Printing > Overprinting |
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Overprinting
Overprinting is a technique to compensate for slight misregistration that might occur on the press when printing separations.
When one colored object overlaps another, by default, the top object cuts out the overlapped portion when separations are printed on the press. If the press is misregistered, the printed overlap can show knockouta small white border between the overlapping objects. You can compensate for knockout by setting objects to overprint and mix colors underneath.
Note: Text is set to overprint black ink by default.
Knockout (left) and Overprint (right)
You can overprint ink colors, so that all occurrences of a specified color in a document overprint (ink-level overprinting). For instructions on applying ink-level overprinting, see Setting separations options.
You can also overprint specific objects (object-level overprinting). Object-level overprinting overrides ink-level overprinting. For instructions on applying object-level overprinting, see Applying overprinting to selected objects.
You can choose to hide or show overprinting onscreen.
You cannot set an imported EPS to overprint in FreeHand; you must set overprinting in the exporting application. For example, to overprint objects in EPS images and prevent the EPS from knocking out the background on placement in FreeHand, set the objects to overprint in the exporting application.
Trapping is another way to compensate for misregistration. Talk to your service provider before getting started for advice on whether to overprint or trap, and which settings to use. For more information, see Trapping.
To view overprinted strokes and fills onscreen:
1 |
Choose Edit > Preferences and click Redraw. |
2 |
Select Display Overprinting Objects, and click OK. |
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Overprinting strokes or fills appear as a pattern of white O's onscreen, but print normally to a PostScript or non-PostScript printer.
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