16.4. Printing on a Commercial Offset Press

If you prepare artwork for magazines, product packaging, newspapers, and so on using a commercial offset printing press, you've got loads more to worry about than if you're sending your image to an inkjet printer. Unlike printing to an inkjet printer, where your images gets converted from RGB to CMYK during the printing process, a commercial offset press usually requires you to convert your image to CMYK before it's printed. In this section, you'll learn the very specific steps you need to follow to preserve your image's color while you convert it to CMYK. But before you dive too deeply into color-mode conversion, you need to understand a bit more about how offset presses work.

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Note:

Inkjet printers spray their ink from a print head directly onto a page. An offset press, however, transfers, or offsets, ink from an image on a plate onto a rubber blanket and then onto a page—which is why commercial printing presses are called "offset presses."

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