Difference Between Pantone 226U and 226C

[Fresh Baked Printing]

Fbaked not to get get all high and mighty but black isn't technically a color. Neither is white for that matter.
But we all know what you mean!

Funny you mentioned that. Back in Home Economics class, back in the day, one of classmates gave me a really hard time that my sewing project was using black fabric. "That's not even a color, man. It's an absorption."

I should have remembered that!

[Command-Z]

Fbaked not to get get all high and mighty but black isn't technically a color. Neither is white for that matter.
But we all know what you mean!

Yes, but as printers, y'all need to stay away from such technicalities, or customers will argue paying against for white and black screens as extra colors.


Just

Sayin'

[Sbrem]

Actually, black is no light, so no color, and white is all colors... that used to make me shake my head, until I shook something into place and it made sense all of a sudden. FBaked, get a U swatch card. As mentioned earlier, it grays all colors down. Print a nice image out of your computer onto some photo grade glossy paper, then print it on cheap copier paper, you'll get an idea from that what happens on paper. The shirts have no coatings, but most of our inks are fairly opaque, so you're really trying to simulate the color on the swatch.

Steve

[JBLUE]

You actually have that backwards.  White is the absence of color.  Black is all colors.  Easy to prove try mixing a bunch of primary colors together.  I promise you the end result won't be white.  This of course is the application of color.  Not the theory of light and refraction which is what you are refering to.  Different rules and theories.

Also U has been the standard for printing on textiles for the last 20 years.  C is intended for offset printing.  You will never match a C on a t shirt.  to the original color.  Unless of course you modify it then you might as well just mix by eye to begin with.

[mk162]

ink, you have that backwards.  black absorbs all colors of the spectrum and white reflects them back...all together.

[blue moon]

actually we are talking about two concepts. Reflective and transmittive or also called additive and subtractive color. In one case all of them combined create black (ink on a shirt, absorbing all the reflections) or white (think pink floyd prism, all the colors combined create white. Think RGB monitor or TV).

So technically, you are both correct!!!

 

[Denis Kolar]

As far as what I remember from my Color Theory class back on college in Serbia, Black and White were considered pigments and not colors.
I wish I can remember the two color wheels (the names of people that invented them), one as primary colors have Red, Blue and Yellow; while the other one had Green added to those colors. I guess, with combining Red, Blue and Yellow you could get any color possible.

[Sbrem]

You actually have that backwards.  White is the absence of color.  Black is all colors.  Easy to prove try mixing a bunch of primary colors together.  I promise you the end result won't be white.  This of course is the application of color.  Not the theory of light and refraction which is what you are refering to.  Different rules and theories.

Also U has been the standard for printing on textiles for the last 20 years.  C is intended for offset printing.  You will never match a C on a t shirt.  to the original color.  Unless of course you modify it then you might as well just mix by eye to begin with.

No, not to be argumentative, but white light is the presence of all color, and black is no light at all. That's why a prism splits sunlight into a rainbow. You don't see rainbows at night. It's about light, not ink. You can't see the ink without light.
Yes, of course, if you mix inks together, like paints in a paintbox when we were kids, you get browns. You won't get absolute black that way either. But the discussion is about color first, and matching it. I've been printing t's since '75, and U has not been a standard, since almost no ad agencies ever ask us for it. If they ask for 185 red, they expect it to be saturated, not dulled down, at least that's been our experience. 185U is definitely duller than 185C, but more importantly, it's grayer, because that's what happens on plain paper.
Now, we're aren't printing paper, so the reference swatch card is simply a reference color to be matched. Coated or uncoated doesn't figure in since we're not using paper, or offset inks, or an offset press. One needs to understand the basics of color theory, based on light, to then have a foundation to work from for working with pigments.
For instance, in theory, 100% of C, M, and Y should give you black, but since the pigments in the inks are imperfect, that is, contaminated with other colors, they don't. That's why the K or black printer was added to print in the shadows to add contrast and help make images pop. So, when theory breaks down in practice, we have to come up with workarounds that give us, and the customer, what they are looking for. I don't separate the light from pigment, because without light, you can't see what you're doing anyway. One can't mix a color under greennish fluorescent lighting and expect it to look the same in daylight, and when this pops up, understanding the light theory helps you figure out what's going wrong. Sorry, didn't mean to go on, I really like this discussion.

Steve

[Northland]

And to make the whole discussion even more complicated and convoluted..... what about the variances in the way different people perceive color?
My bride will say "there's too much green in that"... and I'll say "Green ? that's gray"

[Sbrem]

According to one of our artists, a lot of men have that issue. And yeah, as if it weren't convoluted enough, perception comes into play and ruins everything...

[Command-Z]

ink, you have that backwards.  black absorbs all colors of the spectrum and white reflects them back...all together.

This is the winning answer. Unless you are looking at a light SOURCE, all colors you see are reflected off objects or particles. Light wavelengths get absorbed by an object, the ones that get reflected are the color of that object. Grass, for instance, absorbs the entire spectrum and reflects the colors that make green.

[mk162]

I knew I could get one right.

[JBLUE]

actually we are talking about two concepts. Reflective and transmittive or also called additive and subtractive color. In one case all of them combined create black (ink on a shirt, absorbing all the reflections) or white (think pink floyd prism, all the colors combined create white. Think RGB monitor or TV).

So technically, you are both correct!!!

Yes this is what I was refering to.  Which is why I stated application and theories are different depending on the medium.  White will never be made out of "solid" primaries which is what ink is.  Light is different than solid which is why light does create all the colors through a prism and why space is black.

Also,  I'm surprised to hear that U is not considered a standard.  I've been in the business since 87 and ran some of the biggest shops in So CA.  Giant, Bugle Boy, Creative, Dimensions etc.  U has always been one of the few consistent things through all these shops until recently when GAs from other industries came into the biz. 

[Sbrem]

I get that we are talking light and pigment, and of course wouldn't begin to think that we could make white by mixing all of our other ink colors together. Obviously, we all know that. Ink, as far as U being a standard, well I guess I missed that. It's just that I hardly ever had that request, which is why I was surprised when you wrote that. Where you were, they apparently were much more in demand, so sorry if I offended. Getting back to the original question, I still think the way to go is to mix the C then add white or black to gray, or mute, the color down to simulate the effect of offset inks on uncoated stock. I think someone said earlier that Wilflex's system has formula's for the U colors. If you wouldn't mind what are the differences between the U and C formulas from the Wilflex system? (We use the Union, which doesn't have the U color formulas) I can't believe I'm typing this on a Saturday night on a holiday weekend, boy am I getting ooolllddd

Steve

[Frog]

Your typing this on a Saturday night and feeling old is about par for the course, as you also are saying much the same as I did! And yes, I'm old and typing on a Saturday night..
I'm also curious about the difference in formulas for the U and C, though Tony already warned us that some vary way more than others, the formulas for this 226 would still be an interesting study.