Kittl and other design tools: getting a CMYK PDF for print

Not every designer works in Canva or Figma. Kittl, VistaCreate and many other online editors can export a PDF, and once you have a PDF the route to a print-ready file is the same: export it with print settings, then convert it to CMYK and check the ink. This guide covers Kittl in detail and gives a checklist for any other tool.

Step by step (Kittl)

1. Open the Export panel

   Click Export in the top right of the Kittl editor. Kittl also has a Quick Export button above a selection, but according to Kittl’s help it does not offer DPI or color settings, so use the full panel for print.

2. Choose the artboards and size

   Pick the artboards to export and enter the width and height. You can switch units to inches or millimetres in Kittl’s settings.

3. Set the DPI and choose PDF

   Kittl’s help suggests 300 DPI for print. Choose PDF as the format. With several artboards, turn on Combine artboards into one file to get a single multi-page PDF.

4. Choose RGB or CMYK

   Under Color, Kittl offers RGB and CMYK. Either is fine for CMYKflow (see below). Click Export.

5. Upload the PDF to CMYKflow

   Go to cmykflow.com, sign in and upload the PDF.

6. Choose what you need and check the preview

   Choose Convert to CMYK for an RGB PDF, and Safer for press (Light, Medium or Strong, optional Deeper blacks) to lower the ink. Check the free preview, the four ink plates and the ink figures, then download the print file.

RGB or CMYK export?

When a design tool exports CMYK, it converts your screen colors to ink values itself, with the profile it has chosen. Kittl’s blog names US Web Coated (SWOP) v2 for its CMYK export. CMYKflow respects colors that are already CMYK: Convert to CMYK keeps their values. Safer for press still processes them, replacing part of the cyan, magenta and yellow in dark and neutral areas with black.

When the tool exports RGB, CMYKflow does the conversion with GRACoL 2013 for coated paper and caps converted colors at 320% total ink. RGB with an embedded color profile is converted from that profile; RGB without one is treated as sRGB.

Neither is “wrong”. If your printer has told you which profile to use, follow them. If they only said “send CMYK”, either route gives them a CMYK file.

Checklist for any other design tool

VistaCreate and most other editors have a download menu with several formats. Menu names differ, so look for these things:

• Format: PDF. Choose the PDF option meant for printing if there is more than one (often called “PDF Print”, “print quality” or “high quality”). A “standard” or “web” PDF may compress photos more.
• Bleed and crop marks. Turn on bleed if your design touches the edge. Add crop marks only if your printer asks.
• Size. Export at the size the piece will be printed.
• No password. CMYKflow cannot open password-protected PDFs.
• Not an image. CMYKflow accepts PDFs only. Exporting a PNG and turning it into a PDF afterwards loses sharp vector text, so export a PDF directly when you can.

What the ink figures tell you

For every version, CMYKflow shows the total ink before and after: the average amount of ink over the page, adding up cyan, magenta, yellow and black. In our examples the plain CMYK versions averaged from 135% (a honey label on a cream background) to 219% (a dark business card). The number to compare is the difference between versions: in our night-market poster example, Safer for press Medium used 14.9% less ink on average than the plain CMYK version of the same file.

The ink plates show where the ink goes. After Safer for press, dark areas show more black and less of the other three. If your printer gave you an ink limit (for example “max 300%”), that limit is about the darkest point, not the page average; What is total ink coverage explains the difference.

Typical problems with design-tool PDFs

• Neon and very bright colors become calmer in CMYK. That is the limit of ink, not a fault in the file. See Why colors look different in print.
• Textures and grain overlays on top of a whole design add ink everywhere. Check the ink plates.
• Dark backgrounds are the most common reason for ink complaints. See Printing large dark backgrounds.