[Adolf Witzeling]

The problem with RGB is that, in theory R+G+B printed on top of each other should give you BLACK. In reality that isn’t the case..all you would get is a dark brown mess, but not black….thats why printers print in cmy+K…to get the density and total black….that would be impossible to achieve in a RGB workflow.
There are different ways to achieve “vibrant colors”. One is called Hexachrome printing, which separates the colors differently, than cmyk. Printing in Hexachrome is more expensive than cmyk, but depending on what you are shooting for, might be well worth the extra cost. Some print houses are specialized in Hexachrome printing….search the internet for locations.
Another way to improve the colors, is to choose the right paper…..believe it or not….the right choice of paper for a certain job can Make or Break a print job. Uncoated paper usually soaks up the ink, and after it dries, the colors “muddy” down, because they soak into the fibers. Printing on coated stock brings out the colors a lot better, because the inks never really touch the”paper” but dries on the surface of the coating or finishing.
Another way to improve the colors is UV coating, or varnishing for example, where after the piece is printed it runs through the printing press again and will be coated with clear substrate, that really crunches up the colors. It’s also possible to “spot varnish” certain areas of a piece, to bring out certain colors or elements.
So there are quite a few ways to improve colors and make them vibrant……But of course all that assumes that you know what you are doing, before it goes to press…..
Color management is crucial…..Just looking at a RGB monitor with vibrant colors, and then converting to cmyk, won’t cut it…..Color profiles,monitor profiles, system profiles, Printing press profiles…..all that is neccesary to translate a good looking piece from a monitor, to a good looking piece on paper.
That should get you started…..
Take care.
Adi

[Adolf Witzeling]

Hi,
A couple questions:
What color space are you printing from in Ilustrator?-Document color mode…
Are you printing straight to the printer, or through a RIP?
Does the same color shift occur when printing to “matte” paper?

Adi

[Adolf Witzeling]

Well…..looking for the needle in the haystack.
A couple more things that are worth checking :

1)Delete the preferences file by holding down CTRL+ALT+Shift while PS loads. It’ll ask you if you want to delete the Settings File….click yes and see what happens.
2) remove some fonts, that you might have installed recently ( corrupt fonts can cause all kind of problems)….
3) Uninstall PS from your system……reinstall in Safe Mode
4) Try removing (temporarily) one Ram module….
5) take it off the network, before starting up

Give it a try…good luck…and let us know.
I’m a Mac person by heart, but I work on both Mac and PC so all those things I recommended are things that I have encountered myself during the years….one way or the other.
Take care.
Adi

[Adolf Witzeling]

Hi,
Click once on the application, then “get info” (or “command”+I), and make sure in the ownership and permission section it is a s follows:
You can: Read & Write
Owner:system
Access:Read & Write
Group: admin
Access:Read and Write
Others: Read & Write.

If your settings are different, try clicking the unlock icon and changing to these settings.
You might be prompted for your password , when making changes to these settings.
Hopefully this will help.
Take care.
Adi

[Adolf Witzeling]

Hi Milkman,
can you provide more details about your system? Operating system, memory….
Do you have any older (than 7) PS versions on your system?

Are you installing from an “original disk”? Also, watch when it starts up, when exactly is it quitting…..try removing all fonts, that are not required by the system….a corrupt font could cause all kind of problems… this is just a guess.

On the other side, I don’t really understand why you still want to use PS 7, if you have access to CS2, and it works?
Newer version..more features…more productivity…

It’s like leaving the Porsche in the garage and walking to work…. ; )

Take care.
Adi

[Adolf Witzeling]

Hi,

“Simply” copy the alpha channel onto a LAYER (temporarily), then grab all the layers and copy or drag to new project. Then copy the alpha back into an alpha channel (in new doc).

You also can drag and drop channels from one project to another…or you can “load” the alpha channel from one project to another (SELECT…LOAD SELECTION)…to do this, both projects need to be open.

Hope that helps.
-Adi

[Adolf Witzeling]

Hi,
1.) Try recreating the Illustrator preferences file, by renaming the current one. Then restart Illustrator- it should create a new preferences file.

2.) If the message still pops up, uninstall and reinstall Illustrator. It will install all the necessary UI fonts.

By the way, the message is referring to a display font that Illustrator needs to display menues, dialogs etc. Some of those UI fonts are hidden on the system.
Hope that helps.

-Adi

[Adolf Witzeling]

Because some photoshop filters only work in RGB mode.

[Adolf Witzeling]

Don’t use the “character pulldown”. Instead go to …menue bar …type…font.
All the fonts should be displayed correctly.

[Adolf Witzeling]

Hi,
convert the text to outlines, turn off compression when saving. That should work.
-Adi