As an ad design student, I can admit that color is so important for brand recognition, but sueing over color when nothing else matches is absolutely hilarious and wild.
Pantone: “We want to use one of our colors to highlight the problem of climate change!” Also Pantone: “We are granting color exclusivity to large conglomerates responsible for climate change!”
Any color swatch is a mixture of some basic pigments. PANTONE uses 14. But you can use any pigments available worldwide and mix your own color. Any of your created colors will have its Lab formula, which is universal and doesn’t depend on particular technology. You can put this formula in your app to create your own color swatch that can be recreated anywhere on the 🌎where standard pigments are available.
As a screen printing artist/designer/illustrator, I found the best way to get intense color from CMYK or process color space is to treat the individual CMYK as Spots some of the time. On T-Shirts, this works very well, and we (most screen printers) utilized what we called 7 color process, which is basically a four color process with a white "bump" and two other colors to add both contrast and intensify color ranges. This gave us a huge range of options, as well as photographic detail, without sacrificing intensity of hues.
@@MazHem Window -> Channels -> New Spot Channel, talk with your printer to find what colors they can do and get your on screen color to match the color of their ink
@@MazHem We ran third party plug ins, to Photoshop, Spot Process being one of them, they basically ran actions to generate separations via histograms and value measurements, then converted the bitmaps into alpha channels, you could then tweak them individually just like any other. You could run them with or without a bump map for dark shirts, but most of the time we ran them for both then swapped the spots out for the best effect.
@@mztgood Yes for a long time only wealthy people could afford certain dyes (purple from a specific shell, blue, some reds) Ironically now black/white & beige are really popular among bougie types & super colorful things are often associated more with lower class aesthetics & non-Western cultures. Goes along with the minimalist trend.
I like the idea of an ink recipe to achieve colour consistency across different products, but yeah, blocking off access to commercially using the colour spectrum is madness
had to start using the pantone swatchbook because i started making enamel pins, and that's how you communicate colors with your manufacturer accurately. spending $200 on the book set physically hurt, but on the bright side most people don't need both books so i was able to re-sell the uncoated one. on the downside i now have to deal with pantone and they are another entry on my long list of overly-capitalistic shithole companies, all for reasons like this @ _ @ hell is real and it's called being an artist, but at least the colors on my pins all slap hard
@@paintedmoments_ Hex codes are for computer screen colors. They are not referenced to any specific printed color, and look different with different monitors and settings.
@@paintedmoments_ from what i understand from the video, pantone colors have to be used for printing things because of the way they have like, ink "recipes" for each color. basically it guarantees you get the same color every time, and you cant do that with hex codes so manufacturers use pantone as the standard :/
@@paintedmoments_ unless your monitor has been professionally calibrated everyone is looking at different colours on different screens. Try holding up your phone to various screens in your house, you might find the difference huge.
OKAY, STORY TIME... Used to work at a library at my art school. Lady running the Graphics Design department is stuffy AF (power suit, cravat, those glasses that make you go 'yup, that's the lady I never want to talk to', the WORKS), comes in, demands why her students have to use outdated Pantone swatches. I didn't even have to turn around, my manager was right there. WHOO, GD lady must do that often, because my manager called the lady out, by first name, and told her that they had been through this before... "Pantone is expensive, there is never any significant change between the colors, we do not and are not given the budget for recent Pantone binders." (Learned later we wait a year or two, sometimes more, between updating them. Because, you know, prices go down.) Lady looked like a chicken that was just told what nuggies were made out of. Que a long and exhausting conversation that went in more circles than a carnival ride, and then she stormed off, proclaiming that the Dean would hear of it. I was told she does this about every quarter. I worked there a year. Never failed, about two to three weeks in when the first of the assignments are handed in, she was there to cluck about it. This, and a later wiki-walk that somehow ended me up in reading about the BILLIONS of lawsuits that come up around these colors, had convinced me to just use hex colors and pray for the death of Pantone as an idea and entity. **And I'm, technically, an amateur artist at this point in my life.**
@@littlestbroccolithe company I work for printed on fabric bags this summer, and during the design process we learned that our manufacturer in China wasn't using the Pantone colors in my illustrator files but just looking at them and matching by eye… needless to say, there was much consternation between me and the coworker who had been heavily involved in the color-choosimg process 😂
Knew two long-time employees of Pantone who didn't have many nice things to say about the people in charge there. It's just another greedy family-owned company that treats many, or at least the two I know, employees badly.
to me pantone makes sense as a consistency thing. a friend of mine made enamel pins and was able to communicate with a manufacturer on which colors they wanted through that book (the manu ended up getting the colors wrong anyway which is another conversation lmao) i think that's a pretty huge advantage IF it would like, actually work. given that they're switching out their formulas, and the consumers are dependent on their swatches being consistent enough that everyone's going to be seeing the same thing, it's more than a little silly. like, you could be making recipes for new colors every year and instead you're doing legal battles with companies and continually gatekeeping access?
Yes the video mentioned different materials, but this is another huge factor. Imagine waiting for 20 samples from across the world from each manufacturer because they don't know what shade purple you want/matches your existing products. Or your product needs to be made in multiple factories and you expect the colors to still match up.
I've just realized why I feel anxious when I watch your videos. You talk in a calm and methodical way. I've gotten so used to watching people manically scream at their camera that when I watch you I grow tense, waiting for you to raise your voice. (I also love your super educational videos and am glad your neck surgery went well.)
i was gonna comment on the shadiness pun but then i figured that was a silly thing to notice but i am SO GLAD IT WAS INTENTIONAL. as for the video itself, you did a really good job of summing up the problems with pantone. color is an integral part of how so many people experience the world, and when pantone tries to pretend they *own* that, i'm gonna have a problem with that both as a person and as an artist. fuck 'em! great video :) edit: i also wanna say your scar looks so cool. congrats on getting rid of the tumor
"It's a colour! You didn't invent it!" -- they can kind of claim they did. At least, they lay claim to the formulation of that colour with their technology and inks. I agree though that they can't really copyright it though. You can't copyright something that a CMYK or RGB colour wheel in any art program can replicate.
