4 ms·
Good opportunity for someone to make a pantone -> non pantone converter. Pop in your file, convert all the Pantone colors to similar free colors. Profit.
by polishdude20 4y ago
Good opportunity for someone to make a pantone -> non pantone converter. Pop in your file, convert all the Pantone colors to similar free colors. Profit.
- jeroenhd 4y agoI don't think Pantone will give you a license to their database if you make a product to compete with them. If they do, you can probably expect a lawsuit anyway.
- fy20 4y agoI wonder if that is considered a copyright violation. The customer is giving you X and you are giving back Y. But Y is not copyright. It could be considered a derivative work, but what if you change Y, so it's a couple of degrees off on the HSV scale?
- kuschku 4y agoIt's exactly this mapping which is what pantone owns and licenses, reproducing it is very likely going to be illegal.
- nine_k 4y agoI immediately remember encrypted, region-locked DVDs and the oppressed but often open-source tools to counteract it, like DeCSS. Early 2000s were fun!
- zinekeller 4y ago> But Y is not copyright. In a similar vein, phonebooks. The answer... is complicated. There is a thing called "database rights", which as you might guess is a mess. The US argues that there is no right as you've simply compiled information (see Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co., and that's why I used phonebooks as an analogy) while Europe (not just EU, even UK and Russia) do recognize database rights. Even skipping about it, Pantone named them, which could give them copyright protection in the US (and other countries without specific database rights). Wikipedia about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Database_right https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Database_right
- fxtentacle 4y agoThe correct RGB values heavily depend on your printing process. And your ICC profile. So conversion is not trivial. You could license it, though, because that's precisely what Pantone has been selling for 20 years.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- dkarras 4y agoPANTONE does not work that way. A converter like that would only allow you to see similar colors on your screen but would not guarantee the likeness of the color on different devices / print. So such a conversion would be lossy.