can you explain "Spot Colors"?

[Enola]

I am making a sign for a customer who said he would "much rather I use "Spot Colors", rather than CMYK.
His sign will be 10' x 5' and will be a total of 3 colors - black, white and a medium blue (no vinyl match for the blue). He gave me a PMS color for the blue.

As stupid as this may sound, how do I provide a "Spot Color" on a sign?

 

[dypinc]

What software are you using?

 

[Solventinkjet]

When it comes to digital CMYK printing, when people say spot color they usually mean to match a PMS color. Most CMYK digital inkjet printers don't have true spot color capabilities. They just use the CMYK process to simulate it. The Gerber machines are an example of a true spot color machine. While you can print CMYK process on a Gerber, you can also buy spot color cartridges for certain colors, usually either out of the CMYK gamut or for a special effect like chrome. Another example would be in screen printing. You can print in CMYK but you can also mix your ink to a specific color and just print that instead. That's a spot color.

 

[Reveal1]

Spot Colors are laid down in solid blocks of ink in those specific colors eg. screen print, letterpress or offset printing are examples. You probably know that CMYK is a mix of Cyan/Magenta/Yellow/Black inks in dot patterns which can be mixed to simulate Spot colors (process printing). That's what the Pantone color bridge attempts to simulate. So depending on your print capability, you can print or paint with ink/paint mixed to match spot colors, or use CMYK to do the same . You could also use vinyl which is produced to mimic those spot colors.


Why not print a sample matched to the spot color? He should want an accurate color result and leave the process up to you.

 

[Enola]

The only printing I do would be the Edge, of course that is not the machine for this job due to size (and no foil to match the blue anyways)
I would design this in Flexi and send off to a fellow sign shop to print on his HP latex.

He says he can match a PMS color, but again, I am lost on the terminology.

 

[WYLDGFI]

Latex....if decently calibrated can hit many PMS colors very well.

 

[Andy D]

As others have said, almost all digital printing is a bunch of tiny dots of CYMK or RGB, to give the illusion of a color.
Spot colors are almost always a color combination that's mixed together.
Paints are spot colors with a white base. Color vinyl are spot colors with or without a white base.

I have had the misery of trying to print match a bunch of PMS colors & had to get committee's approval
for each PMS color, I would print several close colors for them to pick the best match.. it was a nightmare, they all
picked different colors and depending on the lighting and angle of view would change their minds...
Lesson learned, we all see printed graphic colors differently, so there is almost never one correct printed color for a PMS#

 

[dypinc]

As others have said, almost all digital printing is a bunch of tiny dots of CYMK or RGB, to give the illusion of a color.
Spot colors are almost always a color combination that's mixed together.
Paints are spot colors with a white base. Color vinyl are spot colors with or without a white base.

I have had the misery of trying to print match a bunch of PMS colors & had to get committee's approval
for each PMS color, I would print several close colors for them to pick the best match.. it was a nightmare, they all
picked different colors and depending on the lighting and angle of view would change their minds...
Lesson learned, we all see printed graphic colors differently, so there is almost never one correct printed color for a PMS#

That is precisely why you should use a named spot color especially when send out a job. That way the printers will know exactly what the should look like. It is up to the printer to match that spot color if they can. If they can't match it because of gamut limitations then they need to convey that and should show how close they can get to it.

 

[Boudica]

I am making a sign for a customer who said he would "much rather I use "Spot Colors", rather than CMYK.
His sign will be 10' x 5' and will be a total of 3 colors - black, white and a medium blue (no vinyl match for the blue). He gave me a PMS color for the blue.

As stupid as this may sound, how do I provide a "Spot Color" on a sign?

I think maybe they are talking about "Process" colors... ?

 

[Andy D]

That is precisely why you should use a named spot color especially when send out a job. That way the printers will know exactly what the should look like. It is up to the printer to match that spot color if they can. If they can't match it because of gamut limitations then they need to convey that and should show how close they can get to it.

That's what we started with, "spot" colors sent to the rip program, using a ICC profile I created for that material, but as I'm sure you're aware "Spot" colors in a design or print program are a misnomer, they
are somebodies interpretation of a spot color...
The only spot colors a CMYK printer can truly print are: Cyan, Magenta, Yellow & Black.