That's the problem: The color wheel can't replicate it. Color wheels can approximate it - but there are always differences in display calibration, and the exact inks used by different printing processes, and the dyes used on plastics. Pantone's service, the one they charge a fortune for, is calibration: They provide the references and processes for making sure that colors are consistent. Which is very important commercially, because a production run can be ruined if the customer wants one shade and the factory produces another. So pantone does serve a function. But it's a function that doesn't need a greedy company to carry out. Pantone introduced their system at the right time (the 60s, when the print industry was exploding with new technology), and cornered the market. They were smart about it: The pantone color system is specifically designed to be meaningless, the numbers are entirely arbitrary, so it's impossible to use without licencing Pantone's intellectual property. It's too entrenched to move away from any more.
colors as concepts that are linked to, but independent from wavelengths of visible light or w/e, are absolutely human inventions. now if you want to own rights to a color, you have to prove that its use in context is culturally understood to belong to you/your brand. colors are social constructs, you cant create one for you to own from scratch and all alone
@@decepticonne but you can claim a specific colour for use in a specific product category. That's the rules (at least where I am). Like Tiffany blue can't be used by competitors to market their jewelry. Its a consumer protection thing along with a brand protection thing. Problem is brands are overreaching the application of this. Now Pantone used to make their money selling printers ink. Each PMS colour is a specific recipe that blends their proprietary inks. There are plenty of non PMS inks to choose from, with their own colour books, but generations of designers and companies have chosen PMS as the standard of their designs. And 95% of professional printers only stock PMS inks to use on their press. That's what Pantone is leveraging to start charging just to access their swatches. Only once have I delt with a printer who did not use PMS inks, and it was a major hassle to coordinate colours between them and the client.
So good to see you’re back in the swamp known as UA-cam. This topic has always been strange to me so thank you for the HUEge amount of work you put into this video post surgery. Recovery is a marathon not a sprint, healing takes time and your audience will wait for as long as you need :)
Really interesting video. As an illustrator who get jobs that are printed Pantone is a great tool to keep consistency and have more predictable results. For years I had an old Pantone "fan", a beat up thing from a printing shop, recently I manage to buy a new one and I can tell you the quality of their ACTUAL product, is going down. The paper is thinner and there is more pages now, but they keep the fan system so it's really inconvenient to use. And the "achievable in CMYK" and or "achievable in RGB" logos have disappeared making it harder to know if your computer can display them accurately of it you can keep the same file for a CMYK print. It's baffling.
Precisely everything I dislike about Pantone! 🙌 I've been in the industry for over 20 years. The company I work for (it's...global) got sued by Tiffany over an RGB that was a medium teal on a jewelry ad my coworker created; not even a Robbins egg blue. We're not a jewelry store - we sell *everything*, if you know what I mean... So fellow designers, be careful out there! Also fun fact regarding the blind community: a study was done several years ago while I was still in college that observed how the blind perceived color when entering a space. Though a lot of them can't see color, they can legit FEEL it!! Super neat stuff. This is something interior designers consciously have to keep in mind when designing spaces, especially for those with ADA requirements.💕
Just a couple days ago I was driving along the highway with my mom and we saw a Pantone billboard with a color (I don’t remember actually) on it. She asked how does it make sense to copyright a color? I’ll have to show her this video. Thanks :)
Also: Colorblind artist here (strong green deficiency). This is such an interesting topic to me, because I've worked really hard to learn about color and learn how to work around my deficiency, which is effectively that I can distinguish between far less variations of green (or colors that contain green) than people with full color vision. When I finally just accepted that our experience with color is personal, I got less stressed about it. I get why we need to have standards to communicate and discuss colors for production, but Pantone always seemed a like an excessive attempt to control (and I guess monetize) something that's ultimately subjective anyway. We can't literally see through anyone else's eyes and experience color the exact same way.
Glad to see you're doing better. 16:16 What!?! They fade? They charge so much money but can't make it lightfast? In heraldry, because it is quite old, there is no specification as to what particular shade any colour has to be whatsoever and it works. Gules is red and the shade does not have to be consistent at all.
the fading thing made me laugh so hard. In their greed to get more money from people, they're essentially admitting they can't make their print colour last beyond a year without noticable degredation. But if it CAN last beyond a year, then they're admitting they lied to force people to buy more samples. Corporations be wild.
I mean... it's paper. Even archival paper will change colour with time. But It's in a book. You store the book properly - as in not leave it open to a page when you finish work for the day. Ensure your hands are clean when touching it.. it's basically fine. Heck, people use booklets of paint chips for 5-10 years without issue. But it depends on the degree of precision you need. And pantone is based on precision.
When I was working with this stuff professionally, our printers had ratty 5-10 year old PMS books next to the press. Still worked fine. They replaced them when the inkstains obscured the real swatches.
Heraldry; I’m part of the SCA and we get to design our own arms to their standards. “What do you mean I can’t have a light grey, and white, and cream, and snow!” Because it’s alllll White…..
First off, I'm happy the surgery went okay. While I'm a graphic artist, my day job is in printing. I'm not exactly worried about pantone because offset printing is losing ground to digital printing. Smaller shops have phased out offset altogether for digital (xerox, canon, ricoh, etc.) So what you get is a cmyk mix. Some production machines have a 5th color bay which can aid in coming closer to hitting some of those harder to hit pantone's, like 021 orange. A lot of corporate inplant printshops have these 5 color machines.
Spinal scar club (gentle) high five! I'm glad you're doing well. I knew pantone were a pretty scummy company but I'd forgotten about them and Adobe (another pretty scummy company) holding people's back catalogue of work to ransom.
Hey, coming outright: don't have the energy to watch this video right now, but clicked on it for the health update. And, gosh we are so incredibly glad you are doing better. We hope recovery keeps going smoothly.
Replacing the swatches every year? How bad is their ink lightfastness to fade that bad that quickly? Now I want to see a light test made on the swatches kept in the case, out in the light and brand new. It has to be a cashgrab
It's actually not bad. I had mine for over 10 years. They're just trying to scare you into buying a new one. All you have to do is keep the thing in the box it came with and it's perfectly fine. Sometimes I go on tours of printing companies and whenever I see their pantone shelf those book are 100% not new. Like lol, I don't know any other company that insists their product is bad so you must buy a new one every year.
Your video on scam art school made me feel so vindicated with my own experience :). I also watched your vide just now on your spinal tumour and I am so glad youre back! Thank you for your amazing content
Thank you for making these very good points. The Adobe-cloud-fee ist more than extremely annoying! 😩🤬Luckily for us here in Germany, we use a system called HKS which is used for paints you can buy in any store as well as for printing as well as RAL. Btw. Stuart Semple is one of my heroes!
