Hello,
I have a pdf document with elements. Some of the elements are assigned a spot color (e.g. RAL9003) with underlaying cmyk values. We need to convert all spot colors in the pdf document into pure cmyk colorspace (the RIP does not allow spot colors). In Acrobat or Pitstop it is possible to convert all colors (including spot colors) to cmyk.
I have to do that color conversion automatically without using another software (e.g. GhostScript).
Thanks
Thomas
If a RIP doesn’t support spot colors, it should automatically default or “fail over” to the CMYK values specified in the spot color definition.
I understand your question, but wonder why you’re having to do this in the first place. The RIP should handle it.
Thomas
The RIP supports spot colors but it changes the cmyk values so the result is not right. The RIP changes the cmyk colors every time different.
That’s how RIPs are supposed to work. They maintain their own CMYK builds of each Spot Color, and those can be adjusted through a color calibration process.
It puts the onus of getting the color “right” on the printer itself, not on the original designer.
Since the RIP supports spot colors, it sees the color name and looks up it’s own, calibrated, CMYK build. If the device does NOT support spot colors, it uses the fallback CYMK build in the incoming PostScript.
So one solution might be to see if the RIP has the option to turn of spot color support for a given job. I know the Fiery RIPs have this option. If you turn off spot colors, you’ll get the CMYK from your PostScript rather than from the RIP.
Thomas
I think its a Caldera RIP for LFP printers. It generally supports spot colors but for our workflow it is not allowed to use the spot colors with look up tables (dont ask why… 
). So in our case the RIP has to use the fallback CMYK build in PostScript, but it does not use the CMYK values from the PostScript right away, instead it translate it every time in a different way. See following example:
We have a spot color named “myColorname” with CMYK values 70,20,70,0 and we send the same pdf file three times to the RIP. The RIP turn off spot color support and takes following CMYK values for processing.
First processing CMYK result: 69,18,67,1
Second processing CMYK result: 71,20,70,0
Third processing CMYK result: 70,19,70,1
That`s very strange but our operator means it is normal. 
So I have to find a solution to do the same Acrobat does. There you can convert spot colors with a checkbox to cmyk colorspace (turn off spot colors in document).
Thomas
What a strange problem. I don’t see any options in Connect to convert Spot Colors to CMYK for incoming PDFs.
Does PlanetPress Image help? I see there is an option to output PDF/A-1b:2005 (CMYK).
Also, the numbers you listed are very, very close. Could the variance be in the method you’re using to read out the colors; I assume you’re using a color densitometer?
I have found another solution. We now use process colors in a special EPS format.
PlanetPress Image does not help, because there is obviously a technical problem at the moment (Connect Version 2018.2). Imaging does not convert any files. I already opened a support ticket (german OL support).
The listed numbers are only example numbers. The optical result is the problem. E.g. we get turquoise or even dark blue instead of lightblue, and every time it`s another color result. We are printing on metal and sorts of plastic and have to comply with customers CI.
I think my request to discard spot colors can be closed. But it would be great to have the possibility to choose own joboptions. Actually it`s not possible in Connect nor in PlanetPress Image. Maybe that would be a useful feature request?