Special colors are pre-mixed special inks, used to replace or use CMYK four-color inks together, and need to add exclusive printing plates on the printing machine. Special color printing uses a fixed color premixed color system called the Pantone color matching system(Referred to as PMS).
Pantone color matching system
It is an authoritative international reference standard for selecting, determining, matching, and controlling ink colors, which can help us compare the accuracy of the colors in the design with the colors of the printing inks.
Advantage
The special color printing effect is very saturated and bright, without the feeling of gray and dirty, suitable for the performance of large color blocks, which is the effect that the general four-color printing ink cannot print. If the color that needs to be printed is very accurate, a special color is a way that can be achieved. Because the ink is not mixed, the color of each printing will not change. Of course, incorrect color printing is also related to the machine and paper. Certain colors (such as metallic and fluorescent) can only be used as spot colors.
Disadvantage
Special colors need to add exclusive printing plates on the printing press, so the overall cost will increase accordingly.
CMYK and special colors
If the finished product requires a lot of colors, and when these colors are too expensive or impractical to use special colors (such as printing color photos), use CMYK four-color printing.
If your design contains a large area of tones or color percentages must be matched, using special colors will be easier to achieve.