[cairo] Spot colors (and CMYK)

[Bill Spitzak]

ecir hana wrote:
 > Yes, I really want to control the CMYK, such API is the topic of this 
thread.
 >
 > If I say CMYK(40, 30, 30, 100) I want CMYK(40, 30, 30, 100). I bet you
 > understand what I'm talking about - it's the same as reading Quicktime
 > and writing it back as Quicktime, as you wrote above - going from CMYK
 > to sRGB and back to CMYK makes no sense.
 >
 > Again, the real question is, how do you supply CMYK image to Cairo and
 > first, show it on the screen and second, export it to PDF with the
 > same set of graphic operators?

I do not think Cairo should understand color profiles. This is an 
ENORMOUS complication that will only cause grief. This is why I very 
strongly reject any of Kai-Uwe Behrmann's ideas.

I am also under the impression that "CMYK" means "exactly these inks on 
this specific device". Printer profiles apparently are defined as "here 
is how to turn this CMYK into a matching point in a 3-dimensional color 
space". Therefore I believe that any portable information derived from a 
CMYK color can be conveyed with a 3-dimensional color api.

Therefore my method to fill a shape with an exact CMYK on an output 
device is:

1. Specify the color in sRGB. If the application only has CMYK 
information, it is the applications responsibility to figure out how to 
turn it into sRGB. An obvious way is to use the device profile to turn 
it into XYZ and from there into unclamped sRGB.

2. Also specify using a device specific api that this exact spot color 
is wanted. A backend that understands this will use the spot color other 
than the sRGB. Most backends will ignore this information.

There cannot be any guarantees about compositing of any transparency or 
antialiased edge, but a 100% opaque area should produce exactly that 
spot color on output. The reason we cannot guarantee anything about 
transparency is that the only predictable result would be to convert the 
composited sRGB to the device inks, but this would result in a 
discontinuity of antialiased edges with the enclosed area. I think users 
would prefer an antialiased edge made of the spot color even if the 
exact composited result is device-dependent.

As spot colors tend to be one channel, I am uncertain how to do a CMYK 
separation image. One way would be to draw 4 monochrome images with 
different spot colors (each of C,M,Y,K are a spot color), with the 
compositing operator set to subtract (or maybe multiply or maybe some 
new operator) which is an indication that ink must accumulate. Since 
Cairo has no information about how the colors mix it will be impossible 
to produce an accurate sRGB equivalent. Alternative is to use an N+3 
channel image, with the sRGB data included so that back ends that do not 
understand the spot colors can use the sRGB fallback. Or an api that 
takes two different images as input. In any case again anything other 
than 100% opacity is going to produce device-dependent results and no 
color management is going to fix that.