: Is the difference between GRACOL and SWOP really drastic? I recently made a boo-boo. I sent a printer that usually receives documents prepared using SWOP a poster prepared using GRACOL. The
I recently made a boo-boo. I sent a printer that usually receives documents prepared using SWOP a poster prepared using GRACOL.
The print part was managed by my client, not by me, so I could not see a proof. When I saw the final result I was devastated. Everything was very dark. The ink was cranked up to the point that mid values turned almost black. The print included photographs so they became very ugly. It was a CMYK print on coated stock but it almost looked like a B/W print on newsprint with a crazy 40% dot gain.
Now, I know I should have set the document as SWOP and not as GRACOL and that was my fault. I was wondering, though, if the difference should be so dramatic.
Is this a common result? If you print a GRACOL thinking it was SWOP, does everything look darker? Or was the print job just badly done with inks cranked up to absurd limits by the printer.
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The short answer is yes. The GRACoL file will print darker under SWOP conditions.
The differences between GRACoL and SWOP depend on which GRACoL and SWOP you’re talking about. The main difference is the amount of ink being laid down on the paper.
Typically CRACoL has TAC of 320% and up to 340% depending on the destination of the GRACoL profile used. SWOP on the other hand is limited to 280% for SWOP 5 or 300% for SWOP 3. That can be a big swing.
Color Management comes into play as well on both the client side and on the printers side and whether they use embedded profiles, how the printer handles files with and without embedded profiles and what/if they convert to an ‘in-house’ profile for their press conditions.
Your reference to 40% dot gain on a coated stock is pretty dramatic but given that a GRACoL separated file was supplied, printing to the numbers could yield a much darker print than expected so that means the press operator didn’t make adjustments or pull the job from the press.
Printers today are ‘printing to the numbers’. That can mean different things to different printers but there is no mistaking a GRACoL proof for a SWOP proof so that responsibility lies with the printer, his print production staff and the press operator when the job started printing.
The differences between SWOP and GRACOL should not be that drastic. That sounds like problems in printing (such as the halftone not being correctly aligned, or carelessness from the pressman to keep it on color).
Just for your info, the SWOP profile is pretty much a "dumbed down" profile that most offset presses can match, because it's a pretty small gamut. Modern presses have a way larger gamut, so can do a way better job than SWOP. Most pressmen use it because they don't have to lift a finger to match it.
The GRACOL profile takes it a step further trying to keep an image looking similar across presses with very different gamuts, by keeping the hue as similar as possible, even if it is a different saturation or brightness.
You say "The print part was managed by my client," I'm assuming you mean the color proof. If the color proof looked like that, then it doesn't matter what color profile you chose! Sure it makes it harder for the pressman to match, but he can still get close to the proof. So I am either assuming the proof was that bad, and it is the clients fault, or the pressman was too lazy in trying to match it. (granted it is harder)
But I've worked as a designer closely with pressman (offset and digital) for 15 years, and that is what I see.
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