Differences Between RGB vs CMYK

Differences Between RGB vs CMYK

Learn the differences between RGB and CMYK colors and when to use them. 

When to use

In most cases, you will want to use RGB for anything that will be viewed on a screen, and CMYK for anything that will be printed. 

Instructions

• With your 9" x 11.5" file from the previous lesson open, click on the Image Menu and go to 'Mode'.
• From here you will be able to see which Color Mode you are working in.
• At the moment, this should be set to 'CMYK' but we are going to instead change it to 'RGB'.
• If we try to change the Color Mode from 'RGB' back into 'CMYK' Photoshop will give us a warning, but we can simply click 'OK' to bypass this.
• Before continuing, let's change the Color Mode back to 'RGB'.
• After changing the Color Mode of the file, click on the foreground color at the bottom of your toolbar to open the Color Picker.
• Notice that any color can be represented in five different ways: RGB, CMYK, HSB, Lab, and a Hexidecimal value.

Hints & tips

• Any color in Photoshop can be represented in RGB, CMYK, HSB, Lab, and Hexidecimal values.
• You can change the Color Mode of your file at any time through the Image Menu.