Colour Printing

Get the Best Color From Your Rimage System

Whether you use a Rimage Everest printer or a Rimage inkjet system, there is a rich variety of color that your printer can produce. If you have ever tried to match a very specific color or have gotten an unexpected result when trying to print a certain label though, you may wonder what you should do to get the finished product you desire. 

The first thing to understand is that both the Everest and inkjet printers use the Cyan-Magenta-Yellow (CMY) spectrum. The printers use those three base colors in different quantities to produce the wide variety of colors they can print. This is different from your computer monitor that is used to design the label and pick the colors in the first place. Computer monitors use the Red-Green-Blue (RGB) spectrum. While the printer driver is designed to translate RGB colors from the computer into CMY colors for printing, this difference is why the printed result may not match the color on the screen. 

The second important note is that color science is complicated. If you are interested in the science details, see the Rimage website for an in-depth explanation that goes into the details of color, CMY vs RGB differences, and how it impacts disc production. 

There are a few options to try tweaking the color results that a printer is producing. If you’re using CD Designer, one method is to use the Image Processing options on a specific graphic file and then adjust the Contrast, Brightness, Hue and Saturation. These options adjust the difference between light and dark areas of the print, overall darkness and lightness, base color, and amount of color. This can be done per image so you do not impact images that are already printing correctly. 

Another option is to adjust the printer driver settings. This impacts all discs and the entire label, so it should only be used if this is acceptable. The first driver setting is the Color Matching. This changes the way the driver translates the label color into the CMY spectrum. The desired setting can vary depending on the color and label file, so experimenting is encouraged. The second setting is the Image Adjustments. These can produce some dramatic effects, but using the Custom option allows for subtler changes.

 It is also possible to adjust hardware to help with color matching. Calibrating your monitor used to design labels can make it easier to know what color will be printed prior to testing the print. If a printer is serviced in the field, it might also be necessary to balance the color of the printer as well. Rimage technicians will perform color balancing when a printer is brought in for repair. 

More detailed instructions on the steps discussed here can be found in the colour matching guide on the Rimage support site

If you have any technical queries please contact Magellan: support@magellanworld.com