Anyone who's printed images straight from their computer knows that the pictures don't look exactly like they do on screen. Part of the reason has to do with light. On a monitor, or television, the colors are additive. If the red, green, and blue colors combine in pixels, they create white. But, when you look at inks printed on paper, you're seeing subtractive color - all the inks would combine to black - think two-year-old playing with water colors.
One easy way to remember additive/subtractive:
A screen when it's off, starts out black. You have to add light to get color.
A paper with no ink, starts out white. You have to subtract light to get color. (subtract light by adding ink).
Another difference between screens and printed materials, is how they generate colors. Screen combine varying degrees of red, green, and blue (RGB). Printers most commonly use four colors in varying degrees to create colors, called a four color process. Printers use cyan, magenta, yellow and black (CMYK). As you might imagine, colors made with RGB have to be replaced with CMYK colors before being printed, which is not always identical.
There's a ton more about reproducing colors in print and on displays - color management is a field of expertise - but these are some basics to think about.
Anyway, here's a look at my business cards - I really like how the blue color came out.
And here's a look at Gutenberg
Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg - Printing Press 1440's
