Pantone naming convention is a numbers followed by various different letters. The letter suffixes denotes how that particular color will appear on uncoated, coated, or matte finish papers. The coating and finish of the paper affects the apparent color of the printed ink even though each uses the same formula.

When selecting a PMS color you want to make sure you are looking at the appropriate swatch book in regards to the stock you will be printing your project on. If you are printing on an uncoated stock such as Cougar you want to look at the uncoated (U) swatches. If printing on a glossy coated stock such as McCoy Gloss you want to look at the coated (C) swatch book.

U = uncoated paper
C = coated paper
M = matte paper
CV = computer video (electronic simulation)
CVU = computer video - uncoated
CVC = computer video - coated

By Bill Esler, Editor in Chief — Graphic Arts Online, 2/12/2009 8:28:00 PM

When investors read spice firm McCormick & Co.’s 2008 annual report, they may find themselves getting hungry. Because this year 24 pages of otherwise straightforward financial results have bSchmitz Press Maryland printing McCormick Annual Reporteen given an aromatic addition—seasoned with cinnamon. For more than 30 years McCormick has tried to make its annual report rise above other firms’. (The numbers are good, too; McCormick reported $3 billion in revenue.) The Sparks, MD spice firm is assisted in the effort by an inventive and high-quality printer, Schmitz Press, based in nearby Sparks Glencoe, MD. McCormick selects one of the many exotic spices it sells around the world, blends essential oils derived from it with a varnish, then supplies it to Schmitz for the run. Over the years, investors have discovered clove, nutmeg and Chinese five spice emanating from the pages. The cinammon aroma for the 2008 edition, now in the mail, comes from a hand-harvested spice taken from the bark of a tropical tree grown in the highlands of Southeast Asia. Joyce Brooks, VP Investor Relations at McCormick, says Schmitz Press applied the varnish at the end of the run. The project is overseen each year by pressroom foreman Angelo D’Anna. The aromatic varnish is the color and consistency of honey applied just before delivery on a Heidelberg 4-color Speedmaster 102 VP. The treated financial section (pages 41-64) is printed on a 70-lb. Domtar Feltweave stock in Ashe color. Quality control manager Mike Billian pulled a job jacket to report the cover was run on another of the firm’s Speedmasters, a 102 SMP. The 22,000 run also included NewPage Sterling Ultradull Text and Cover, with flecks embossed and coated in register with the printing.

Reprinted from Graphic Arts Online 

These processes were meant to APPROXIMATE the selected color of how it will look when printed. Unless you have gone through an extensive color calibration process these devices each shows colors differently. You can take the same image on 5 monitors and it will look different on all of them. The same will occur when printing out to 5 different laser/inkjet printers. Each device has different degrees of calibration that are possible.

A monitor displays color in RGB (red, green blue). Colors are created by adding red, green and blue light (additive process). Offset printing will typically be either CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow and black) or PMS Colors. Inked paper absorbs or reflects specific wavelengths (subtractive process). Cyan, magenta and yellow pigments serve as filters, subtracting varying degrees of red, green and blue from white light to produce a selective range (gamut) of spectral colors. PMS Colors are specially formulated colors that don’t always have CMYK or RGB equivalents.

Both RGB and CMYK can only represent at best a relatively small part of the total color space, and there are some colors that can be produced in one but not in the other and vice-versa. The range of color that a color space can produce is called the gamut.

Another element that affects the way the color will look when printed is the stock. An uncoated stock will absorb more ink creating a heavier image. On a coated stock the ink will typically sit more on the top of the surface. The coating on the stock had a different reflective property creating more vibrant images. If the stock has a color to it the inks will be affected by the color. If you print a light blue on a cream stock that light blue will have a tinge of green to it. When using special or colored stocks it is best to ask for ink drawdowns on the actual paper. This will give you a better idea of how the actual color will look. Something to remember with drawdowns - an ink draw down is created by putting the ink onto a paper by hand without water — when you actually get on press and add all the other elements in there can be a slight variations when on press.

For CMYK offset printing we recommend a matchprint proof to show how the color will print on press. The matchprint device has been calibrated to match the printers press. Each press will print a little differently (some may be heavier reds, some may be heavier cyan.) Matchprints can be calibrated to show the difference in what happens to an image on Coated vs Uncoated stock. This will help to eliminate any surprises on press.

In 2007 Pantone updated their CMYK color builds for PMS colors to create better CMYK matches. Many of the common design programs are using the  old cmyk color builds. Quark 7 and Quark 8 both come with the current CMYK libraries. If you are using Adobe CS3 or earlier you will need to update your libraries. To ensure the best CMYK color match of your PMS color you should visit the Pantone website and go to the support section to download the updates.

www.pantone.com

PMS stands for Pantone Matching System. The Pantone matching system was created to universalize and standardize the selection of ink colors and is broadly used through out the world. It gives the color a number that is easily ordered by the printer and gives the client a way to select colors with relative assurance of the outcome from one printer to another. Pantone prints various different guides for matching colors. These guides are used through out most print shops creating a common language to speak about colors.

Pantone guides are available on coated, uncoated and matte stocks. The reason they are made for different types of paper is because each paper has different reflective and absorption characteristics. The same PMS color on a coated stock can have a very different look when printed on an uncoated stock. When looking at PMS swatch books you always want to be looking at the correct book for the type of stock you will be printing on.

Pantone makes a very useful swatch book called the solid to process book. This is a “must have” tool for anyone who designs project with PMS colors and then wants to print them as 4CP. Not all Pantone colors will convert to CMYK well. Some colors will have a drastic color shift – others the difference will be barely noticeable. This swatch book will show you the PMS color and how it will print in 4CP. It will help you to determine if that 5th color is really necessary for a project. The following image on the left shows the PMS Color. The right side of the strip shows the CMYK match to the color. You can see that in PMS 1767 the CMYK is not as rich of a color – it becomes muted. For PMS 1817 the CMYK equivalent becomes much heavier and darker loosing the brightness of the color.