White ink on black paper - how should I knockout a stroke around some text?

Question

I am preparing artwork to be sent to a printer for the production of custom umbrellas. We want to print a logo on black fabric with 2-inks: white-spot and orange-spot (PMS 021) colours. The path in the picture is the stroke for the type. That's the one I want to be black, the fabric. Shown below is only one character coloured in orange.

How do I get a stroke on an object to knockout underlying white ink and to not print on the stroke at all so that it ends up looking like the second image below? With 0% C 0% M 0% Y 0% K process swatch?

And how can I preview it? We don't have black paper nor white ink.

Answer 1

No, you simply use black (just like you are doing for the background) for the stroke on the text.

To make it easy, make your black a CMYK black, instead of a spot – then you can advise the printer to simply ignore all CMYK and print the spot plates only.

To visualise as you're working, bring up the "Separations Preview" (Window menu) to see a list of inks: it should show CMYK plus your two spot colours. Making sure Overprint Preview is turned on, you then turn off CMYK plates to see your white and orange plates in isolation. Only catch is you won't see white ink against the white artboard so temporarily colour your white ink with a bit of magenta or whatever.

Answer 2

Select the path and that white burst.... choose Object > Compound Path > Make from the menu.