the opposite effect by degrading the print’s luminosity, disrupting smooth

tonal transitions, and producing or increasing colour fringing.

1. A CMYK inkjet printer resolution of 1440 dpi will actually only be achieved in the reproduction of maxi-

mum black, where there is at least 1440 (1/1440th inch) dots per linear inch in the print. A resulting maxi-

mum print density of Log 2.1 would produce an effective Zone V (Log 0.70) resolution of 1440/3 = 480 dpi,

while Zone IX (Log 0.10) would only be 1440/21 = 68.6 dpi. If the light cyan, light magenta and light black

ink density is a quarter the opacity of normal cyan, magenta and black ink, four times the resolution (275

dpi) will be required to create the same highlight print density, thereby also increasing highlight detail.

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