As a musician I’m sitting here imagining what it would be like if Bankers Life owned the C# note and anyone who dared to use it could get sued. The whole idea is so absurd that it’s hard to really comprehend.
OH MY GOD SOOOOO happy to see your face again, in the last video I honestly thought you might die and that terrified me. i am so grteful for your existence, keep it up!!
Usa Kasikbo! Im so happy to have found you! Im glad you're healing and gifting this fantastic video essay on Pantone. Im a Queer 2Spirit death doula and art therapy undergrad , Im excited to check out more of your videos and such!
That scar looks cool AF and I hope the closure holes manage to stick around, but you can always take photos of the scar in detail just in case they don't. That way you could get it tattooed on in the future if it ever fades away. That is what I would do but I also wear all my scars with pride even the ones caused by my OCD that I made when I was a kid and I don't even remember what caused the initial wound lol (that I then compulsively picked at causing it to scar)
Well this is as if dictionaries claimed monopoly over words and trademarked them to brands. Like think about the "React" situation that happened here on UA-cam.
I'll be honest, this is the first video of yours that I've seen, and was incredibly nervous to read the comments due to how icky the comments sections of other pro-LGBTQ+ creators tend to be. However, this is the first comments section in a very long time to make me feel safe to exist. You all are incredible, and you have a new subscriber
i worked at a printing press for two years, and was mostly responsible for mixing the pms colours. ive had this stuff in my haur, clothes, underneath my nails. everywhere. cool video, thanks
No idea why this was recommended. But it was absolutely fascinating. Brilliantly presented. No idea if you made this all up or researched it to a high degree of accuracy because it’s a totally new topic to me. But you were very convincing for sure. Thank you for making a dull evening filled with back pain more tolerable. Glad your head didn’t fall off in surgery, fingers crossed everything works out long term, must have been terrifying. So pleased the algorithm sent me your way.
When i went to the new school, a lot of my friends went to parsons and the amount of them who had to purchase Pantone cards, the Pantone adobe plugins, etc. was so ridiculously expensive
Thank you for this fascinating dive into Pantone; I never thought to look into who they actually were. I had always just assumed that they were a sort of color reference guide that was free. I had no idea they were basically the Chromo Mafia.
Love your vids Cat, always so eloquent and thought provoking. You inspire me. Really glad to hear that you're doing okay and getting through it. Keep on swaggin on
I love your glasses. I'm so glad you made this video, as a small designer, self learning I didn't understand why we "need" to use their colors. I got really confused with their different types. I love it when a youtuber makes a video about a topic I've been pondering about. Glad your video got recommended to me! Sending you well wishes. Healing isn't linear, so be gentle with yourself😊
I don't know how is this legal. as if they invented colors. I see the necessity to have a system to organize colors, but trademarking them is ridiculous. when I first learned about pantone back in school. I could not believe it. even less that no one seemed to question it. so much bs
This was the first video i have watched from you but i am going to binge many more!! Your video was well made, well edited, and has a lot of resources and education behind it. Thank you for making your video and art! Im glad your surgery went well and that scar looks sick as hell!!
This directly affects my wife's work and kept me from deciding to pursue design professionally because...Pantone sucks. They're trying to Color as a Service *glares in software engineering* NO Edit: I feel the need to point out that my wife is from Austria. So this is also an EU problem.
The separation of Pantone subscription from Adobe is weird… I always thought the swatch palettes just functioned as a preview, so if you were aware of the corresponding code and a CMYK approximation of the colour, you could probably create your own Spot swatch, and ask your printers to use the Pantone code of choice at the printing stage in place of that swatch. But I might have it wrong. (Oops… was covered in the video)
I have a scar just like that down the front of my leg! I broke the fuck out of my ankle, and they had to put a plate and screws in. I'm glad you are back and doing well!
This was an awesome video. I knew some of the things, especially from artist friends about the fun with photoshop, bust still this was nice and comprehensive. also must say the scar is so cool! hope you continue doing good in healing from the surgery :)
Yes, your scar is very metal 🤘really happy you're doing well!! 🎉 Thanks for doing all that research on pantone. I am so glad I never bought their products when I started making digital art. I thought they would always be the industry standard back then.
Pantone is supremely useful for people who design physical objects, particularly in a variety of materials. There is no substitute the way there is in digital media. It's incredibly useful, really to the point of being an absolute necessity for disciplines like fashion and interior design. I wouldn't cry about a less expensive, non-proprietary system though. I would also like to add that Pantone does put work into their colors. They're very human, and they look like "real" colors in the way colors on a screen or even a lot of hardware store paint swatches don't. The service they provide is definitely worth the money, depending on what you do.
This system feels like a deeply perverse commodification of one of the most basic parts of the human expierience, the perception of light and the emotions it can conjure. Just wait until they "patent" single wavelength of sound, specific states of viscosity or the haptic expierence of a type of wood. People need to understand that these companies don't make money by providing you with something, but by restricting the access to something that should belong to you in the first place.
Thank you! I feel cautious about the practice of companies or anyone owning “everyday” things like color. On one hand it is “smart” to develop new ways of owning the means of producing non proprietary products, but also strange seeing them manufacturing ownership in a way that limits general access and creativity. The movement toward how to sell free stuff is only gaining more traction with the idea that selling free stuff is providing value although only to those able and willing to pay to play.
Wow. I’m convinced daily that ownership is just bad, all around. No one really owns anything, we just borrow for a time. And wouldn’t you know it, more and more powerful people are refusing to share.
Forgot to comment this the first time I watched, but so glad you're back! I didn't expect to be seeing another youtube video for much longer as you recovered, I'm so happy you made such a quick recovery, love your videos
1. They put out a book with a bajillion colors of dirt. DIRT! My daughter is an archeologist and at least one person on the crew has to have that book. Of dirt colors. They even have dirt colors locked down. 2. I was a commercial sculptor for one of the best companies around that made stuff for movies, commercials, and the major theme parks ‘round here. And, uh, no-one kept updated Pantone books around. They were the most battered, paint spattered, dog eared, rachet things around. More importantly, none of our clients ever noticed. One was 10 years old. Most people can’t color match that finely. Thank dog…
Also, I got an uncoated book for my birthday over a decade ago. It’s seen the light of day maybe 4 times. I keep it wrapped and tucked into a dark hole….
