1. A printing system, comprising: a printer controller comprising a processor operable to process an image in a print job from a host system, to cluster Lab image data of the image into a plurality of color regions, to determine numerical centers of the color regions, to refine boundaries of the color regions based on the numerical centers, to generate a covariance matrix for each color region, to determine a rank of each covariance matrix, to remove a one or more of the color regions from subsequent image processing based on the ranks of the covariance matrices, to distribute color values of removed color regions into remaining color regions, to convert the remaining color regions into an output color space of the printing system, and to transfer the processed image; and a printer operable to print the processed image to a tangible medium.