Reply To: To include or not include an ICC profile

I believe that most printing companies ignore the embedded profiles when you send them a PDF that contains CMYK images. I believe the only reason to embed CMYK profiles is when the profile that you used is something they do not expect, and if you explain that they must honor your profile.

But in your case, where you are using Fogra29 and Fogra39, you probably do not need to include the profiles. (And, if you are making PDF/X files, then I believe you cannot embed the profile anyway.) But what you can do is set the “Output Intent Profile Name”. That does not embed the profile, but it makes an annotation inside the PDF that says “my intention is that you use this profile.” The printer may or may not see that, but at least you tried. :-)

I explained more about making PDFs in my Lynda.com courses on:

• Making PDFs
• Color Management