From work experience, I know that for catalogs a web-offset press typically has CMYK and one or two other inks of a custom color. Usually related to a major sponsor. Target red or Pepsi blue, for example.
SO happy to hear the spinal surgery went well. That shit is terrifying and I was seriously worried about you. Super happy to see you in my sub feed again!
Never watched this video because I wasn't too interested in Pantone but i remembered the title, watched new vlogbrothers where John Green mentions pantone is owned by the price-gouger Danaher, now I'm back here!
I tinted paint at a hardware store. Our department members, at that particular location, took a lot of pride in being able to do some seriously custom colour matching - colours that we didn't have formulas in our brand (tint set) for, that we had no sample to let the photospectometer test (It bounces light off a sample, and creates a formula of tints to make that colour) or that the sample, wasn't compatible with the spectrometer. (Magazine images are made up of dots - a machine can't read that accurately as a colour). Oh, and the company supplying our tints/in house formulas, changed some of them part way through my job there. So suddenly, a client wanting the same colour they bought a week ago... as a "perfect" match to finish a job. well... uhm... you see... it might not be the same. We can figure it out for you, we'll get it right... but it might take 10-30 minutes (as opposed to the 6min it ought to take if you bring in the previous can). It was fascinating. But yikes.
Thanks for your perspective, Cat. To be honest, I haven’t done as much research on Pantone as you have with regard to its motives or strategy, so I think I need to hold off on forming a fully fledged opinion on the company as a whole. On one hand, I agree that the monetisation and monopolisation of colour is absurd. Pantone bills itself as a consulting firm-almost like a nonprofit!-but you don’t have to look far to see them peddling their merchandise. The legal and artistic ramifications you mentioned are very real and important to consider. On the other hand, I will say that I do tend to like many-though certainly not all-of their Colour of the Year forecasts. I’ve never bought any of their official merchandise (I’m sure we’ve all supported them indirectly), and you won’t catch me buying a ticket to the “Magentaverse” exhibit anytime soon, but I have been inspired by them more times than I can count. “Emerald”, which Pantone made aware to me, is now probably my favourite colour of all time, and I just painted an accent piece in my bedroom to match the sophistication of “Marsala”. I figure if they can profit off of colours they didn’t invent, I can profit from their research without giving them money. 😉 One thing I do disagree with, though, is the possible implication from the quote you read that optimism in the face of tragedy and hardship is inconsiderate of those who are suffering. Indeed, there would be no need for hope if there weren’t tragedy that defies it. One could argue that Pantone was trying to sell hope with optimistic colours, taking advantage of vulnerable people, and I understand that, but I don’t feel like that’s the case, at least not for me. Maybe I’m drinking the Kool-Aid, but colour was very important to my mental health in the worst throes of the pandemic, and I actually appreciated Pantone’s reminder to look to colour for cheer and joy when I was feeling hopeless with the world. I appreciate your thoughts, Cat. They’re definitely something I need to consider!
as someone who studies print, there are attempts being made to expand the CMYK gamut so that spot colors are not needed! including colors like Orange, green, and violet. using the new 7 color printing process, we can match about 90% of Pantone colors.
while I know that your video is more specific to trademarking colors and stuff, I just wanted to share an interesting tidbit of information that I know
I cannot tell you how frustrated I was as a designer to learn that I now have to pay a subscription to be able to have full access to all of the pantone colors in illustrator. ANOTHER SUBSCRIPTION? TO USE COLORS?? It looks like freetone is great for digital printing but I'd still have to use pantone if I want to do spot colors :'(
As an ad design student, I can admit that color is so important for brand recognition, but sueing over color when nothing else matches is absolutely hilarious and wild.
Completely agree
it's just a way to get the higher ups a big ol bonus🙄
Pantone: “We want to use one of our colors to highlight the problem of climate change!”
Also Pantone: “We are granting color exclusivity to large conglomerates responsible for climate change!”
damn thats a good point lol
Preformative activism and greenwashing at it's finest.
Soon Pantone: "We can now tell you exactly which industrial chemicals to burn to correctly reproduce your brand's color in the sunset."
Any color swatch is a mixture of some basic pigments. PANTONE uses 14. But you can use any pigments available worldwide and mix your own color. Any of your created colors will have its Lab formula, which is universal and doesn’t depend on particular technology. You can put this formula in your app to create your own color swatch that can be recreated anywhere on the 🌎where standard pigments are available.
As a graphic designer... thank you. The whole print industry is full of scams. Long live freetone!
I've been excited about freetone, but how is it doing?
there is nothing propriatory that open source cant do better
Never heard of freetone; intriguing. Thanks for sharing this tip!
I spent more time in graphic design school yelling expletives at my printer than completing A+ assignments.
I feel this spending hours days, getting colors and graphics perfect just to have the printer screw it up or have printer issues/errors.
21:18 "Colours are a business for Pantone, but for us humans, they're still powerful vessels for moods, feelings and emotions." Sums it up perfectly!
As a screen printing artist/designer/illustrator, I found the best way to get intense color from CMYK or process color space is to treat the individual CMYK as Spots some of the time. On T-Shirts, this works very well, and we (most screen printers) utilized what we called 7 color process, which is basically a four color process with a white "bump" and two other colors to add both contrast and intensify color ranges. This gave us a huge range of options, as well as photographic detail, without sacrificing intensity of hues.
that's pretty cool can I have further info on how to set that up in a file?
@@MazHem Window -> Channels -> New Spot Channel, talk with your printer to find what colors they can do and get your on screen color to match the color of their ink
@@MazHem We ran third party plug ins, to Photoshop, Spot Process being one of them, they basically ran actions to generate separations via histograms and value measurements, then converted the bitmaps into alpha channels, you could then tweak them individually just like any other. You could run them with or without a bump map for dark shirts, but most of the time we ran them for both then swapped the spots out for the best effect.
@@chrisgriffith1573That is fantastic! ❤
Ahhh thank you for this I'm saving this as someone who aspires to print my art
There is something so horribly dystopian about the idea of owning colors
its like a real life version of the villain in Rainbow Brite that tries to steal colors!
Royalty owned them in ancient times. Been happening
@@mztgood Yes for a long time only wealthy people could afford certain dyes (purple from a specific shell, blue, some reds) Ironically now black/white & beige are really popular among bougie types & super colorful things are often associated more with lower class aesthetics & non-Western cultures. Goes along with the minimalist trend.
