8/22/2019 Color Management Made Easy

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Tutorial

Adobe InDesign 2.0/Photoshop 7.0/Illustrator 10.0

Color management made easy

Traditionally, color management has involved long,

arduous processesand a fair amount of finger-

crossing. With the lastest releases of Adobe design

applications, however, getting consistent color is a

simple process. All these applications use the same

interface and color settings files for color management,

so you can be sure that the colors you see in Adobe

Photoshop 6.0 and 7.0 will appear the same in Adobe

Illustrator 10, Adobe InDesign 2.0, and even Adobe

Acrobat

5.0.

1. Create or obtain color profiles for your devices.

Assemble accurate ICC profiles for each of the devices

you use: scanners, monitors, digital cameras, printers,

and so on. You may be able to use the profiles provided

by device manufacturersbut individual devices often

vary from the default profiles, so custom profiles give

you the most accurate results.

For information about creating or obtaining profiles,

see chapter 4 of the Photoshop 6.0 user guide, chapter 7

of the Illustrator 10 user guide, or chapter 13 of the

InDesign 2.0 user guide.

2. Customize a color settings file.

Choose Edit > Color Settings in InDesign, Photoshop,

or Illustrator. From the Settings pop-up menu, choose

the predefined color settings file that most closelyresembles your workflow. Then specify the profiles for

your devices in the Color Settings dialog box. Click Save

and name the custom color settings file. To ensure that

InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator, and Acrobat can

access the settings file, save it to its default location:

Program Files/Common Files/Adobe/Color/Settings

folder (Windows) or System Folder: Application

Support: Adobe: Color: Settings folder (Mac OS).

You might notice minor differences in the Color

Settings dialog box in these applications. In InDesign,

you need to select Enable Color Management before

you can specify settings. In Photoshop or Illustrator,select Advanced Mode to see more fields in the dialog

box.

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ADOBE INDESIGN 2.0/PHOTOSHOP 7.0/ILLUSTRATOR 10.0

Color management made easy

Adobe, the Adobe logo, and Acrobat, Illustrator, InDesign, and Photoshop are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Adobe Systems

Incorporated in the United States and/or other countries. Windows is either a registered trademark or trademark of Microsoft Corporation in

the United States and/or other countries. Macintosh is a trademark of Apple Computer, Inc., registered in the United States and other countries.

Flash is a trademark of Macromedia, Inc.

2002 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Predefined color settings files are each designed to

provide consistent color in a particular publishing

workflow under typical conditions. In some cases, the

predefined settings files provide sufficient color

management. However, you can achieve the mostconsistent color using ICC profiles created for your

specific devices.

3. Apply the custom color settings file in each

application.

When you open the file in another Adobe application,

apply the same color settings: In InDesign, Photoshop,

and Illustrator, choose Edit > Color Settings; in

Acrobat, choose Edit > Preferences> General, and then

click Color Management in Acrobat. Choose the file you

named from the Settings pop-up menu.

You may want to modify the settings for fields not

included in the saved color settings file. For example,

Photoshop is the only application that designates a

working space specifically for spot colors, so if the color

settings file was saved from InDesign, the default Spot

working space is selected in Photoshop.

If you regularly print to different devices, or work with

different input devices (such as scanners or digitalcameras), you can create additional color settings files

that are customized for those workflows. Save each file

with a name that clearly states its purpose, so that you

can identify it easily.

By default, Photoshop and Illustrator embed the

profiles designated in the Color Settings dialog box

when you save a file in native format or as a PDF, JPEG,

or TIFF file. If color management is enabled in

InDesign, InDesign embeds profiles when you save a

document or export it to PDF.