Blusish B&Ws in a Blurb Book

[Frank Petronio]

So my latest Blurb book came and it has a blue cast to the B&W images in daylight - they look neutral in Tungsten light. My older version is warmer in tone so that it looks neutral in daylight and slightly sepia in Tungsten.

It's not objectionable but I prefer the warmer look for my work.

Any clue whether this the normal "drift" for an HP Indigo? Or is there a check box somewhere?

Color images look OK, cover is nice.

I am taking greyscale and RGB images and converting them to CMYK usung the Blurb CMYK profile, then placing them into InDesign, then exporting a PDF to Blurb's specs.

[John NYC]

Whenever I have used Shutter Fly for quick prints, my b&w comes out on the extreme end of cool tone, and I also do not like that blue tone myself. I will be looking forward to anyone who can answer this question not just for Blurb, but for possibly online printers in general, but definitely also Shutter Fly.

[JeffKohn]

I've yet to see anything from a print-on-demand servce that had what I would consider excellent print quality or color consistency. B/W just makes it harder. Any printing system that uses color inks for B/W tones is going to have problems. Your best bet might be to apply a bit of warm toning to the monochrome images, so that you can be sure if they're not neutral they'll at least be warm.

[Frank Petronio]

Thanks, I know all that, I meant my question to be about Blurb and what I am talking about is subtle, nowhere's near as bad as some of the howlers I've seen from other places.

To be more specific, how have people's untoned B&W images been looking from Blurb lately?

Warm or Cool?

[Frank Petronio]

New version of the book arrived today and it's perfectly neutral, maybe a hair warm, definitely not blue.

I guess that is their range of variation....

[Richard M. Coda]

I can't speak for blurb, but I am currently doing a book for a friend who is computer illiterate. I am using EditionOne. These are platinum prints, which are inherently warm. I made the scans. I did a test run in both RGB and CMYK using just Photoshop's conversion/profile. The CMYK was far and away, the winner. The RGBs were cooler and more contrasty.

[Frank Petronio]

Richard, I don't know what printer or press Edition One is using but if it is color, then it is using CMYK inks or dyes (and maybe a few extra colors if it's an inkjet) to print the pages themselves. CMYK conversion is a large topic, but whether you did the conversion of your color RGB scans to CMYK in Photoshop -- or gave Edition One RGB files -- somewhere along the way there was a CMYK conversion that took place. In the case of some printers, their software does this automagically, as is the case with our Epson/HP/Canon photographer's inkjets.

For most commercial projects, the designer or photographer will do the CMYK conversions on their desktop and submit those files embedded within the page layout program, or they will use their CMYK files to export a press-ready PDF (which Blurb wants if you chose their PDF Workflow). Blurb also offers the chance to use RGB files if you use their BookSmart software to design your book (probably the more consumer-amateur approach).

If I were scanning monochrome Pt/Pd prints I would scan them however you like so long as you arrive at greyscale files. Then I would convert them to either Duotones or RGB and apply either Duotone controls or Hue/Saturation>Colorize and use a consistent setting for the color. Then I would convert (not assign) the proper CMYK icc profile to suit the printing press conditions and paper choice, re-saving the files as your final CMYK files for the layout. This way everything would be consistent in color regardless of how the scanner might see one image as having a slightly different color than another.

I'd also bump the contrast and make sure I had a good black and white point set for these Print On Demand outfits since they tend to flatten monochrome images just by the nature of the printing process.

[Richard M. Coda]

Edition One uses an Indigo just like all the other places. But it is more like an old fashioned bookmaker... smaller, more personal... you can talk to a person.

I scanned the PT prints in RGB, spotted them, adjusted them to match the prints, then made copies of the flattened RGB files and converted to CMYK. I then made two identical layouts in InDesign (I am a self-employed graphic designer in my day job)... one using the RGB files, one using the CMYK files. They sent me test printouts of both and the CMYK proofs were almost an exact match.

[benrains]

My advice would be to not start with grayscale images for the b&w. I always work with them as RGB (although working with them as CMYK should be fine as well).

[Frank Petronio]

My advice would be to not start with grayscale images for the b&w. I always work with them as RGB (although working with them as CMYK should be fine as well).

I convert my 'Black & White" to Greyscale at the image editing phase to eliminate any chance of color contamination when you'e making adjustments, burning/dodging, curves, that sort of thing.


Edition One uses an Indigo just like all the other places. But it is more like an old fashioned bookmaker... smaller, more personal... you can talk to a person.

Well then I'd assume they would know their press and workflow best. Just seems odd that they'd even want RGB to me.

[benrains]

I convert my 'Black & White" to Greyscale at the image editing phase to eliminate any chance of color contamination when you'e making adjustments, burning/dodging, curves, that sort of thing.


If you're using Photoshop (PS3 or later), working in RGB and then adding a 'Black & White' adjustment layer at the end will strip out any color. And if you wish to adjust the tone of the B&W, you can do that handily using the controls provided in the layer, and you can easily replicate this precise tone across all your images by duplicating the layer to them.

I find the output from digital to print holds truer when working in RGB with something like the standard sRGB profile to that of the output device/media than going directly from grayscale. (On the downside, the files are a lot bigger.)

[Frank Petronio]

thanks, good tip

I used a RIP here so I can print greyscale directly to the Epson so I never had to keep them in RGB.

[sully75]

I'm scanning in my LF scans in greyscale. Am I missing something there? When would I change them to RGB?

[Frank Petronio]

Nothing to do with the original topic ;-) it really doesn't matter how you scan if it works.

There is another whole topic as to whether to scan B&W as RGB? You can experiment with that for yourself.

If you do a print on demand book you'll end up saving them as RGB jpgs or CMYK psds somewhere along the line.

[patrickjames]

I've never bought a book from Blurb so I can't speak to their quality, but I have heard that they use multiple printers around the country. If true, that may account for the inconsistencies you are experiencing Frank. I have always liked MyPublisher. Never had a problem. They don't quite have the visibility of Blurb though, but I am not big on visibility.

If you want to avoid going to greyscale the easiest way is to add a solid color layer (any solid grey/white/black) and then change the blending mode to color. Simple really. No need to get complicated nor go back and forth between greyscale and RGB. I only use RGB for black and white images though. Color stays in LAB except for output.