Printing Process 2: Color Separation

Printing Process 2: Color Separation

Color separation is a professional term in printing, which involves breaking down various colors on the original manuscript one by one and restoring them into four primary colors: cyan (C), magenta (M), yellow (Y), and black (K). This meets the needs of printing ink use.

CMY is the first letter of three printing ink names: cyan (Cyan), magenta (Magenta), and yellow (Yellow). And K takes the last letter of Black, the reason why it doesn't take the first letter is to avoid confusion with Blue. In computer printing design or graphic design image software, color separation is the process of converting the color mode of scanned images or images from other sources to CMYK mode. In various design application software, various CMYK colors are quantitatively expressed in percentage scale, such as C60% M20%. Mixing four different proportions of colors together can restore various rich tones.

CMYK is a color mode that relies on reflection. We only "see" the content when sunlight or light shines on paper and reflects back into our eyes while reading journals, magazines, picture books, or advertisements. Generally, the scanned image is obtained in RGB mode, which is the most basic color mode. The image displayed on the computer screen must be in RGB mode. Because the physical structure of the display follows the RGB mode. If you want to print, you must perform color separation, which is a requirement for printing.