Appreciation post: My local print shop in Austin fixed my dull flyers in 20 minutes

Honestly, I've been fighting with CMYK conversion for months and kept getting these washed out blues on my band's show posters. Last week I took my file to this little shop called East Side Press near my apartment. The guy there showed me how my RGB blues were way out of gamut and gave me a specific Pantone number to swap to. He even printed a test sheet with three different black settings so I could compare. Now my posters actually pop and I don't feel like I'm guessing anymore. Has anyone else found a printer that actually takes time to walk you through the color shift? I owe that guy a six pack.

2 comments

2 Comments

rose_murray1mo ago

East Side Press sounds legit, but isn't Pantone for spot colors on specific materials, not a direct CMYK swap for digital printing?

faith_smith1mo ago

Yeah, has anyone actually tried matching a Pantone spot color to a CMYK build? I remember back when I did a small run of business cards with a deep navy blue from a Pantone book. The printer warned me it would shift, and sure enough, the digital prints came out looking kinda muddy and greenish. Meanwhile, a friend of mine swears by using the Pantone Connect app for screen stuff, but she prints on fabric, so that's a whole different mess. So yeah, your mileage may totally vary depending on what substrate you're working with.