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Processing Color
Documents
To process a color page, PCL provides ways of specifying
and modifying color so that the printed result appears as
the user desires. This section provides a conceptual
overview of the process.
Non-Raster Color
vs. Raster Color
All color portions of a page consist of either:
Page Marking Primitives (non-raster data)
Color Raster Data
Page Marking Primitives
Non-raster data consists of HP-GL/2 and PCL page
marking primitives such as glyphs, rules, polygons, circles,
and vectors. Page marking primitives contain no color
information about the image. They merely mark the page
with attributes assigned to the current working
environment (for example, colors, patterns, logical
operation modes, etc.). Page marking primitives act as
stencils through which color “paint” is poured, forming a
homogeneous pattern.
Page marking primitives print in the currently specified
color, which is specified using the Foreground Color
command. For example, if you specify the color blue using
the Foreground Color command, and then send some text to
the printer, the text will be printed blue.
Color Raster Data
Unlike page marking primitives, each pixel of a color raster
image contains color information. A color raster pixel may
be defined by either:
Palette Entry Indices
Direct Color Specifications
User-defined color patterns are a form of color raster, but
each pixel of a user-defined color pattern can be defined
only by palette entry indices, not by direct color
specifications.
1-12 Color Printing Overview1-12 Color Printing Overview