A printing method where a color image is separated into 4 different color values (called a color separation) by the use of filters and screens.
This used to be done with photographic film on a graphic arts camera, but is usually done digitally with software now. The result is a color separation of 4 images that when transferred to printing plates and sequentially printed on a printing press with the colored inks cyan (blue), magenta (red), yellow and black (the k in cmyk), reproduces the original color image. K is black which stands for “Key” which means it is the plate that registers all the others to line up properly. If the plates are off slightly, the composite image they create will be blurry. Most of the entire spectrum or gamut of colors are reproduced with just these four process ink colors. The four color printing process is universally used in the graphic arts and commercial printing industry for the reproduction of color images and text.
Also, each plate’s color is broken down into dots. If you look through a magnifying glass, you’ll see that the printed image consists of dots in these four colors. These dots are printed on top of each other, next to each other or just close to each other, depending on the color and tonal values wanted. For example; by printing a blue dot over a yellow dot will give you green etc. To created the shadows in the image, all the colors (with or without black – depending on the intensity of the shadow) will be printed on top of each other to create a dark brownish color. The closer the colored dots are printed to each other, the darker it will appear. The further apart the colored dots are printed from each other, the lighter that part of the image will appear.
use it in real life: Let’s say you are printing a brochure with a color photo on it using the four color process method. In order to reproduce the photo, it will need to be scanned, then broken down into percentages of cyan, magenta, yellow and black that when layered in ink on the press will actually re-create the color photo.
See also: CMYK