CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5 – Color Management

When I was part of Corel’s Advisory Council for CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5 and later beta tested Coreldraw X5 and X5 Photo-Paint not forgetting, it very soon became clear that the color management engine in CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5 would be something that really rocked. It was and is an enormous work done by the Corel team. And I, as a daily user of CorelDraw and Photo-Paint is very happy for the revamp of the color management engine and everything connected with it. I bow in thanks and salute.

Color management in CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5 – X5 CorelDRAW and Corel Photo-Paint X5.
With the new CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5 Corel did a total overhaul of the color management engine. Everything has become so much easier to work with and more accurate. You can now quickly and easily, both for regular and professional users, set an accurate color profile and rendering intents that you want to use by default on all the documents and images. While just as quickly and easily make specific settings for individual documents and images to work with ”right now”, both created from scratch by yourself, and change in incoming external. One need not go in and change the default settings just because one want a different color setting to a specific image. In this new way you can now quickly obtain accurate color representations both for those who need more advanced settings as those requiring less advanced. It is therefore suitable for all kind of users. Everyone should be able to find a method that suits their workflow.

What I first think of and that quickly took me in my own work is:

– Default Colour Management Settings
– Document colour management Settings
– Document/Image Palette
– Color Proofing Docker
– New Image / New Document Dialog

In my own web site’s store is a tutorial in Swedish on the Document Palette for about 10 GBP. Click here > OBSERVE in SWEDISH language.

It works much the same way in both CorelDRAW and Photo-Paint.
One  make settings for Default Color Management settings via ”Tools> Color Management > Default Settings”. If you want to make document/image-specific settings to a document / image currently working with, these specific settings will override the default setting. Via ”Tools> Color Management> Document Settings.

Primary Color Mode 
While the color space RGB, CMYK and Grayscale object is supported within the same document, Coreldraw X5 Photo-Paint X5 provide a new Primary Color Mode setting, which in turn controls the default ”standard” color setting via export and default ”standard” palette colors with RGB and CMYK.

Colorproof settings / Colorproof Docker
All color profiles settings (color proof) are grouped within the same, which makes it possible to save presets and prepare documents and images to different devices more efficiently. The Color Proof Docker help to save a lot of time allowing several devices provided that one can choose from before it goes to press. If you need to get a clearance from a customer / client (which I strongly recomend at all times) one can both export and send a soft proof (digital samples) and press proofs (Hard Proofs).

Stefan Lindblad
Illustrator, artist  & graphic design