Check ink coverage

Too much ink can saturate paper and cause drying problems or change the expected color characteristics of the document. Total Area Coverage specifies the total percentage of all inks used. For example, 280 means 280% ink coverage, which could be accomplished with 60C, 60M, 60Y, and 100K. Ask your print service provider for the maximum ink coverage of the press you will be printing on. You can then preview the document to identify areas where total ink coverage exceeds the press’s limit.

  1. In the Output Preview dialog box, choose Separations from the Preview menu.
  2. Do one of the following:

    • To check for specific area coverage, use the pointer to hover over that area in the document window. Ink coverage percentages appear in the ink list next to each ink name.

    • To check for total document coverage, select Total Area Coverage, and choose a number from the pop-up menu or type a percentage in the box.

    You can adjust ink coverage by converting some spot colors to process colors using the Ink Manager.