@@minngaelwasn't black always expensive tho?
@@mztgoodbut at least they weren't like, "hey you can't use that dye in your clothes"
I like the idea of an ink recipe to achieve colour consistency across different products, but yeah, blocking off access to commercially using the colour spectrum is madness
had to start using the pantone swatchbook because i started making enamel pins, and that's how you communicate colors with your manufacturer accurately. spending $200 on the book set physically hurt, but on the bright side most people don't need both books so i was able to re-sell the uncoated one. on the downside i now have to deal with pantone and they are another entry on my long list of overly-capitalistic shithole companies, all for reasons like this @ _ @ hell is real and it's called being an artist, but at least the colors on my pins all slap hard
could the manufacturer not use hex codes? idk how this works
@@paintedmoments_ Hex codes are for computer screen colors. They are not referenced to any specific printed color, and look different with different monitors and settings.
@@paintedmoments_ from what i understand from the video, pantone colors have to be used for printing things because of the way they have like, ink "recipes" for each color. basically it guarantees you get the same color every time, and you cant do that with hex codes so manufacturers use pantone as the standard :/
@@paintedmoments_ unless your monitor has been professionally calibrated everyone is looking at different colours on different screens. Try holding up your phone to various screens in your house, you might find the difference huge.
OKAY, STORY TIME... Used to work at a library at my art school. Lady running the Graphics Design department is stuffy AF (power suit, cravat, those glasses that make you go 'yup, that's the lady I never want to talk to', the WORKS), comes in, demands why her students have to use outdated Pantone swatches. I didn't even have to turn around, my manager was right there. WHOO, GD lady must do that often, because my manager called the lady out, by first name, and told her that they had been through this before... "Pantone is expensive, there is never any significant change between the colors, we do not and are not given the budget for recent Pantone binders." (Learned later we wait a year or two, sometimes more, between updating them. Because, you know, prices go down.)
Lady looked like a chicken that was just told what nuggies were made out of. Que a long and exhausting conversation that went in more circles than a carnival ride, and then she stormed off, proclaiming that the Dean would hear of it. I was told she does this about every quarter. I worked there a year. Never failed, about two to three weeks in when the first of the assignments are handed in, she was there to cluck about it.
This, and a later wiki-walk that somehow ended me up in reading about the BILLIONS of lawsuits that come up around these colors, had convinced me to just use hex colors and pray for the death of Pantone as an idea and entity. **And I'm, technically, an amateur artist at this point in my life.**
Nah. Nah. You are not an amateur artist anymore, you are a crusader now!
I’m not even an artist and I’m joining this crusade!
Until you have to print something in China on fabric, then hex colors might cost you thousands.
@@littlestbroccoli Okay, point taken. I also, unfortunately, know a little about that. :S
@AngelicDirt does using hex codes create consisteny when printing? It's so silly that different brand and types of prints can change colors so much.
@@littlestbroccolithe company I work for printed on fabric bags this summer, and during the design process we learned that our manufacturer in China wasn't using the Pantone colors in my illustrator files but just looking at them and matching by eye… needless to say, there was much consternation between me and the coworker who had been heavily involved in the color-choosimg process 😂
I'm glad you're doing better. The scar is indeed metal af. I wish you a speedy recovery. Also fuck Pantone
Knew two long-time employees of Pantone who didn't have many nice things to say about the people in charge there. It's just another greedy family-owned company that treats many, or at least the two I know, employees badly.
to me pantone makes sense as a consistency thing. a friend of mine made enamel pins and was able to communicate with a manufacturer on which colors they wanted through that book (the manu ended up getting the colors wrong anyway which is another conversation lmao) i think that's a pretty huge advantage IF it would like, actually work. given that they're switching out their formulas, and the consumers are dependent on their swatches being consistent enough that everyone's going to be seeing the same thing, it's more than a little silly.
like, you could be making recipes for new colors every year and instead you're doing legal battles with companies and continually gatekeeping access?
Yes the video mentioned different materials, but this is another huge factor. Imagine waiting for 20 samples from across the world from each manufacturer because they don't know what shade purple you want/matches your existing products. Or your product needs to be made in multiple factories and you expect the colors to still match up.
I've just realized why I feel anxious when I watch your videos. You talk in a calm and methodical way. I've gotten so used to watching people manically scream at their camera that when I watch you I grow tense, waiting for you to raise your voice. (I also love your super educational videos and am glad your neck surgery went well.)
Thank you and I'm sorry I think?
i was gonna comment on the shadiness pun but then i figured that was a silly thing to notice but i am SO GLAD IT WAS INTENTIONAL. as for the video itself, you did a really good job of summing up the problems with pantone. color is an integral part of how so many people experience the world, and when pantone tries to pretend they *own* that, i'm gonna have a problem with that both as a person and as an artist. fuck 'em! great video :)
edit: i also wanna say your scar looks so cool. congrats on getting rid of the tumor
"It's a colour! You didn't invent it!" -- they can kind of claim they did. At least, they lay claim to the formulation of that colour with their technology and inks. I agree though that they can't really copyright it though. You can't copyright something that a CMYK or RGB colour wheel in any art program can replicate.
That's the problem: The color wheel can't replicate it. Color wheels can approximate it - but there are always differences in display calibration, and the exact inks used by different printing processes, and the dyes used on plastics. Pantone's service, the one they charge a fortune for, is calibration: They provide the references and processes for making sure that colors are consistent. Which is very important commercially, because a production run can be ruined if the customer wants one shade and the factory produces another.
So pantone does serve a function. But it's a function that doesn't need a greedy company to carry out. Pantone introduced their system at the right time (the 60s, when the print industry was exploding with new technology), and cornered the market. They were smart about it: The pantone color system is specifically designed to be meaningless, the numbers are entirely arbitrary, so it's impossible to use without licencing Pantone's intellectual property. It's too entrenched to move away from any more.
colors as concepts that are linked to, but independent from wavelengths of visible light or w/e, are absolutely human inventions. now if you want to own rights to a color, you have to prove that its use in context is culturally understood to belong to you/your brand. colors are social constructs, you cant create one for you to own from scratch and all alone
@@decepticonne but you can claim a specific colour for use in a specific product category. That's the rules (at least where I am). Like Tiffany blue can't be used by competitors to market their jewelry. Its a consumer protection thing along with a brand protection thing. Problem is brands are overreaching the application of this. Now Pantone used to make their money selling printers ink. Each PMS colour is a specific recipe that blends their proprietary inks. There are plenty of non PMS inks to choose from, with their own colour books, but generations of designers and companies have chosen PMS as the standard of their designs. And 95% of professional printers only stock PMS inks to use on their press. That's what Pantone is leveraging to start charging just to access their swatches. Only once have I delt with a printer who did not use PMS inks, and it was a major hassle to coordinate colours between them and the client.
if they can lay claim to breathing air, they will.
