CMYK
What's the difference?
RGB colour is made up of Red, Green and Blue colours. This is typically used for screen graphics: monitors, handheld devices such as smart phones, and other screens. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RGB_color_model
CMYK colour is made up of Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black colours. This is also known as process colour, full colour and four colour. CMYK is typically used in inkjet, digital and offset press printing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CMYK_color_model
Spot colour is made up of whatever inks are chosen or the job. Typically designers will use a black ink plus one, two or more 'spot' inks. We create one press plate per colour, and these are each printed in turn to create the finished image. True spot colour printing can only be done on a press, but many digital devices (inkjet and digital printers, for example) are able to emulate spot colours. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spot_color
Which one should I use for my files?
It depends entirely on the job.
Production method |
Best colour model |
Typical examples |
| Full colour offset press | CMYK | brochures, fliers, posters, rack cards, some stationery |
| Spot colour offset press | spot colour | stationery, forms, some posters and promotional printing |
| Large format inkjet | RGB | posters, exhibits, displays, maps |
| Digital colour | CMYK | reports, booklets, business cards, stationery |
If you accidentally provide the file with a mismatched colour model, that's fine. Our prepress operators have a lot of experience swapping files from one to the other.
Still confused?
Don't worry about it. Give us a call.