Color adjustments for pictures and groupings in small color newspapers

At present, many counties and cities in China still only publish four editions and have a circulation of about 20,000 copies. Due to the needs of the market, they sometimes have to go to some big newspapers and print newspapers. The same printing machine, using the same software for processing, can print at a good time with a good time difference, and has a big difference between the print quality of hundreds of thousands of prints. The reason is that the important point is that the speed of the high-speed webbing belt can reach 9~13m/s, and the number of prints available for small color paper is only about 10,000 copies. In the case that the color has not been transferred to the best, it has reached the limit of printing scrap. Numbers, printers often make do, which is difficult to guarantee the quality of printing. How to solve this problem, on the one hand, the technical workers of the printing plant should improve their own quality, and the color correction should be accurate and fast. On the other hand, the typesetting personnel must also have certain cooperation in the pre-press processing of the small color newspaper, so that when printing It is relatively easy to adjust the color tone, and to speed up the coloring speed when printing in small color papers. Therefore, small color newspapers will have a relatively good print quality. Prepress processing includes the process of image processing, group edition, output, and plate making. The following two aspects of image processing and group edition adjustment will improve the printing quality of small color newspapers.

The picture plays a very important role in the color newspaper. Beautiful pictures often play the role of finishing touch and give people an artistic enjoyment. In order to get the best printing effect, the first thing is to adjust the picture. In the printing of small newspapers, the prepress processing of the pictures is particularly important. Only a good picture can make it easier and faster to adjust the colors during printing.

1. Original quality

It can be said that if the original quality of the picture is not high, although the prepress processing and printing process adjustment are fully in place, the quality of the picture cannot be greatly improved. For this reason, the selection of manuscripts is crucial. The requirements for color pictures printed by color newspapers are: colorful, rich, accurate, realistic, basically without large color deviations; distinct layers, good clarity, and good luck; moderate contrast, uniform distribution of levels; no scratches on photographs, Handprints, dust, creases, etc.

For the original is a photo, try to use non-meter photo paper (do not have a variety of lines); if it is the second time the printed manuscript is best to print more than 150 lines / inch (exquisite sample, etc.), and do not enlarge The original draft for the line drawing manuscript is better than the copy. In addition, the picture files downloaded on the Internet are generally relatively small, and the accuracy and definition are not enough, and they should be used as little or as little as possible.

It should be pointed out that in order to achieve the above requirements, in addition to the hard work of the image processing staff, it is necessary to get the cooperation of newspaper editors and reporters to jointly improve the quality of the original image.

2. Image processing

(1) Process color pictures in RGB mode. The RGB mode is the color mode adopted by all devices based on the principle of optics. It can express many colors, especially bright and bright colors. The editing process of a picture often goes through many subtle processes. For example, it may be necessary to combine the contents of several pictures. Since the original colors of the various components cannot be the same, they need to be adjusted. Regardless of the effect of the picture processing, the operator wants to create and retain as many subtle effects as possible, and to make the picture as real and rich as possible. Since the color range of the RGB mode is much larger than the CMYK mode, when the picture is processed in the RGB mode, a wider color space and more nuanced editing effects will be obtained during the entire editing process. If you use it well, most of you can keep it. Although in the end it still had to be converted to CMYK mode and there was definitely a loss of color, it was much better than letting pictures lose color from the beginning.

(2) Image sharpness adjustment. Sharpening is the most effective way to improve image sharpness in small color picture adjustments. Compared with the high-end printing, because of the limited printing conditions, the dot-printing rate is high, the coarse mesh, and the large sharpening value are conducive to improving the image sharpness. Generally, the screen effect can be slightly out of date. From the point of view of the hanging net technology, sharpening also eliminates the effect of the level loss that occurs due to the hanging net. From this point of view, sharpening is by no means a link that can be done, but is an essential part of prepress processing. The degree of sharpening is related to the type of the original image and the zoom ratio. Usually, the sharpness of the character artwork is smaller, while it may be larger for the landscape document. In general, the greater the sharpness of the picture, the higher the magnification and the deeper the sharpening.

