Abstract: A method of determining colorant amounts to be laid down in a color printer includes determining an initial set of cyan, magenta and yellow (CMY) values; ordering the initial set of CMY values to determine the largest, middle and smallest values of the three values and generating an ordering vector; selecting a gamut center black generation LUT and two gamut boundary black generation LUTs from a set of black generation LUTs from a selection table; indexing the selected black generation LUTs to determine black values for each black generation LUT as a function of the minimum of the CMY values; interpolating a final output black colorant amount from the black values, and interpolating final output CMY colorant amounts from the initial set of CMY values, the maximum CMY ink limit constraint, and a set of boundary threshold values.