So good to see you’re back in the swamp known as UA-cam. This topic has always been strange to me so thank you for the HUEge amount of work you put into this video post surgery. Recovery is a marathon not a sprint, healing takes time and your audience will wait for as long as you need :)
You are very right about it being a marathon! I still have a long ways til the finish line. Thank you for the kind words!
Really interesting video.
As an illustrator who get jobs that are printed Pantone is a great tool to keep consistency and have more predictable results.
For years I had an old Pantone "fan", a beat up thing from a printing shop, recently I manage to buy a new one and I can tell you the quality of their ACTUAL product, is going down.
The paper is thinner and there is more pages now, but they keep the fan system so it's really inconvenient to use. And the "achievable in CMYK" and or "achievable in RGB" logos have disappeared making it harder to know if your computer can display them accurately of it you can keep the same file for a CMYK print.
It's baffling.
my brain every 3 minutes of this video: Premenstrual syndrome Premenstrual syndrome Premenstrual syndrome
Precisely everything I dislike about Pantone! 🙌 I've been in the industry for over 20 years. The company I work for (it's...global) got sued by Tiffany over an RGB that was a medium teal on a jewelry ad my coworker created; not even a Robbins egg blue. We're not a jewelry store - we sell *everything*, if you know what I mean... So fellow designers, be careful out there!
Also fun fact regarding the blind community: a study was done several years ago while I was still in college that observed how the blind perceived color when entering a space. Though a lot of them can't see color, they can legit FEEL it!! Super neat stuff. This is something interior designers consciously have to keep in mind when designing spaces, especially for those with ADA requirements.💕
Just a couple days ago I was driving along the highway with my mom and we saw a Pantone billboard with a color (I don’t remember actually) on it. She asked how does it make sense to copyright a color? I’ll have to show her this video. Thanks :)
Pantone...has billboards??
@@CatherineGraffam yep, somewhere near the OR-CA border🤔
Was it a Barbie advert? I recall someone showing a Barbie movie billboard that was just Barbie pink and the number (I think).
Welcome back! We missed you, hope you are healing well
Also: Colorblind artist here (strong green deficiency). This is such an interesting topic to me, because I've worked really hard to learn about color and learn how to work around my deficiency, which is effectively that I can distinguish between far less variations of green (or colors that contain green) than people with full color vision. When I finally just accepted that our experience with color is personal, I got less stressed about it. I get why we need to have standards to communicate and discuss colors for production, but Pantone always seemed a like an excessive attempt to control (and I guess monetize) something that's ultimately subjective anyway. We can't literally see through anyone else's eyes and experience color the exact same way.
Glad to see you're doing better.
16:16 What!?! They fade? They charge so much money but can't make it lightfast?
In heraldry, because it is quite old, there is no specification as to what particular shade any colour has to be whatsoever and it works. Gules is red and the shade does not have to be consistent at all.
I'm shocked but also not suprised. Was looking at their books and the paper quality didn't look too good for the price.
the fading thing made me laugh so hard. In their greed to get more money from people, they're essentially admitting they can't make their print colour last beyond a year without noticable degredation. But if it CAN last beyond a year, then they're admitting they lied to force people to buy more samples. Corporations be wild.
I mean... it's paper. Even archival paper will change colour with time. But It's in a book. You store the book properly - as in not leave it open to a page when you finish work for the day. Ensure your hands are clean when touching it.. it's basically fine. Heck, people use booklets of paint chips for 5-10 years without issue. But it depends on the degree of precision you need. And pantone is based on precision.
When I was working with this stuff professionally, our printers had ratty 5-10 year old PMS books next to the press. Still worked fine. They replaced them when the inkstains obscured the real swatches.
Heraldry; I’m part of the SCA and we get to design our own arms to their standards. “What do you mean I can’t have a light grey, and white, and cream, and snow!” Because it’s alllll White…..
First off, I'm happy the surgery went okay. While I'm a graphic artist, my day job is in printing. I'm not exactly worried about pantone because offset printing is losing ground to digital printing. Smaller shops have phased out offset altogether for digital (xerox, canon, ricoh, etc.) So what you get is a cmyk mix. Some production machines have a 5th color bay which can aid in coming closer to hitting some of those harder to hit pantone's, like 021 orange. A lot of corporate inplant printshops have these 5 color machines.
Spinal scar club (gentle) high five!
I'm glad you're doing well.
I knew pantone were a pretty scummy company but I'd forgotten about them and Adobe (another pretty scummy company) holding people's back catalogue of work to ransom.
It's a scum-off! Which company is the most vile?
Not that either of them can hold a torch to the fossil fuel industry.
Hey, coming outright: don't have the energy to watch this video right now, but clicked on it for the health update. And, gosh we are so incredibly glad you are doing better. We hope recovery keeps going smoothly.
Replacing the swatches every year? How bad is their ink lightfastness to fade that bad that quickly?
Now I want to see a light test made on the swatches kept in the case, out in the light and brand new. It has to be a cashgrab
Seems pretty intentional to me. Planned obsolescence.
It's actually not bad. I had mine for over 10 years. They're just trying to scare you into buying a new one. All you have to do is keep the thing in the box it came with and it's perfectly fine. Sometimes I go on tours of printing companies and whenever I see their pantone shelf those book are 100% not new. Like lol, I don't know any other company that insists their product is bad so you must buy a new one every year.
Your video on scam art school made me feel so vindicated with my own experience :). I also watched your vide just now on your spinal tumour and I am so glad youre back! Thank you for your amazing content
Thank you for making these very good points. The Adobe-cloud-fee ist more than extremely annoying! 😩🤬Luckily for us here in Germany, we use a system called HKS which is used for paints you can buy in any store as well as for printing as well as RAL. Btw. Stuart Semple is one of my heroes!
