Plates Collection

A collection of Plate objects in a publication.

Using the Plates collection

The Plates collection is made up of Plate objects for the various publication color modes. Each publication can only use one color mode. For example, you can't specify the spot-color mode in a procedure and then later specify the process-color mode. Use the CreatePlateCollection method of the Document object to specify which color mode to use in a publication's plate collection. Use the Add method of the Plates collection to add a new plate to the Plates collection. This example creates a new spot-color plate collection and adds a plate to it.

Sub AddNewPlates()
    Dim plts As Plates
    Set plts = ActiveDocument.CreatePlateCollection(Mode:=pbColorModeSpot)
    plts.Add
    With plts(1)
        .Color.RGB = RGB(Red:=255, Green:=0, Blue:=0)
        .Luminance = 4
    End With
End Sub
		

Use the EnterColorMode method of the Document object to the specify the color mode and the Plates collection to use with the color mode. Use the ColorMode property to determine which color mode is in use in a publication. This example creates a spot-color plate collection, adds two plates to it, and then enters those plates into the spot-color mode.

Sub CreateSpotColorMode()
    Dim plArray As Plates

    With ThisDocument
        'Creates a color plate collection,
        'which contains one black plate by default
        Set plArray = .CreatePlateCollection(Mode:=pbColorModeSpot)

        'Sets the plate color to red
        plArray(1).Color.RGB = RGB(255, 0, 0)

        'Adds another plate, black by default and
        'sets the plate color to green
        plArray.Add
        plArray(2).Color.RGB = RGB(0, 255, 0)

        'Enters spot-color mode with above
        'two plates in the plates array
        .EnterColorMode Mode:=pbColorModeSpot, Plates:=plArray
    End With
End Sub