Why still no CMYK - at least for cataloging?

[nemophoto]

My wife is a graphic designer/art director. For one of her largest clients, she maintains an image database of many thousands of RAW/RGB/CMYK photos (99% of which I shot). Her difficulty is that she hasn't been happy with most of the solutions she's found for cataloging/viewing/retrieving. Frequently a shot must be repurposed from the original CMYK form to RGB for web, or converted to B&W (but CMYK, and often in PDF form from an ad layout).

We were talking about Lightroom and how great it is... to a degree. I said the big weakness, from her standpoint, was the lack of support for CMYK images (at least the last I heard). Will Lightroom at least import and catalog CMYK, as well as render a display, is that still a no-go? It's been a while since I last attempted that.

[Ken Bennett]

I realize that designers and printers have for years repurposed existing CMYK files for different projects, even on different presses and papers. A skilled press operator can even make it look pretty good.

But a CMYK file is, if done properly, very specific to a size, sharpening, press, and paper. In my mind it's a one-off file in the same way that a tiny web-size jpeg is a one-off. It shouldn't be re-used.

So for me, I would generate a new CMYK file from the original raw for each new project. That's semi-easy with Lightroom, as I can easily find the original raw file, but then of course LR won't directly create CMYK, so I need to export a 16 bit TIFF to Photoshop and make my conversion there.

I have managed to get our staff designers on the same page in the last few years, so we're working from originals and outputting new images for new projects.

[nemophoto]

What you say is correct, regarding some of the repurposing an image. Since I do all the pre-press work, almost all are saved first as RGB (in an RGB folder) and then I do the pre-press work (incl sharpening) for CMYK, which are saved to their own folder. The complications come when other uses are made for the CMYK, but are still saved as CMYK until needed again as something else. Being able to catalog all versions is helpful so the right one is selected for the use. An argument could be made, oh keep it all RGB and use Acrobat for CMYK conversions. But that still leaves some room for error, though it works much of the time. But when native InDesign files are required, then you are back to square one and needing the help of a good image database. Years ago we tried Extensis Portfolio, but it felt kludgy to work with. The beauty of Lightroom in the ability to create collections for specific purposes and the ability to convert a virtual copy of an image to B&W if needed.

[Martin Kristiansen]

Which brings us back to Bridge. Not quite the same thing but until LR supports CMYK Bridge will be the go to software for me. Creates collections and has so e other advantages over LR in my opinion.

[john beardsworth]

I said the big weakness, from her standpoint, was the lack of support for CMYK images (at least the last I heard). Will Lightroom at least import and catalog CMYK, as well as render a display, is that still a no-go? It's been a while since I last attempted that.

Lightroom 5 will import CMYK images (and has done so since LR4 was released in March 2012).

There's also a smart collection criterion for the colour mode, so you can easily find and group those pictures.

[digitaldog]

As John points out, LR does catalog CMYK data. But that's all it can (and should) do. The processing engine is 100% RGB so aside from cataloging the CMYK data, there isn't anything more it can do with this output centric data.

[john beardsworth]

Yes, I don't think it should do any more. To use LR to generate a number of CMYK images, a Photoshop droplet can be set up as an external editor in LR or run as a post processing step (bottom of Export dialog).

John