If you need an alternative I'm pretty sure Stuart Semple made an alternative to Pantone that is completely free.
As a musician I’m sitting here imagining what it would be like if Bankers Life owned the C# note and anyone who dared to use it could get sued. The whole idea is so absurd that it’s hard to really comprehend.
OH MY GOD SOOOOO happy to see your face again, in the last video I honestly thought you might die and that terrified me. i am so grteful for your existence, keep it up!!
God couldn't get rid of me that easily!
Usa Kasikbo! Im so happy to have found you! Im glad you're healing and gifting this fantastic video essay on Pantone. Im a Queer 2Spirit death doula and art therapy undergrad , Im excited to check out more of your videos and such!
oh as I saw the title of the video I was waiting so badly you talk about that color of the year shenanigan! Thanks for yet another great video!
That scar looks cool AF and I hope the closure holes manage to stick around, but you can always take photos of the scar in detail just in case they don't. That way you could get it tattooed on in the future if it ever fades away. That is what I would do but I also wear all my scars with pride even the ones caused by my OCD that I made when I was a kid and I don't even remember what caused the initial wound lol (that I then compulsively picked at causing it to scar)
Well this is as if dictionaries claimed monopoly over words and trademarked them to brands. Like think about the "React" situation that happened here on UA-cam.
Stuart Semple continues to be amazing for the common accessibility of art and I am thankful he exists.
He’s like, the Robin Hood of the art world. 🥰
I'll be honest, this is the first video of yours that I've seen, and was incredibly nervous to read the comments due to how icky the comments sections of other pro-LGBTQ+ creators tend to be. However, this is the first comments section in a very long time to make me feel safe to exist. You all are incredible, and you have a new subscriber
CAT!!! so glad to see you back!! thanks for continuing to make content even during recovery, you're incredible
Thank you so much!!
So happy to see you back!
i worked at a printing press for two years, and was mostly responsible for mixing the pms colours. ive had this stuff in my haur, clothes, underneath my nails. everywhere.
cool video, thanks
No idea why this was recommended. But it was absolutely fascinating. Brilliantly presented. No idea if you made this all up or researched it to a high degree of accuracy because it’s a totally new topic to me. But you were very convincing for sure. Thank you for making a dull evening filled with back pain more tolerable.
Glad your head didn’t fall off in surgery, fingers crossed everything works out long term, must have been terrifying. So pleased the algorithm sent me your way.
When i went to the new school, a lot of my friends went to parsons and the amount of them who had to purchase Pantone cards, the Pantone adobe plugins, etc. was so ridiculously expensive
Thank you for this fascinating dive into Pantone; I never thought to look into who they actually were. I had always just assumed that they were a sort of color reference guide that was free. I had no idea they were basically the Chromo Mafia.
Your scar IS metal 🤟
Also, hi, happy to discover this channel, adding bunch of videos to the queue right now 😆
Love your vids Cat, always so eloquent and thought provoking. You inspire me. Really glad to hear that you're doing okay and getting through it. Keep on swaggin on
I love your glasses.
I'm so glad you made this video, as a small designer, self learning I didn't understand why we "need" to use their colors. I got really confused with their different types.
I love it when a youtuber makes a video about a topic I've been pondering about. Glad your video got recommended to me!
Sending you well wishes. Healing isn't linear, so be gentle with yourself😊
I don't know how is this legal. as if they invented colors. I see the necessity to have a system to organize colors, but trademarking them is ridiculous. when I first learned about pantone back in school. I could not believe it. even less that no one seemed to question it. so much bs
3:57 my intro to Pantone was learning their codes are what manufacturers use
I’m really enjoying this video, but I can’t continue watching until I tell you how much joy your matching glasses and nails gave me. So good. 🥰
This was the first video i have watched from you but i am going to binge many more!! Your video was well made, well edited, and has a lot of resources and education behind it. Thank you for making your video and art! Im glad your surgery went well and that scar looks sick as hell!!
This directly affects my wife's work and kept me from deciding to pursue design professionally because...Pantone sucks. They're trying to Color as a Service *glares in software engineering* NO
Edit: I feel the need to point out that my wife is from Austria. So this is also an EU problem.
The separation of Pantone subscription from Adobe is weird… I always thought the swatch palettes just functioned as a preview, so if you were aware of the corresponding code and a CMYK approximation of the colour, you could probably create your own Spot swatch, and ask your printers to use the Pantone code of choice at the printing stage in place of that swatch. But I might have it wrong. (Oops… was covered in the video)
I got an Adobe Photoshop ad at the end of the video... how ironic
I have a scar just like that down the front of my leg! I broke the fuck out of my ankle, and they had to put a plate and screws in. I'm glad you are back and doing well!
How can a person be so cute while talking about such a important and weird thing that's happening here! I love the bold glasses with you're curly hair
This was an awesome video. I knew some of the things, especially from artist friends about the fun with photoshop, bust still this was nice and comprehensive.
also must say the scar is so cool! hope you continue doing good in healing from the surgery :)
Yes, your scar is very metal 🤘really happy you're doing well!! 🎉 Thanks for doing all that research on pantone. I am so glad I never bought their products when I started making digital art. I thought they would always be the industry standard back then.
Hey! Hope you get better very soon, sending you lots of good energy and love ❤️
Pantone is supremely useful for people who design physical objects, particularly in a variety of materials. There is no substitute the way there is in digital media. It's incredibly useful, really to the point of being an absolute necessity for disciplines like fashion and interior design. I wouldn't cry about a less expensive, non-proprietary system though.
I would also like to add that Pantone does put work into their colors. They're very human, and they look like "real" colors in the way colors on a screen or even a lot of hardware store paint swatches don't. The service they provide is definitely worth the money, depending on what you do.
I guess I'm the only one who kinda likes that my colors look slightly different depending on how they're printed.
This system feels like a deeply perverse commodification of one of the most basic parts of the human expierience, the perception of light and the emotions it can conjure. Just wait until they "patent" single wavelength of sound, specific states of viscosity or the haptic expierence of a type of wood. People need to understand that these companies don't make money by providing you with something, but by restricting the access to something that should belong to you in the first place.
rad scar!
wishing you a solid & lasting recovery.
they literally made colors into nfts 💀💀💀
UA-cam showed me this video unexpectedly in my feed, and I’m so glad about it. 😊
Your skin healed so well!!
I’m so happy you are doing so well! Your scar is metal!!
