What are Pantone colors?
Pantone colors refer to the Pantone Matching System (PMS), a color matching system used by the printing industry whereby printing colors are identified by a unique name or number (as opposed to just a visual reference). This helps make sure that colors turn out the same from system to system, and print run to print run.
Printers accept a total of six plates or colors. If you choose the four-color printing process (CMYK), there is room for two additional plates; a white flood is considered one plate, if you go with Pantone colors only, you have a choice of six plates. These additional plates are known as spot colors, and may include anything under the Pantone metallic, silver, gold, fluorescent or any other color in the Pantone. Additional Pantone colors are recommended if you are looking for a specific color within your graphic. There are additional costs associated with using Pantone colors.