The present invention provides a color and darkness management system, method, apparatus and software for determining colorant values for reproduction of an image on an output medium having a minimum darkness, and with the reproduction having a maximum black colorant darkness on the output medium. An exemplary apparatus embodiment comprises a memory and a processor. The processor is adapted, when an input darkness level of a selected pixel is greater than a first predetermined darkness level, to nonlinearly constrain an output black darkness of the selected pixel to a value less than or equal to the lesser of the input darkness level and the maximum darkness; when the input darkness level of the selected pixel is less than a second predetermined level, to nonlinearly constrain the output black darkness of the selected pixel to a value greater than or equal to the greater of the input darkness level and the minimum darkness; and otherwise to determine the output black darkness of the selected pixel as a substantially linear mapping from the input darkness level.