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Really odd (for myself anyway) layering issue - [screencast]


MrToM

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Your 'Predator' layer is set to 'Darken' blending mode.

This means that the blended 'result' is always going to show the darker of the two layers....in this case the black rectangle.

Change the 'Predator' layer to 'Normal' and the rectangle will appear behind it.

Regards.
MrToM.
 

Doug Montgomery

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Beautiful, thank you.

Another question if you have a moment...
From what I understand, if I've done my homework, to get a true black, where black ink is used, the image should be in cmyk mode with settings of 0,0,0,100. When I use that the black is not as dark on my monitor. I'm not understanding why.


http://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/cDQFcKjoJx

Thanks again
 

MrToM

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In CMYK pure 100% black is the 75, 68, 67, 90 you show in the latter part of your video.

When Cyan. Magenta and Yellow, (Translucent ink), are mixed they theoretically 'should' create black but in reality, being on white paper, they produce a kind of dark muddy brown. For this reason a fourth colour, black, (The 'Key' colour), is also added.

Without going into too much detail, (the internet is flooded with explanations on this), use the above ratios if you want your 'black' to be 'black'.....and not a dark muddy brown.

Regards.
MrToM.
 
Last edited:

Doug Montgomery

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Thank you for the detailed explanation. The one thing I didn't understand in the equation was the idea of the 3 colors being mixed and the white paper not giving the theoretical black, thereby adding in the true black. I get what you're saying...and I've read a lot of information out there... Although, shouldn't it give a true black when using the key black ink? Forgive me for not getting my head around this.
 

MrToM

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...Forgive me for not getting my head around this...
No worries at all.

To be honest if you want to know 'why' it would be better for you to just search for written or video explanations yourself from as many different sources as possible....which it sounds like you've done already anyway.

Printing is a 'Subtractive' process...the 'Ink' filters out different wavelengths of light which are 'reflected' off the white paper....white being a composite of all wavelengths.

By 'subtracting' colour the result is what's left. Unfortunately filtering every wavelength isn't practically possible with just C,M and Y so 'Black' is added to remove the remaining light reflected off the paper.

Using those ratios of ink is the most efficient way of producing black on white paper using the 4 colours CMY and a 'Key' colour, which is usually black.

I'm sure someone else here can give you a more detailed explanation as the above only just scratches the surface really.

One thing to remember though is that what you see on your monitor is 'Additive' colour...its coloured light added to black, as opposed to ink being 'subtracted', (filtered), from reflected white light.

Pretty lame explanation which why you are better off searching for as many different explanations as possible and eventually you'll understand it....honest.

Regards.
MrToM.
 

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