Enfocus and Adobe are hosting a free seminar regarding InDesign Server & Enfocus Switch on the 18th (Ghent, Belgium) and 20th (Brussels, Belgium) of March. By Enfocus: For creative agencies and publishers, the pressure to deliver more content faster never ends. Your life is filled with repetitive tasks that require your undivided attention. You can’t afford to make mistakes, yet you would rather spend time on your customer or on your creativity! We want to give you back that time… Read more

De beide PDF’s van Henk Gianotten’s presentaties ‘Voorspelbare Kleuren’ en ‘Untitled’ staan online. Henk verzorgde in Amsterdam beide presentaties tijdens de InDesign User Group. Het betreft “ISO 12647 druk- en printstandaarden: voorspelbare kleuren” en “Untitled, of waarom ze jouw PDF niet vinden!”. De PDF’s zijn erg informatief en ook nuttig als je de presentaties gemist hebt. Een korte omschrijving: “Het doel van de ISO-organisatie: gelijktrekken en standaardiseren, ongeacht afkomst. Voor drukwerk is de huidige standaard 12647, maar van gelijktrekken is nog absoluut geen sprake. Henk Gianotten zal tijdens deze sessie de samenhang aantonen tussen de kleurruimtedefinities van vector- en pixelafbeeldingen in de werkruimte, op het beeldscherm, en tijdens output naar een proof, drukwerk of print. Ook de verwerking van PMS-, Goe- en HKS-steunkleuren komen aan bod waarbij de optimale werkwijze wordt uiteengezet. Waar moet je als gebruiker op letten om optimale kleurresultaten te bereiken, en op welke manier kun je kleurdefinities bij huisstijlen beter vastleggen? Kortom, genoeg informatie om consistente kwaliteit te kunnen leveren.

In response to the “Color Management in the Command Line” article, a reader tells me ImageMagick is also very fast, highly flexible and scriptable command line software. Apart from that, it’s Open Source (e.g. free download) and can also be implemented in a Switch09 flow. So at first glance both Apps appear do be able to perform the same tasks. But there are few important differences between the two: ImageMagick is free, but it is more limited. It can read, write and convert images as well as perform fairly simple tasks like scaling, flipping or adjusting colors.

SoftColor however, can perform fully automatic color corrections which can be tuned (layer based / correction intensity / non-linear color, exposure, contrast adjustments). It supports color management using ICC profiles, thus allowing the application to convert images from RGB to CMYK for example. It can output to layered PSD files (original image / improved image) and perform more complex tasks like sharpening, changing the contrast or colors.

ImageMagic does have one advantage: It can be implemented using Windows, Unix or Mac OSX. SoftColor is Windows only. That’s not entirely bad, as SoftColor is build around a tiny collection of easy to use static binary configuration files. Imagemagick binary version requires multiple dll files. SoftColor also supports RAW files out of the box, ImageMagick requires a plug-in. You do pay a few extra bucks for SoftColor, but not nearly as much as a Photoshop license and you can reach an actual human if you run into any problems or have specific questions. To sum it up: If you’re thinking about automating repetitive tasks and you’re looking for a lightweight tool be sure to check both tools out.

Over the years I’ve seen quite a lot of tools to perform your color correction. But I’ve never come across a command-line tool for color correction. SoftColor Toolbox from Finland is just that. It can perform your color corrections, image processing and color management chores, either per single image or batch processing via the command line. You can either activate the command line or run SoftColor from a server. These days with Apps increasingly building feature on top of feature (and generally being a big memory-hog) it’s nice to see a super-light command-line tool like SoftColor. If you’re interested in command-line image-processing, be sure to have a look at their blog as well.

After several years of discussing the topic of ‘Certified Color’ (or ISO12647) RIT’s School of Print Media decided to start developing an audit and certify program for printers in North America. “RIT is an autonomous organization with the reputation and the know-how to fill this much-needed demand”. A bit late, but welcome to the party guys! More details in this PDF. (Tip of the hat to mr. Gianotten.)

The InDesign User Group Amsterdam has another great gig coming up for everyone that’s interested in typography. A totally free all-day event with type designers and InDesign experts. Details in Dutch after the ‘read more’. Read more

A great deal of corporate identities can be found at the website of Hans Stol (just click the names on the right). A lot of the identities of the companies, schools —or even entire cities— are Dutch. As such you might not always be able to read the text, but you do get a great inside look of Dutch Design like the city of Amsterdam. Dutch readers might want to download Hans his PDF-presentation at the bottom of this page. It’s a great catalogue and you can learn a lot just browsing through all the different identities or study how to best set up an advanced online corporate identity.

Ever needed to send really big files to a client that can’t use FTP? Then you know it’s not easy. Services like YouSendIt or Send2Deliver are free but usually have a limit of just 100 Mb and they’ll send out advertisement-emails to you and your client. Now there’s a new Dutch Service that’s absolutely free and supports up to 2 Gigabyte. It’s WeTransfer. The service is free, requires no registration, holds up to 2 Gigabyte and keeps the data for two weeks. Perfect! How can they do it? They sell advertising-space for the entire background. And some of those those backgrounds look really nice. (Just a thought but they would make nice wallpapers as well guys!)

Recently the 45th printer company in the Netherlands got ISO 12647 approval. This basically means their entire operation is dedicated to the so-called ‘Certified Color’ process. The ISO qualification guarantees their printing quality, the inks, paper and just about every detail you can think of. As such companies selecting these printers can rest assure they will receive the best possible quality. More and more companies that rely on perfect color (such as the food-business) are starting to find out. The 45th printer to join the ISO qualification is Telenga located in the Frisian town Franeker. Currently only 45 printers carry the complete ISO 12647. Another 135 have stated they can reproduce the exact quality. (One of the important things about the ISO process is the fact that a client is able to measure the quality. The ISO guidelines, rules and datasets are available to anyone. As such complete ISO approval is not absolutely necessary in order to reach the same level of quality). Of course these companies are not able to carry the official ISO approval. Read more

From Frederik Ruys: We’re proud to present the lineup of our third Dutch Infographic Conference IC10, on march 5th 2010 in the design Hotel Theater Figi in Zeist. Among the speakers are: Charles Blow (graphic director New York Times, National Geographic Magazine), Prof. Michael Stoll (professor for Informationdesign and Media Theory), Liesbeth Melkert (head visual department at the daily Het Parool), Lars Scholten (professor at the multimedia college in amsterdam), Mark Bryson (BBC Interactive Designer), CatalogTree (Processing and Datavisualisation) and Chris Campbell (Infographic Designer at the International Crime Court in The Hague). Infographic legend John Grimwade kicks off the award ceremony of the Dutch Infographic Award 2009. The conference is concluded with a drink in Figi’s Atrium, sponsored by the Association of Dutch Designers. Read more