2013

Imagesetting 293
Imagesetting
Spot colors
Normally four colors are used when printing, cyan, magenta, yellow and black (key)
commonly known as CMYK. But it’s also possible to produce spot colors. Spot colors
are not normally printed using the CMYK inks, and are instead additional inks.
Spot colors have two uses:
• Many simple jobs use only two or three ink colors (for example a simple
newsletter with black text and blue headings). Creating a spot color for each ink
color can make the job cheaper to print.
• Some complex jobs require either PANTONE COLOR BRIDGE colors or special
inks that cannot be reproduced in CMYK such as gold or silver. These special
colors require spot colors.
See chapter PANTONE colors (on page 174) for more on PANTONE COLOR
BRIDGE.
Note: As each spot color is an additional ink and printing plate, it does increase
printing costs.
Spot colors appear as circles on the COLOR LINE and COLOR Gallery.
Spot colors are always Named colors.
Technical notes on color separations:
• Tints based on a spot color output on that spot separation. So if you require a
lighter shade of a spot color, define the color as a Tint (on page 170) of the spot
color.
• Sha
des and linked colors based on a spot color output on the CMYK separations.
• Objects with transparency applied always output on the CMYK separations, not
to the spot separation.
For more information on how spot colors are affected by transparencies, fills and
blends see "Transparency and Color Separations" later in the chapter.
On screen printer plate previews
The process of printing requires that your artwork is separated into CMYK print
colors. It can sometimes be useful to see and understand exactly what inks are
printed on each printer plate, especially if using spot colors. MAGIX Page & Layout