(3) Adjustment of picture level. The purpose of level adjustment must first meet the printing requirements. According to the characteristics of newspapers with high expansion rates of printing outlets, the compensation for the expansion of outlets in the printing process is to be concentrated in the middle region, ie, 20% to 60% of visually sensitive areas. In the adjustment process, that is to say, the gradation of the manuscript corresponds to the gradation that the printing can reproduce to the maximum, so that the image is clear and real, and secondly, the accuracy of the adjustment of important parts is ensured according to the content of the manuscript and the level distribution. Such as clothes, face, etc., must be clear, such as the level of the face should not be less than 15%; again, to adjust the value of extreme light or shade, can not be a large area of ​​net, generally controlled at 2% to 95% about.

(4) Image color adjustment. The adjustment of picture color is what people usually call school coloring. It is mainly to reproduce the color reflected by the original (not the original itself). In the course of operation, it is mainly to correct the color shift caused by the original or scanning, and to ensure the color of the main body is accurate. The color adjustment should ensure that the screen effect is compatible with the final printing effect. Keep in mind that newsprint has a grayscale of 3% to 5%. It is best to use the proofs or more accurate printing products to open the original digital file and contrast the color. . At the same time, it should be noted that the school color adjustment should be based on the information displayed on the information board, but not on the screen alone.

(5) Convert RGB mode to CMYK mode. The picture used to print the film must be in the CMYK mode, so the picture mode must be converted before the film is released. It should be noted that some picture color changes occur when the picture mode is converted. The picture in CMYK mode is always brighter than the picture in RGB mode. After the conversion, you should first observe the picture and confirm that there is no color cast before output. If you think that you are not satisfied, you should immediately cancel the conversion of the color mode, and never convert it back to RGB color mode again, resulting in irreversible color loss.

The process of group edition is also an important aspect affecting the quality of color newspapers. The use of layout colors affects the positioning, theme and style of the entire layout. Although most of these are edited by the editors, the typesetting personnel must use colors properly and adjust the colors appropriately so as to reduce the time for adjusting the colors during printing and improve the printing quality of the small color newspapers.

1. Image processing in layout

In the process of group edition, the influence of picture quality is small, but it must not be ignored. First of all, don't simply zoom in or out of the picture when making a layout. Reducing the picture will make the picture worse, and the output will be slower. When you enlarge the picture, it will have more influence on the picture effect. If you need to change the size, you need to do it in the picture processing software. Second, we must pay attention to the pressure of the picture. The pressure cannot be too large or too large. Do not use it, or it will affect the picture. In addition, characters and pictures must be kept at a certain distance, and they should not be overcrowded or too loose, which will affect the overall beauty.

2. Shading treatment in the layout

In the small color newspaper, the most difficult to print is the large area shading, not the color is not allowed or uneven color, which is mainly caused by the color of the printing technology workers can not be caused. How to properly use shading to make it a reasonable part of the layout language is an important part of printing a small color newspaper. First of all, the choice of shading color should be reasonable. If the visibility of yellow on white newsprint is low, if a yellow shading is used, a solid color (a single color of 100% saturation) is used, otherwise it is difficult to have a high printing quality; if the shading has black characters, If the characters are not bordered, the shades of purple, cyan, green, and red must be used less frequently. They are less visible with the black characters and should be avoided. Secondly, the shading color should be used in the use of sub-pure, solid color, and less complex color, because the complex color is four-color synthesis, which means that it needs to be printed with four reasonable prints, increased in the small color newspaper printing The difficulty of coloring makes it difficult to print the colors and is prone to color cast. Again, the color block is added to the objection text, because it will reduce the visibility of the text and should be avoided if the font size is not large enough. The background color of the text should be based on the premise that it does not interfere with the reading of text. Therefore, it is advisable to use a small-size text of a certain length to make the background soft and light tones, and avoid dark colors such as blue-green, blue-violet, and the like.

3. Text processing in the layout

Under normal circumstances, the body text is black, because black is the most visible in white newsprint, and it has minimal color irritation to the reader's retina, allowing the reader to reduce visual fatigue during prolonged reading. If the content of the body text must be in color, it is generally appropriate to use purple, cyan, etc., to make the color easily visible in white newsprint, and to use less visible colors such as gray and red. Basically, yellow cannot be used because this The color has the lowest visibility in white, and the color is highly irritating, it is dazzling and looks tired.

The headline of the article is generally larger in size and less in number. It uses more high-grade, high-purity colors, such as yellow, red, and orange, to attract readers' attention. At the same time, from the printing point of view, Easy to print. Of course, in order to meet the overall needs of the layout, you can also use some soft light colors.

The above methods are just my personal thoughts, for your reference only.

Source: E Times Network Builders