Main Index
Printing 101
Mr. Toad's Templates
Disc Design Strategies
Disc Design Critiques
Ink Not Light

RGB vs. CMYK
Registration Nightmare #1
Registration Nightmare #2
Registration Nightmare #3
Registration Nightmare #4
Rich Black vs. Plain Black
Overprinting Black
Resolution Requirements

Proof Early, Proof Often
Formatting and Layout
For The Novice
File Management
Miscellaneous
Further Study
About This Site

Registration Nightmare #1

Say I want a simple purple line. I'd like it to be very thin, say .25 points, or 1/288th of an inch. So I draw that line in Quark. On the screen it looks like this:

There's a problem, though. I'm designing for CMYK inks. The particular purple that I want can be approximated by printing 100% magenta and 100% cyan right on top of each other. But if the inks are printed a miniscule amount offset from each other, I won't see a purple line; I'll see a magenta line and a cyan line side by side.

Possible Solutions:

The most obvious solution is to print a spot color purple, such as Pantone 274. However, this adds substantially to the cost of a print order. Other potential solutions all involve modifying the design in some way. Would a solid black line be acceptable? Solid magenta, or perhaps cyan?

Here's a radical trick: print a background that's 100% cyan. Overprint a solid line of 100% magenta.

This is a different design altogether - there's a background, where there wasn't one before. The technically problematic original design has been used as a point of departure. Perhaps the client likes this better... perhaps not...

Previous: RGB vs. CMYK Next: Registration Nightmare #2