Pantone Tints

[dkelley]

I see pantone no longer produces the tint guides, what are others doing for color matching tint colors such as 10% of PMS 185 or any % of any color for that matter

 

[pacart]

If it is really critical, we have our customers do a press check. But Mostly we go off of our old guides, yes they don't have new colors from the plus system but we get by. And yes they are old, but we keep them out of the light as much as possible.

 

[michaelejahn]

Pantone stopped making that for a reason

Pantone stopped making that for a reason

I see Pantone no longer produces the tint guides, what are others doing for color matching tint colors such as 10% of PMS 185 or any % of any color for that matter

Pantone - TINTS four–guide set

They never worked very well as the paper they used and you might use are quite different, as well as the press conditions they use and you use are quite different.

- a 10% tint of 185 - wow, that is ( in CMYK ) 12M 2Y ?

Pretty damn light - can't imagine measuring that sheet to sheet would ever vary more that 5 deltaE - not much color there to move that much !

 

[mewhitenoise]

I see pantone no longer produces the tint guides, what are others doing for color matching tint colors such as 10% of PMS 185 or any % of any color for that matter

I copy a patch of the colour (say if you're working in illustrator for example) paste in Photoshop, grab that colour with the eye dropper, double click that colour in your toolbar swatch to get to the colour picker window, click colour libraries, then choose your colour model that you want to use. PS will give you it's closest approximation. Hope this helps

 

[michaelejahn]

i do not think that is the problem they are trying to solve

i do not think that is the problem they are trying to solve

I copy a patch of the colour (say if you're working in illustrator for example) paste in Photoshop, grab that colour with the eye dropper, double click that colour in your toolbar swatch to get to the colour picker window, click colour libraries, then choose your colour model that you want to use. PS will give you it's closest approximation. Hope this helps

I am pretty sure they are not trying to come up with a simulation of a Pantone tint on a computer screen.

I think they are looking for is some guide that is paper based so they can show a customer 'what a tint of that Pantone color" might look like, since there is no method to color manage Pantone colors on screen - never mind solids, but tints are nearly impossible. No ICC profile will do anything to re-render a pantone color on screen - it is all a look up from RGB or some LAB value re-rendered to RGB

 

[mewhitenoise]

Ah, my mistake. I thought they were looking for the closest spot match for a given tint percentage.

 

[John W]

We use Serendipity Black Magic to colour manage and print to an Epson 9900.
Lab values are calibrated for all spot colours using an EyeOne device(metallics are zoned in by a few trials!). We also colourize the backgrounds to match the stock the job will print on, and use real dot technology to even show moire from the halftoning of one bit tif plate files. Obviously, screens of spot colours give a good approximation of the lighter values.
For critical colour customers, eg: when metallics or foils are used, we still turn to the Kodak Approval.

 

[gordo]

I see pantone no longer produces the tint guides, what are others doing for color matching tint colors such as 10% of PMS 185 or any % of any color for that matter

Printshops and/or their ink suppliers can use a Little Joe (Little Joe Industries) to do ink draw downs - including screened tones - on the actual substrate that will be used as a way of proofing spot colors.

 

[BeauchampT]

Printshops and/or their ink suppliers can use a Little Joe (Little Joe Industries) to do ink draw downs - including screened tones - on the actual substrate that will be used as a way of proofing spot colors.

Sorry if this hijacks this thread at all, but....

Gordo, is the method you described a way of getting accruate Lab values that can then be used as a basis for creating a colour accurate proof?? Or just a method of determining target values for use? I ask since we recently had a job where we wanted to ensure that the solid screen of a Pantone matched well, but not much was done with ensuring the screens were also achieving what the designer wanted...

T

 

[gordo]

Sorry if this hijacks this thread at all, but....

Gordo, is the method you described a way of getting accruate Lab values that can then be used as a basis for creating a colour accurate proof?? Or just a method of determining target values for use? I ask since we recently had a job where we wanted to ensure that the solid screen of a Pantone matched well, but not much was done with ensuring the screens were also achieving what the designer wanted...

T

"Accuracy" is an interesting word.
The little Joe is a dry offset press so it can't "accurately" reflect what the screened tone will look like on a completely different output device (i.e. Dot gain, impression pressure, water balance etc.)
The same is/was true of the original Pantone screen tint guides (printed on a waterless press).

If accuracy is important then, IMHO, the only reliable proof (or method to get a Lab value) would be an actual press proof.

 

[BeauchampT]

I agree with what you say Gordo regarding actual press proofs.

How can that be easily translated into a standard across a multi-site operation?

 

[gordo]

I agree with what you say Gordo regarding actual press proofs.

How can that be easily translated into a standard across a multi-site operation?

Well, in for example packaging, the usual way is...
Pantone spot colors are built using recipes for ink mixes. So, the selected base inks are identified and standardized. Then a target solid ink density is defined which includes a specified tolerance for deviation. Sometimes that's represented by a printed target/hi/lo sample (which eliminates issues caused by measuring device variation).
That gives you consistency of your solid inks across different facilities. With that as your standard you could then measure the CIELab value of that solid to use to mix inks for other reproduction processes e.g. Flexo, screen printing etc. that gives you consistency across different media despite instrument measurement variation.
With that in place you can create a simple dot gain/tone reproduction target for any screen value.

You have to be very careful when using Lab values to specify color. The numbers seem to be absolute in defining a hue. However, people of ten forget that there can be a large discrepancy between sprectrophotometers and the numbers they report - even from instruments from the same manufacturer: http://the-print-guide.blogspot.ca/2010/05/top-reasons-why-color-instruments-dont.html
The difference can be large enough to cause an obvious visual difference even when the instruments indicate that two samples are at the same Lab value.
Also, screening a color, and especially a spot color can shift its hue depending on the screening used (AM vs FM) the lpi, the actual tone value, the OBA content of the substrate.

 

[Deleted member 16349]

Well, in for example packaging, the usual way is...
Pantone spot colors are built using recipes for ink mixes. So, the selected base inks are identified and standardized. Then a target solid ink density is defined which includes a specified tolerance for deviation. Sometimes that's represented by a printed target/hi/lo sample (which eliminates issues caused by measuring device variation).
That gives you consistency of your solid inks across different facilities. With that as your standard you could then measure the CIELab value of that solid to use to mix inks for other reproduction processes e.g. Flexo, screen printing etc. that gives you consistency across different media despite instrument measurement variation.
With that in place you can create a simple dot gain/tone reproduction target for any screen value.

When printing screens with Pantone matched inks, needs more than just dot gain/tone information because the hue can change quite a bit depending on the ink and the process. My experience with Dry Offset (printing on plastic containers), which is much like flexo, the shift in hue can be quite dramatic due to the ink being squeezed outside the dots areas.

It would be nice to have a model to calculate the colour of the screen of Pantones and other special colours but I suspect it is difficult to do accurately. I agree that the best way is to just do the press proof method.