Customer Reviews

Process Color Manual, 24,000 CMYK Combinations for Design, Prepress, and Printing

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I wish I knew about this book sooner. It is cheaper than getting a pantone cmyk book, and just as useful...if not more. I just got back from a proof check with a printer, and there were no surprises. It is always by myside now as I tackle numerous cmyk print projects.

I only wish there was an index of some sort. I ended up creating my own color index database on my palm handheld to save time when looking for a specific mix within the book.

Anyway...this book is way better than blindly picking colors on your computer screen and hoping for the best.

this is a stupendous compendium of reflective color variations, presented as specific combinations of the printer's four process inks -- cyan, yellow, magenta and black. the book moves systematically across the halftone screen variations of single inks (from most saturated to near white), then two, three, and four color mixtures. two color mixstures are shown as a grid of swatches spread across two facing pages, 5% increments across the column color, and 10% increments in the rows. mixtures of three or four colors are shown stepwise across several pages.

i'm a painter, not a printer, but i find this guide easily as valuable as much more expensive color atlases (from munsell or the swedish ncs) as a way to analyze a specific color in terms of hue balance (as a mixture of the three subtractive primary colors CYM) and reduced saturation (increased black, or screen value below 100%). this is all i need to mix a close match using whatever paints i have available.

the major drawback is that although the swatches are systematically organized, there is no index or page lookup table to guide you to a specific color mixture -- each page is headed simply "two (three, four) color mixture". if you know you want an orangish color (equal parts magenta and yellow), but aren't sure how bright or dull the orange should be, there is no way to find the relevant color pages adding cyan and/or black except by leafing through the book one page at a time. that's 260 pages, folks!

the introduction to subtractive color mixing, computer color programs and good printing practice is concise and accurate. an extremely reliable and useful, if inconvenient, reference.

As any graphic designer working on a computer knows, the color you see on your monitor is not the color you get when your job is printed. This manual has 24,000 color printed swatches that you can assign to your work and feel confident you'll get what you expect in print. What I find really cool is, there are 12 pages of 2 color combos. Great for smaller type and art work. All in all, a must have in our art dept here at Rutgers, a lot less expensive than other color systems with a lot more color to choose from.

Wow. I am rarely impressed with books on color. However, this book is fantastic. The entire book is composed of blocks of color with the cooresponding CMYK values. I have found printed color reproduction of these values much more accurate than using the Pantone Process Guide. In the past, I have had consistent color matching troubles using low end-quick turn around 4 color postcard printers. They do not do Pantone Matching on these print runs - so you have to cross your fingers and pray the printed colors are within a few levels of the Process Pantone Color you plugged in. I have had much better results with these types of print runs using the CMYK values from this book. This is a book that sits on my desk within arms reach. A must have for all print designers.

A well intentioned book with deep flaws. First off, as other reviewers have noted, the way the colors are defined can easily lead to mistakes when noting their cmyk values. For one thing, black values (k) are often listed before cyan values (c). This is rediculous considering that all graphic designers have been trained to write down cmyk values in this order: c, m, y, k. Another tricky thing is that colors are displayed and defined using tables that have a horizontal and vertical axis, and even after using this book for several months I have a heck of a time figuring out which color label (horizontal vs. vertical) refers to which colors. These are deadly oversights on the part of the authors, especially when the book is being used by a designer who has been staring at colors for eight hours straight and needs to get a job to the printer in five minutes! Okay, but the WORST thing about this book is the terrible inconsistency in its printing! I just bought two copies of this book (one that I could cut up into swatches, and one that I would leave intact). It is horrifying to compare colors that are supposed to be identical between the two books!!!! Apparently the quality control at the printing company is severly lacking because there are HUGE shifts in color value, temperature and hue between the two books that I bought. How is this supposed to be used by a professional designer who needs to pick out colors accurately?! I would strongly recommend AGAINST using this book if you care about color or the quality of your work. I couldn't be more disappointed.

I lost this book due to our recent earthquake, and here I am ordering it again already. This manual is really indispensable in specifying process builds and is an unbelievable bargain for what it offers. It's more accurate than the 1999 Pantone Process book and is way more accurate than relying on a software's spot-to-process conversions. Don't guess or hope -- use this book and get the color you want!

I found this book at the library. Now I must have a copy of my own. It is more of a tool than a book though. There are pages and pages of colour grids but not much else. I used it more than my pantone swatches. It is a great tool for colour accuracy, but not really for inspiration. Everything I've used it for has turned out exactly as I expected. A very worthwhile purchase!

This color book has much more than what others have. More combinations, more samples. You can pretty much find any reproducible color here.

This book contains a nearly comprehensive set of color charts illustrating the appearance of numerous CMYK color formulas. I have found it invaluable in specifying CMYK equivalents to spot inks and to color in original, non-digital artwork.

The one disappointment I have with the book is that the color formulas are not also printed on uncoated paper. Most readers will understand that inks appear differently on coated and uncoated papers. A second volume on uncoated paper would make this offering perfect.

I'm sorry, but this book is very poorly done. I was excited to get this book at first, but as of now, I'm going to look to replace it already. As a design challenge goes, this book is a failure, as the layout is not nearly as smooth as it could be. As a book that should be a handy reference, I should never have to struggle to figure out how to find the color I want. The layout just isn't thought out. And the way they've broken down the colors leaves so much room for error and omission. I'm sorry, but I don't work in just 10% color increments. I fail to understand the logic behind some combos being broken down in 10% increments and others in 5% increments. And why do none of the combos go higher than 60% black? I realize that including every color combo would make this book massive (though extremely worthwhile), but why not at least provide every 5% increment?