Background info:

1. I’m doing an illustration which will be transmitted to a commercial digital printer. The printer requires that I submit the final as a PDF, and tells me it doesn’t matter whether I work in RGB or CMYK color mode.

2. I decide to work in RGB so I’ll have access to a bigger gamut of colors. I create the illo in Photoshop as a native Photoshop file (.psd). I use Layers, including Text Layers. When I’m done I save the original (layered) file, then I save a copy. I rasterize the Text (embed the fonts) and then Flatten the file (the copy). Now I need to save this flattened file as a PDF. OK, that’s the background.

I do a Save As, and here’s what my Save As screen looks like just before I click Save:As you can see, I’m embedding Color Profile sRBG IEC61966-2.1, which is the standard RBG profile.

I hit Save and now I have to enter General, Compression, Output, and Security settings for the PDF file.

For my General settings, I’m using the settings for “high-quality prepress printing” (I’ve just given this Preset a new job-specific name): For Compression, I choose “Do Not Downsample” and Zip (to make sure I don’t lose any data):Next, I have to choose the Output settings which control how color will be assigned to the printed piece. This is the part that I’m not sure about.

I choose “No Conversion” because I don’t want the commercial printer to convert my colors. I want the printer to keep the colors I’ve used in creating the illustration, i.e., I want the printer to use the color profile I’ve already embedded in the PDF, namely
sRBG IEC61966-2.1. Here’s what the corresponding display window looks like:Next comes the Profile Inclusion Policy. I choose “Include Destination Profile” even though the word “Destination” seems confusing and doesn’t really belong there. However, my only other choice here is “Don’t Include Profile” which seems completely wrong. I do want to include the profile, and I want it to be the profile I’ve already embedded, namely sRBG IEC61966-2.1. So I go with “Include Destination Profile,” and the settings window looks like this:  (I don’t bother with any Security settings because I’m transmitting the file directly to the printer and I want the printer to be able to open it without any difficulty.)

The Big Question for me concerns the Output Settings shown above. That question is:

Having embedded the RBG profile (sRBG IEC61966-2.1) in my PDF file, if I choose “No Conversion” and “Include Destination Profile,” can I be sure that the printer will print my illustration using the embedded color profile sRBG IEC61966-2.1?