How to Read Your Color References?

PANTONE Formula Guide - for printers & ink manufacturers

The printing process traditionally uses four colours: cyan, magenta, yellow and black, which is called CMYK printing. To access a wider range of colours in printing, a fifth PANTONE colour is added.

To create this PANTONE colour for printing, we need the colour formula. The PANTONE Formula Guide is used by printers and colour manufacturers and contains all the formulas to produce these PANTONE colours.

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How do I read my Formula Guide?

At the beginning of the Formula Guide there are a number of basic colours. All subsequent colours in this guide are made up of formulas of these basic colours combined with a transparent medium.

Next to each colour is a standardized colour code , for example 2001 U . The first four digits are the standardized code for that particular colour, and the U or C indicates whether the paper it is printed on has been coated (C) or uncoated (U). If you already know the colour identification number, you can use the included index to find the page number in the guide for that colour.

In addition to this, there are a number of formulations printed next to the colour showing the ratio of each base colour when combined with a transparent medium. All of these values add up to 100, so each value represents the percentage of the base colour within the overall formula.

How can I communicate my selected colour to the printer?

The Solid Chip Book contains the same colours as the Formula Guide, but these are available as removable swatches. These swatches can be removed and used as communication tools or in mood boards. The Formula Guide , Solid Chips , Metallics & Pastels are all from the same colour system and are available as both colour fans and removable chip books. The books show the colour code, but the Formula Guide must be used to obtain the colour formula.

For printers who regularly print with the same colours or need to produce colours quickly, a colour scale is used to provide immediate information about which basic colours need to be added to achieve the desired colour formula.

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How to read the PANTONE Color Bridge - for designers

Designers use the PANTONE Color Bridge to work with printers to match their designs to the printed product. The Guide shows two versions of each colour reference. The first shows the corresponding Pantone colour (a smaller reference than that shown in the Formula Guide, and does not include the colour formula), and the second shows the closest colour match that can be achieved using the four-colour CMYK printing process, should you choose to use standard CMYK printing only. For some colours, the difference is slight, while for other colours, there is a noticeable visual difference between the original PANTONE colour and the version that can be achieved using only CMYK colours. You can share the CMYK formula (for example , 0 49 84 0 ) included here with your printer, and have them produce the colour you need.

When you design digitally, each colour also displays its corresponding RGB (red, green, blue) values , which you can use when creating content in your chosen design software. For example: R 249 G 145 B 69 . The HTML code used in web design, such as FA04BE, is also included. Again, unlike CMYK, these values are exact and not a mere approximation.

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PANTONE Plastics Range

PANTONE Plastics products use the same colour system as Graphics products, for example 298C . C stands for Coated, which means that the colours are applied to a coated surface.

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PANTONE Fashion, Home + Interiors series

The Fashion, Home and Interiors range includes the PANTONE FHI Guide and Specifier as well as the Cotton , Polyester and Nylon ranges printed on the corresponding fabric type.
All products within the Fashion, Home and Interiors range use a six-digit code to define the colour number and a suffix (e.g. TCX, TPG, TPM) that describes the material printed on it. Within the six-digit code 11-0700 TPG, the first two digits define the brightness level of the colour (between 11 and 19). The second pair of numbers indicates the hue. In total, there are 65 different hues, including 00, which represents the neutral point. The third sequence of digits represents the chroma level of the colour, with 65 chroma levels starting with 00 neutral.

PANTONE Fashion, Home & Interiors Code Suffixes

When the same colour appears in different FHI products, it shows the same six-digit code, with only the suffix changing depending on the material. The choice of guide depends on the material you are designing for and the size of the colour sample you need to reference, whether it is cosmetics, fashion, product design or home accessories.

TPX = Textile Paper , indicating that the colour reference is printed on paper. This was replaced by TPG when PANTONE updated their ink formulations to a more environmentally friendly alternative.

TPG = Textile Paper Green , indicating that the colour reference is printed on environmentally friendly paper. The FHI Color Guide & Specifier uses this suffix.

TPM = Textile Paper Metallic , indicating that the metallic colour reference is printed on paper. This is used for the FHI Metallic Shimmers Guide and Specifier .

TCX = Textile Cotton Extended , indicating that the colour reference is printed on cotton. This suffix is used for the entire PANTONE FHI Cotton range, including the Cotton Passport , Planner , Chip Set and Swatch Library , all of which show the same colours in different swatch sizes.

TSX = Textile Synthetic Extended , which indicates that the colour reference is printed on polyester, as in the Polyester Swatch Card .

TN = Textiles Nylon , which shows the colour references printed on nylon, like the FHI Nylon Brights Set .

PANTONE SkinTone Guide

The PANTONE SkinTone Guide has a separate numbering system. Each four-digit number consists of two digits that reflect the skin's hue and undertone, followed by a second set of digits that represent the skin's tone, lightness and darkness from light to dark, for example 1Y09 SP . The guide is used primarily in the fashion and beauty industries, as well as in digital gaming and video production, to ensure that realistic and diverse skin tones are accurately represented on screen.

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