Help with an ugly gradiant in a print

[krock]

Hey Folks,
I'm printing a job, basically wrapping 8 ft walls with digital printed vinyl,the clients provided artwork , the gave us a CS AI file converted to an AI 8 because we use Flexi 7.5 pro going to a mimaki printer, the gradiant looks very much evident,you clearly see the change in the gradiant.
Is that because the file was dropped down to a AI 8 file?
The artwork was not scale when created?
is this normal or is this something with the artwork?
OR?
Much thanks for any help!
Thanks,
KROCK

 

[Fred Weiss]

The gradient was most likely not created using a high enough number of steps setting. The easiest fix is to select the vector(s) that contain the gradient and make note of all settings, then reset the gradient with all the same settings except choose more steps in creating it.

To do this in Illustrator is fairly simple. In Flexi, you are not given that control as far as I can tell, so the solution would be to enlarge it to the size you are printing it and then reset the gradient. That will then, presumably, be smooth transitioning at the size you are printing it.

Hope that makes sense.

I have deleted the duplicate thread you posted in General Chit-Chat. Please do not make duplicate posts.

 

[krock]

Thanks very much for the help Fred!!!
That was kinda of what I was sort of thinking.
To all I apologize for the duplicate thread I've had way toooo much coffee today and thought I posted in the wrong forum, my Bad.

 

[krock]

Hey Fred,
client wants me to fix the problem,I don't get around illustartor all that well could you Hopefully give me a little direction in doing this!
That would be a huge help!
Thanks,
KROCK

 

[Mason]

Fred/Krock,
In my experience with illustrator I have never come across such a command, if one does exist could you post a little how to on it?
I had this issue in the past with printing large format gradients, we had to recreate it in Photoshop and use the blur tool to blur the steps which kept occuring, eventually we got the smooth transition but it was labor intensive.

 

[Fred Weiss]

Here's some screen shots of Illustrator. And to be clear, I will describe both gradients and blends which are similar and sometimes confused in talking about them.

A gradient is applied to one object to cause it to step through a color change in whatever the gradient style is. Control of steps is not made available and is size related. If it bands when produced, it can be Expanded into segments. At that point (selecting the object and clicking Expand) the number of segments is something you can enter. I have shown the results in the first three screen shots.

A blend is where you use two objects. In my example a red circle and a yellow highlight are both selected and the command Object > Blend > Make is entered. If I were correcting a blend, I would simply release the blend and then change the Blend Options to a better setting and remake the blend. If the file has been saved back to an earlier version of Illustrator sufficiently earlier that non-segmented blends was not supported, then I would simply expand it and delete all the steps saving just the original objects and then reblend them.

 

[Ron Helliar]

Eps?

Can't the client export an EPS with all intact?
Flexi's production manager can take an eps direct and you have all the tiling, profiles, etc. control there?

 

[RobGF]

Just something for consideration... PostScript only handles so many steps per colour channel. If memory serves, the amount for a PS level 2 rip is 256+1. If you have a colour gradient over 8' (96") it would seem likely that stair stepping will be visually obvious. Depending on your RIP you may have access to a generate extra greys option which can permit more than 256+1 steps. Another thing to consider if you don't have success is to rasterise the gradient and add some gausian noise in PhotoShop. The noise will make the stair stepping less obvious.

Or, I could be full of crap

Good luck

Rob

 

[thewood]

I'm also using Flexi and printing on a Mimaki JV3. An easy work-around would be to size the image to full-size in Flexi and re-create the gradient.

 

[krock]

I played with the gradiant in Illustrator tried a few test prints with some different settings,I still can't get the gradiant to look good.
The gradiant fades from a light blue to a slightly lighter light blue, but no matter what I've tried the steps are really noticable.I'm proposing to the client to lose the gradiant it really isn't that important in the artwork anyway,
but I am going to try recreating the gradiant in Flexi will see.

 

[RobGF]

I played with the gradiant in Illustrator tried a few test prints with some different settings,I still can't get the gradiant to look good.
The gradiant fades from a light blue to a slightly lighter light blue, but no matter what I've tried the steps are really noticable.I'm proposing to the client to lose the gradiant it really isn't that important in the artwork anyway,
but I am going to try recreating the gradiant in Flexi will see.

You really should try adding noise to the graphic in PhotoShop. For example, if I have a 100% to 80% black gradient over 96" how many steps in colour do you expect to see? Knowing that there are only 256+1 shades to every colour channel that PostScript can handle there would be 20 steps * 2.57 over that 96" ... that's 51.4 steps over 96" or bands of about 2" size... in a perfect world. The best course of action if you cannot convince the client that the gradient is not ideal is too add noise in PhotoShop and try again.

 

[Ian Stewart-Koster]

Or is the problem some cheaper or more inferior Rip software?