PrepressColorSeparaton

Introduction: Color separations are used by major printing companies to reproduce the color images inside magazines, books, brochures, etc. Typical color separations consist of four colors: cyan, magenta, yellow, and black, or CMYK for short. However, large printing companies may use more if a particular color needs to be exact, such as a company color. By printing these four colors, one top of each other, one can create the illusion of a full-color photograph, when in reality, only four colors are shown. Color separations used to be performed in the darkroom, using expensive and tedious processes. Today, with the technology of computers,

scanners, laser printers, and AdobePhotoShop, one can create a CMYK separation with relatively little time spent in the darkroom, compared to a few years ago.Printers are able to create the illusion of full color using only four inks: yellow, magenta, cyan, an black. Using a scanner, we can electronically separate a color photograph into its yellow, magenta, cyan, and black components, a process know as "color separation." These separations may then be printed, creating an illusion of full color on the printed page.

Selecting/Preparing Photograph:
First, I selected a photograph with bright vibrant colors. I picked a photograph of a wild horse that I photographed while hiking. Then I scanned and adjusted the photograph in Photoshop as follows:
Image Size: 3 x 4.28
Resolution: 106 dpi
Cyan Ink: 53 lpi, 45 degrees, round
Magenta Ink: 53 lpi, 75 degrees, round
Yellow Ink: 53 lpi, 90 degrees, round
Black Ink: 53 lpi, 105 degrees, round

Making the Separation Negatives:

Process Camera

After printing each separation color, I trimmed each separation to about 5x6 and taped them onto a white 16x20 paper. In the darkroom, I made one line negative of the 4 separations. After drying, I exposed the separations on color key transparencies using the Platemaker.

Making the Transparencies:

Platemaker

Using the platemaker, I exposed cyan, magenta, yellow and black onto separate transparencies. After drying, I aligned each separation on top of one another to make what appeared to be a full color picture.

	Separations: cyan	magenta
	yellow	black