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How to find a paint color that corresponds to pantone swatch?
I have a fabricator who needs me to send paint colors that match the pantone shades i’m using in an illustrator document. The colors are 7495c 60% tint and 611 20%tint. Is there an easy way for me to match these colors, or am I going to need to sort through a bunch of paint samples?
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asked Mar 25, 2021 at 17:35
Emily Baker Emily Baker
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Paints are RAL coded, there is a bunch of Pantone to RAL converter online to find, if its what you mean.
Mar 25, 2021 at 18:02
Take a Pantone color chip to a local paint store, ask them to match it and provide you with the formula used. often you can purchase small sample pints of paint fairly inexpensively. So match, get a sample pint, and test to be certain it’s correct when it dries.
Mar 25, 2021 at 18:59
I wouldn’t start with an 80 or 20% pantone. I’d start with a 100% of an actual pantone tint [ie, plus white] of your desired colour . Less margin for error, assuming everything else is properly calibrated.
Mar 25, 2021 at 19:18
I agree that using tints of two Pantone colors seems like a pity if you have the possibility to choose lighter colors and use them at 100% instead. Looks much better as solids and easier to communicate to others when trying to find the right RAL color.
Mar 25, 2021 at 21:10
2 Answers 2
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Converting Illustrator’s Pantone tints to solid paints looks quite a lottery. I guess you have nothing physical, only a file, but you need the tint as paint and want a simple mixing formula like “20% tint = 20% solid color and 80% white, shake 2 minutes”
You will not get it here – Tints in Illustrator try to imitate the look when solid color is printed on white paper with a dense raster and by leaving white between colored dots. Knowing usual print methods and how inks and papers behave makes possible to create somehow acceptable prediction of the result. But the result of mixing liquid paints depends heavily on the used paint materials and no general rule exists for the color of the mixing result.
I continue guessing: Your best option is to search for the most same looking solid Pantone by browsing the color book in Illustrator and making comparison tests. Have side by side a rectangle colored with the tint an another which you color with solid Pantones until a close enough version is found.
Know that uncalibrated screen very likely shows something different than what can be seen in a real Pantone color book (sold by Pantone). That book shows the actual meanings of Pantone codes. If possible, check also the found solid color in the real Pantone book.
If you like the found solid Pantone color you can pick it’s code and find a good RAL color paint with a web Pantone code to RAL code converter as suggested already by others.
Theoretically you can go to a paint shop with a real Pantone book and say “I want this color made of paint material XXX(right for the job)”. Do not try it if you have only the Pantone code, but not the real Pantone book. In that case you have better possiblilities if you have a good RAL code to tell.
Some paint webshop probably can mix for you something (no guarantee nor experience what it would be) if you tell the wanted Pantone code. If you find one who advertises “Pantone matching paints” it can be worth asking. Check also with the Wayback Machine how long they have survived with it.
Do color-matching frustrations have you seeing red? Don’t get mad, get a color model instead.
If you’ve ever struggled to reproduce a color from one project to another, or to “translate” a particular color from a swatch of fabric to a can of paint, then you’ve experienced firsthand the challenges associated with something called “color space.”
Color space refers to the particular universe of colors made possible from combining three or four basic colors, or from adjusting hue, saturation and brightness. For a design professional, the challenge lies in the multitude of color spaces available, each based on a different combination of colors and values.
RGB (red green blue) is an example of a color space. So is CMYK (cyan magenta yellow black). Sometimes getting the sofa to match the paint requires the ability to move back and forth between color spaces. To do that, you need a basic grasp of color models: the different mathematical formulas (based on component colors) for defining color spaces. Let’s take a look at three of the most common color models, as well as their typical applications.
RGB. Common to color models used for computer monitors and television screens, the RGB color model depends on the human eye to “mix” dots (or pixels) of red, green and blue. For example, 85 107 47 in the RGB color model equals a dark olive green.
Here’s where RGB gets tricky: The pixels in various computer monitors display red, green and blue differently, so what you see on one screen rarely matches what you see on another. Also, the RGB color model itself does not define the specific red, green or blue used, so a given RGB color can’t be exact unless the spectral makeup of the three primaries are defined. When they are, the RGB color model then produces an absolute color space, such as Adobe RGB.
CMYK. As with the RGB color model, CMYK color is based on dots of just a few colors — in this case, cyan, magenta, yellow and black. (The K in CMYK stands for black.) CMYK color is common to color printing, which is why that process is often referred to as “four-color printing.”
One of the most challenging aspects of professional printing is converting RGB color from a computer into matching CMYK color for the press. Especially problematic: In some areas of the visible spectrum, the RGB color space lies outside the CMYK color space. In other areas of the spectrum, the reverse is true.
PMS. One way to ensure color matching across platforms (such as computer monitors, printing presses, fabrics and plastics) is to use an exact color model, such as the proprietary Pantone Matching System (PMS). Pantone produces several guides every year containing thousands of solid PMS colors on coated and uncoated chips with corresponding printing ink formulas for each color. The guide refers to each PMS color by its allocated number. Galapagos Green, for instance, is PMS 18-5725.
