ColorSpan Legacy Print Server - ColorMark+ Legacy and ICC Profiles

Document Scope

The information in this document applies to systems running ColorMark Legacy Server Software prior to version

8.97. This is not the same version as ColorMark+ Advanced Color Management. If you are running 8.97 or newer

of ColorMark Legacy server software and you wish to use ICC color management, disregard this document and

see instead the Release Notes for ColorMark Server Software 8.97, found in ColorSpan document 0700093C.

This document has not been updated to cover newer versions of image manipulation, desktop publishing, and

related applications. For help with these applications, please consult the documentation that accompanied the

software or contact the software manufacturer for assistance.

Document Overview

This document presents instructions for implementing an ICC workflow with ColorSpan Legacy printers using

ColorMark+. This process has been divided into the following sections:

1. Color Management and the ICC Workflow Overview

2. Transferring ICC profiles from ColorSpan servers to MacOS and MS-Windows workstations

3. Configuring MacOS and MS-Windows workstations for using ICC profiles

4. Working with image files and page layout applications in the ICC workflow

5. Working with ICC workflow jobs on the ColorSpan print server

This document does not cover the process of creating an ICC profile using ColorMark+. For details on profile

creation, please consult your ColorMark+ Legacy User Guide.

In addition to ColorMark+ on your ColorSpan Legacy print server, the ICC workflow requires a desktop publishing

application that can print color separations. In this document, Quark Xpress 4 and Adobe PageMaker 6.5 are

described in detail. For a complete list of applications that have been tested with ColorMark+ and the ICC

workflow, please consult your ColorMark+ Legacy User Guide.

Color Management and the ICC Workflow

Overview

ICC is an acronym for International Color Consortium, an organization established in 1993 to create and promote

a cross-platform color management standard. CIE is an acronym for Commission International de l’Eclairage, an

international organization involved in the science of colorimetry–the science of measuring color and color

appearance. In the CIE L*a*b* color model, L* represents the degree of lightness of a color, a* represents the

redness/greenness value, and b* represents the blueness/yellowness value.

An ICC profile is “a description of the color rendering abilities of a particular device…the profile defines the gamut

or color range of a device, plus how the device distorts color. ICC profiles make it possible to describe the

capabilities of devices from countless different vendors in a standard, portable format” (“Higher Profile Color”,

Publish on-line (http://www.publish.com/features/9809/color/color.html)).

ICC color management requires three components: a reference color space, device profiles, and a color-matching

engine. The reference color space is one of the CIE-defined models (for example, CIE L*a*b*), which describes

color based on a mathematical model of how the human eye is sensitive to the visual spectrum of light. It is

superior to CMYK or RGB as a theoretical representation of color because it does not depend on variable

elements such as raw ink colors, white points of paper, variances in CRTs, viewing conditions, and so forth.

A device profile contains information about how the color produced by a particular device, be it scanner (“input

device”), monitor (“display device”), or printer (“output device”), deviates from a color norm. For example, to profile

a scanner, we scan a printed target containing known CIE L*a*b* color values, then compare the RGB values

produced by the scanner. The deviation between target values and actual values are then noted and saved in the

device profile.

The color-matching engine does the work of adjusting colors from specific devices so that the color is consistent

from device to device. The engine needs both a source profile and a target profile. The source profile is typically

the profile of a scanner, the target profile is that of a printer. The engine evaluates the device-specific RGB colors

from the scanner and determines the reference color space values, then converts those reference color values