Hey, how you doing?
Even if you are not a professional graphic arts or design, you must have heard about these 3 color patterns right? But after all, what is the difference and where to apply each of these colors? Can I use all in print? Which color is more faithful?
Calm down! We help you understand these differences.
Complexity
In order not to miss, you need to pay attention to some details. See the image on the side for example. Is it totally clear the difference between them?
If your answer was no, that’s the idea. And because there’s no difference it’s what makes it more complex to know where and how to apply them.
PANTONE
Pantone is a company specialized in the development of graphic inks, which develops its products from the combination of various pigments for the creation of the colors we call special, including some of them with metallic finish. This system has been developed and standardized over the years and Pantone has become a world reference in the color market. To get an idea of this, designers from all over the world and some lovers of colors, eagerly await the disclosure of Color Of The Year, theme that we have already talked about in this blog, which is the choice based on the psychology of colors.
A technical note about the Pantone standard, is that it has a much wider color gamut than the RGB and CMYK ranges, which makes the color conversion for these profiles very complex.
RGB
RGB (Red / Green / Blue) is a system of additive colors, that is, it adds colors through light to create new colors, regardless of whether or not there is external light. It’s the color system used in electronic devices, like the one you’re using now. Its color gamut is larger than CMYK but smaller than Pantone.
CMYK
CMYK is a subtractive color system and the most used in the printing industry (and also in your home printer). The CMYK stands for Cyan / Magenta / Yellow / Key or Black - we have also talked about the Key in this blog - where the mixture of these pigments reproduces most of the colors of the spectrum.
PURE BLACK OR COMPOUND?
In CMYK, depending on the application, as in texts for example, the ideal is to use pure black, ie:
C - 0%
M - 0%
Y - 0%
K - 100%
In other applications, when the printing area is larger, it is already recommended that we use composite black to make the black darker and consequently more beautiful. In this case we have some variations of black shim:
C - entre 40% e 60%
M - 0%
Y - 0%
K - 100%
or also
C - 40%
M - 30%
Y - 20%
K - 100%
If you are developing a piece for the internet, social networks, blogs, etc... opt for RGB that has more vivid and saturated colors. If it is a piece for printing, such as leaflets, packaging, labels, etc... (and you will budget with us right? 😉) opt for CMYK or depending on your visual identity manual, the Pantone.
If you have any questions, talk to our team of graphic arts experts that we will be happy to offer the support and the best alternative for your prints.
See you next time!
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