 

[unclebun]

Lot of info mishmash in these answers. The term Spot Color comes from the printing world (not sign printing). Originally, all printed material was spot color (think lithography, slug and hot lead printing presses). The normal color was black ink, and when people got fancy they might add another color or two in a spot here and there. Spot color. Eventually, methods using screens to make your plates were developed, which lead to halftone printing, and then halftones made in color separations (C, M, Y, K) allowed color printing. Because CMYK is made of dots, especially back when the dots were big, if you wanted really clear sharp printing of graphics, you would choose spot color printing rather than process (CMYK dots) printing. That's how ink recipe books were invented (pantone) to standardize the recipes for mixing inks to produce various spot colors. That's all a pantone color is--a recipe for mixing ink.

Now enter digital printing. ALL digital printing is process. We use CMYK inks to mix dots of color to make up the various colors. We can specify pantone or other spot colors as the color we are trying to achieve, but we do not print spot colors. The only exceptions are white and silver if your printer has them. Even if your printer has orange or green ink, the RIP never prints purely the green or orange ink.

Therefore, by definition, you cannot provide this customer a truly spot color printed item with a digital printer. The best you can do is to color match to their spot colors as closely as you can.

If you want to do the job in cut vinyl, you would pick the closest medium blue vinyl color you can find. I'd suggest looking at Avery 950, as they have the widest selection of medium blues.

 

[Billct2]

As has been said, get a sample print of the color and have it approved

 

[Andy D]

medium blue (no vinyl match for the blue). He gave me a PMS color for the blue.

A huge sign company, who had a huge client would pay 3M to create a custom color vinyl run, a work around I have used is to get the closest color vinyl I could find & adjust the
color by printing a light color on it.

 

[gabagoo]

Maybe what your customer is really asking for is that you use colored vinyl as to printing?

 

[Bly]

These sorts of customers usually don't know what their spot colours should look like.
Like they have a Pantone swatchbook? I don't think so.
All they have is their offset printed business cards and letterheads so whatever you give them will probably be close enough.

 

[netsol]

The only printing I do would be the Edge, of course that is not the machine for this job due to size (and no foil to match the blue anyways)
I would design this in Flexi and send off to a fellow sign shop to print on his HP latex.

He says he can match a PMS color, but again, I am lost on the terminology.

enola

no foil to match the blue? not really true

don't you have a spectratone book?




the mix of gerber vinyl's and foils yields something like 3000 (i am at home, so i cn't pick up the book) repestable spot colors.

maybe your client is more astute than you give him credit for

 

[PHILJOHNSON]

As was suggested, you might get a copy of the spectratone guide from Gerber if you can because you can blend the base spot colors to create custom colors. There are around 80 or so base spot colors with the Gerber machines and the guide will provide the pantone code and tell you which two colors to mix together to create that particular color. With the Summa DC thermal printer the custom colors are referred to as duospot colors and they need to be printed in a certain order in order for the color to come out correctly so just be mindful that the order of printing for each color may be an important consideration.

Best regards,

Phil Johnson
Airmark Corporation
(800)527-7778, ext 112(office)
(509)280-6354(cell)
philj@airmark.com

 

[Johnny Best]

It's a black and white spaniel as I remember. Some of you might be to young.

 

[ewded]

My guess would be that your client had some screen printed items in the past where he could choose between CMYK (probably he had a gradient or fade) or they offered a lower prince for spot color print (premixed ink). So if you looked at your client like he's stupid, you were right.

 

[litewave]

I think it could be a comic scene ..

Rep says to the client ...

"Spot colors?
No problem...I can offer you the following Spot colors:

Cyan
Magenta
Yellow
Black.
"

[ armed with an encyclopedia of swatch books rep then says]

"Take a look at all these solid colors were still trying to print these"...

[Rep then throws 15 different vinyl swatch books on table and walks out of room]

Of course on a serious note there is screenprint and thermal like gerber edge, summa dc series, Matan etc as others have mentioned.

Keep safe people.