Absolutely not related to the video, no idea how you ended up on my recommended, but I love your hair and vibe!
Thank you! I feel cautious about the practice of companies or anyone owning “everyday” things like color. On one hand it is “smart” to develop new ways of owning the means of producing non proprietary products, but also strange seeing them manufacturing ownership in a way that limits general access and creativity. The movement toward how to sell free stuff is only gaining more traction with the idea that selling free stuff is providing value although only to those able and willing to pay to play.
I didn't get the pun in the title until the very end but that is so smart
I can’t get over the title of this video it’s PERFECT!!!!
Found out your channel today and I love it here! Keep up the good work ❤
Wow. I’m convinced daily that ownership is just bad, all around. No one really owns anything, we just borrow for a time. And wouldn’t you know it, more and more powerful people are refusing to share.
i smiled when i saw you on my TL again!! I wish you all the best for your recovery!
Glad to see you mention Culture Hustle and Stuart Semple. He is developing paints to match these colors of the year as well as doing freetone.
Forgot to comment this the first time I watched, but so glad you're back! I didn't expect to be seeing another youtube video for much longer as you recovered, I'm so happy you made such a quick recovery, love your videos
We have matching scars! 💗
I've always wondered about Pantone. Ty!
RETURN OF THE GOAT
This reminds me so much of the lawsuits around chord changes in songs (like Ed Sheeran and Marvin Gaye), etc.
I never thought about this before. Very interesting.
1. They put out a book with a bajillion colors of dirt. DIRT! My daughter is an archeologist and at least one person on the crew has to have that book. Of dirt colors. They even have dirt colors locked down.
2. I was a commercial sculptor for one of the best companies around that made stuff for movies, commercials, and the major theme parks ‘round here. And, uh, no-one kept updated Pantone books around. They were the most battered, paint spattered, dog eared, rachet things around. More importantly, none of our clients ever noticed. One was 10 years old. Most people can’t color match that finely. Thank dog…
Also, I got an uncoated book for my birthday over a decade ago. It’s seen the light of day maybe 4 times. I keep it wrapped and tucked into a dark hole….
From work experience, I know that for catalogs a web-offset press typically has CMYK and one or two other inks of a custom color. Usually related to a major sponsor. Target red or Pepsi blue, for example.
babe wake up cat dropped another banger video
That is a cool scar! I’m glad you’re ok. ❤
Your scar looks really cool like a seam or patch and happy healing to you
you had me in the first minute w that golden intro omg
SO happy to hear the spinal surgery went well. That shit is terrifying and I was seriously worried about you. Super happy to see you in my sub feed again!
so glad you're healing , catherine.. this was incredibly interesting .. thank you and wishing you continued healing .. Norakag
Yessss glad to see you back!!!
Never watched this video because I wasn't too interested in Pantone but i remembered the title, watched new vlogbrothers where John Green mentions pantone is owned by the price-gouger Danaher, now I'm back here!
whenever you're mad at people owning shades of color just remember taylor swift trademarked 1989
This was not a thing I was not aware of until I saw this video
sorry this is off topic but i am so sick and your voice and the cadence you speak with are very soothing. subscribed thanks for speaking slowly
I tinted paint at a hardware store. Our department members, at that particular location, took a lot of pride in being able to do some seriously custom colour matching - colours that we didn't have formulas in our brand (tint set) for, that we had no sample to let the photospectometer test (It bounces light off a sample, and creates a formula of tints to make that colour) or that the sample, wasn't compatible with the spectrometer. (Magazine images are made up of dots - a machine can't read that accurately as a colour).
Oh, and the company supplying our tints/in house formulas, changed some of them part way through my job there. So suddenly, a client wanting the same colour they bought a week ago... as a "perfect" match to finish a job. well... uhm... you see... it might not be the same. We can figure it out for you, we'll get it right... but it might take 10-30 minutes (as opposed to the 6min it ought to take if you bring in the previous can).
It was fascinating. But yikes.
Thanks for your perspective, Cat. To be honest, I haven’t done as much research on Pantone as you have with regard to its motives or strategy, so I think I need to hold off on forming a fully fledged opinion on the company as a whole.
On one hand, I agree that the monetisation and monopolisation of colour is absurd. Pantone bills itself as a consulting firm-almost like a nonprofit!-but you don’t have to look far to see them peddling their merchandise. The legal and artistic ramifications you mentioned are very real and important to consider.
On the other hand, I will say that I do tend to like many-though certainly not all-of their Colour of the Year forecasts. I’ve never bought any of their official merchandise (I’m sure we’ve all supported them indirectly), and you won’t catch me buying a ticket to the “Magentaverse” exhibit anytime soon, but I have been inspired by them more times than I can count. “Emerald”, which Pantone made aware to me, is now probably my favourite colour of all time, and I just painted an accent piece in my bedroom to match the sophistication of “Marsala”. I figure if they can profit off of colours they didn’t invent, I can profit from their research without giving them money. 😉
One thing I do disagree with, though, is the possible implication from the quote you read that optimism in the face of tragedy and hardship is inconsiderate of those who are suffering. Indeed, there would be no need for hope if there weren’t tragedy that defies it. One could argue that Pantone was trying to sell hope with optimistic colours, taking advantage of vulnerable people, and I understand that, but I don’t feel like that’s the case, at least not for me. Maybe I’m drinking the Kool-Aid, but colour was very important to my mental health in the worst throes of the pandemic, and I actually appreciated Pantone’s reminder to look to colour for cheer and joy when I was feeling hopeless with the world.
I appreciate your thoughts, Cat. They’re definitely something I need to consider!
Heck yeah I love shit-talking Pantone. Thanks for the new video!
I agree 1000 percent with you :) it is sad what they are doing… 💚💚💚💚💚
Great video, I’m going to sub!
as someone who studies print, there are attempts being made to expand the CMYK gamut so that spot colors are not needed! including colors like Orange, green, and violet. using the new 7 color printing process, we can match about 90% of Pantone colors.
while I know that your video is more specific to trademarking colors and stuff, I just wanted to share an interesting tidbit of information that I know
I cannot tell you how frustrated I was as a designer to learn that I now have to pay a subscription to be able to have full access to all of the pantone colors in illustrator. ANOTHER SUBSCRIPTION? TO USE COLORS?? It looks like freetone is great for digital printing but I'd still have to use pantone if I want to do spot colors :'(