CMYK and Pantones - Did you know only ~60% of Pantone Colors can be printed using CMYK alone?

Did you know that Pantone's are not a direct look-up of all the print colors available? Pantone is a company that started making ink colors in the 1960's as the demand for more colors than what were available in the CMYK color gamut. Modern print technology is able to use CMYK and additional colors to try and achieve Pantone's. But the most common mistake designers make when it comes to printing is choosing a color that is not achievable by most printing equipment, unless you use the ink from Pantone for your print run as a seperate channel. This becomes harder in today's world as these ink colors were designed for offset presses, which still exist but are not economical for running print jobs quickly or in quantities generally below at least 1000 full sheets of 28x40" paper given the high setup fee. Modern on demand print equipment is starting to come out with expanded gamut colors, adding orange, blue (indigo) green, white, light cyan, light magenta and more to try and achieve the full Pantone library. Did you know using CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow and black) only about 60% of the Pantone Color Library is possible to print? https://littlerockprinting.com Calgary Print Shop specializes in Labels, Stickers, Printing and Signage.