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falcon outdoor jr black looks green

chad17

New Member
I am having a big problem printing blacks. I have tried many different cmyk combinations I've tried printing at 720x720 and everything comes out looking gray, i try it at 1440x720 and it looks much better but when you get the black out in the sunlight it either looks like its got a green tint or a purple tint, i dont know what i'm doing wrong any help would be greatly appreciated.
 

Border

New Member
Try turning your color correction off.
Set CMYK values for your blacks to 50, 50, 50, 100

I know everyone's got their own special cmyk values for the richest black, but that's what I have been using for years with great luck.
 

bob

It's better to have two hands than one glove.
Everyone has their favorite recipe for black but, for the most part, they're kidding themselves.

Make your black 100%K and nothing else. Use no color correction for everything but bitmaps. This is carbon black, the definitive black. As long as your putting out sufficient ink to cover the media you can't get it any blacker. Adding some witches brew of CMY to 100%K might make you feel better but it's not going to get any blacker then 100%K. It's just going to get muddy.

Black is black. Black doesn't come in shades or richness, or anything, it's just black. A fact known to auto body shops for years. Any body and paint shop might have a wall of cans of various colors but there's one and only one can of black. Because they know that black is black.

If you think that some combination of CMK and 100%K makes a better black then I would argue that you really don't know what black is.
 

DetailsGS

New Member
I suggest you do a nozzil check to make sure your black is even working correctly.
i had lost mine but didn't realize for some time because it was printing (dark green) which was a combination of the remaining 3 colors.

DK
 

rdm01

New Member
Everyone has their favorite recipe for black but, for the most part, they're kidding themselves.

Make your black 100%K and nothing else. Use no color correction for everything but bitmaps. This is carbon black, the definitive black. As long as your putting out sufficient ink to cover the media you can't get it any blacker. Adding some witches brew of CMY to 100%K might make you feel better but it's not going to get any blacker then 100%K. It's just going to get muddy.

Black is black. Black doesn't come in shades or richness, or anything, it's just black. A fact known to auto body shops for years. Any body and paint shop might have a wall of cans of various colors but there's one and only one can of black. Because they know that black is black.

If you think that some combination of CMK and 100%K makes a better black then I would argue that you really don't know what black is.


Couldn't disagree more. Hold a composite black and a 100% K black up and I
will tell you which is which in a heartbeat. Composite blacks look more
black. 100% K will look washed out, or weak. If you really wanted to get
into it you could say that there is no black ink, just a very dark purple! It is
about what the end user is going to see, and a composite black, if done
right, will look deeper and richer than 100% K.
 

Border

New Member
A fact known to auto body shops for years. Any body and paint shop might have a wall of cans of various colors but there's one and only one can of black. Because they know that black is black.
I come from an autobody background with over 20 years painting/mixing experience and I'm telling you, every car manufacturer has their own formulas for black.
You take the blackest car you ever saw and grab a can of straight black paint off the shelf and paint a single panel, then pull it out in the sun.....You'll be pulling it back into the paint booth to redo it because the "straight black" you used looks like a dark muddy brown next to the factory color.

All of the wholesale printers I've ever subbed out to always say don't use just 100% K for your blacks, and I have seen the difference in using a mix versus straight K.
Call it personal preference, or stupidity if you want. But I beg to differ on that one.
 

Jackpine

New Member
I print black in vectors from the RGB pallet. Yellow and red and other clean colors I use CMYK pallet and as Bob said.....no color correction for vectors. If you are using OEM inks your black will be very nice. If you print "black" rectangle from CMYK and and one from RGB you will see the difference.
 

Jester1167

Premium Subscriber
Wait untill you try and print greys or black to white gradients.

C60 M30 Y0 K100 is my special mix. Most profiles have ink limits of 180 to 220 and will use some formula to get it down from what is specified. I didn't want my any profiles to dump any of the K so I made it as low as possible and still got a good black. Also, I don't wana waste yellow ink $$$ in black when all it does is counteract a purple hue that you don't see unless you fade it.
 

bob

It's better to have two hands than one glove.
Somehow I get the feeling that the most of you are trying to produce black via profiles and color correction. If that's the case, good luck. There is no reason to invoke color correction on anything but bitmaps. Your rendering intents should be set to 'no color correction' or 'spot' on everything including gradients, except bitmaps, which should be set to perceptual.

Do this and you won't have to screw around trying to come up some some magic formula that whatever profile and color correction mechanism you happen to be using will end up interpreting as something you might like. Or not.

Black is still black, not purple, not green, but carbon black, the basic constituent of black ink and the definitive black. Unless, of course, you subject it to the ministrations of a profile and color correction mechanism.
 
I disagree with you on that one bob.
Yes, black is black but if you want a more solid looking "pleasing to the eye" black you need to put some kind of a kicker behind it.
This is something that has been done in the offset printing world for many many years now and I feel makes a big difference when printing digital also.
With that being said, It does not need to be used all the time but if you have a large black solid area it will help to make it appear darker and more solid.
I use 2 different methods depending on the need for it.
Either 60C 100K
or
60C 30M 30Y 30K

Just my opinion. Not trying to start an argument or anything just wanted to add my .02 to the conversation.
 
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