Abstract: Photographic images may be produced on a backing such as paper and polyester sheets, from photographic negatives which encompass line rendering, design comps, copy, complex color separation or the like with water-based varnishes and pigments, the resulting images closely resembling, if not exactly, the same image in its commercially printed form. Thus all aspects of color proofs produced by this invention provide greatly improved predictability as to the appearance of the final printed job, with a further improvement of cost savings over conventional techniques of preparing color proofs. Also, said proofing method can be used to provide a "transfer" so that one may transfer the colored image or images to a more suitable or required backing.