Is it possible to get 'spot colors' in Word?

[Beans2]

I am creating pages in Word that need to go to a publishing company. I am
using black and red, but they say they are not 'true' colors, that they are a
mix of colors. Is there any way I can choose these to be 'spot' colors?

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

It isn't that they're not true colors but that Word doesn't do color
separations. For that you need (at minimum) Publisher.

If you're submitting camera-ready copy, then the publisher's objection to
your black may arise from your using an inkjet printer that uses a
combination of colors in the color cartridge (instead of a black cartridge)
to print black. This would be even more true for red. This objection would
not, however, apply to the computer file itself, I think.

Many printers/publishers can create separations from composite documents or
have printers that automatically print from them (just as a color laser
desktop printer does), but printers who use offset presses and must print
each color separately need to have separations. If your red areas are few
and easily distinguished, you may be able to create separations manually by
changing the red to white in order to print the black separation and then
restoring the red and changing the black to white for the red separation.

 

[Beans2]

Actually, I brought the copy to the publisher on a flash drive. I was told
that both the black and the red were using a mix of colors. They do use a
press, so am assuming where the problem comes in. Would it work to copy and
paste the Word document into Publisher and work with it that way?

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

That would be a start. Depending on how complex the document is, you may
have a good bit of reformatting to do in Publisher, and if you're not
familiar with Publisher, this might be quite a chore. In any case, once
you've got the publication looking the way you want it, use the Help to
search for "color separations." The article you'll want to read first is
"Set up a publication for spot-color or process-color printing." If your
printer is going to be printing the CRC, then you won't need the article
"Print separations of your publication," but you will definitely need to
make sure the printer can work from a Publisher file (not all will).

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

As follow-up, I ran across a post elsewhere that adds the information that
the way to get your document from Word into Publisher is to use File |
Import Word Document in Publisher.