Dixie Drive Thursday: Ghosts!!

Got the cartoon in at the last-minute yesterday.

puttin’ the color to it

I’m always curious to see how it printed in the paper on Thursday morning. It’s a crap-shoot. The giant presses at the paper can be off by a millimeter and add a blur to the whole affair.

I figured out a large part of the problem a few weeks ago and thought I’d had my hands on it but, alas, I can still screw up…especially when under a tight deadline!

You see, the paper runs it’s presses in CMYK , Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black (same as most desktop printers).  If one of those colors is off registration, you get a little ghost on the side. Here’s the problem: a good, rich black is made up of a combination of all four colors… so, if there’s a registration problem, it makes the black look blurry and screws the whole image up. Well,  I figured that if I initially scan the inked cartoon into Photoshop, I can force all the blacks to straight “K”, or black. Then, I do the color work on a layer beneath the black and when it’s printed, the black will be pure and crisp! Lastly, I do my watercolor coloring to the original to match the colors I did in Photoshop and throw it into my flat file.

Printed Vs. Original

Unfortunately, I screwed up somewhere and converted my blacks back to CMYK. Here’s what happens: You can see the “Dixie Drive” title is fine (that stayed straight “k”) but the guy and all the lettering in the balloon, etc.  has a ghost. Looks sorta like a drop-shadow.

And there you have it. A lesson in colors and the limitations of print media! You’ll need to check out the original some day, maybe I’ll have a sale, the colors are much more vivid!

Have a great day!