Finally caught a RGB-to-CMYK disaster before it went to press last week

I'm a junior designer at a small shop in Portland and I did my first big solo proof check on a 5000 piece brochure order. The client sent over these super vibrant greens that I knew would turn muddy in CMYK but I trusted the numbers anyway. I caught it literally 30 minutes before the file went to the printer and converted everything to the right color mode. The greens still looked a bit dull but at least they weren't this weird brownish mess. It's not a huge win I guess but it felt good to dodge a bullet. Has anyone else had a close call like that where you caught something right at the deadline?

2 comments

2 Comments

felix_martin5614d ago

First time I dealt with that was back in 2013 on a 10,000 piece catalog for a bike shop here in Eugene. Their logo had this neon lime green that looked like a highlighter on screen. I spent a whole afternoon tweaking the CMYK values to get something close and it still printed as a sad olive drab. Ever notice how nobody warns you that the whole "trust the numbers" thing falls apart when clients pick colors from their phone screens?

theabennett13d ago

Sorry but that green was never going to work in CMYK no matter how many hours you spent on it.