For any printing device, there will be physical limits to the range of color that can be reproduced. In the illustrations below, there is no way to mix the "dull" inks to produce the pure cyan or yellow, or even the black, of the "bright" inks. This principle applies as well to the red, green, and blue of photographic film and television screens, and in fact applies to all color reproduction systems.

In the image on the right, use of a colorimetric rendering intent has mapped all of the greens to a single color—the one best match. Using the best match may sound like a good idea, but by strictly mapping all of the greens to that one best match, color management has wiped out important detail in the image. This is the typical problem with gamut clipping.

The use of a perceptual rendering intent will prevent this problem by preserving the relationships between similar colors. This involves a compromise to color matching, but it produces a far better picture in this example.

This is the reason a perceptual rendering intent may be preferred in situations involving large changes to gamut.