In the midst of the gloomy season, on 22 November 2021, Adobe published a note in the help system that packs a punch:
Changes coming to the Pantone Color Libraries
In March, 2022, the Pantone Color Libraries that are pre-loaded in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Adobe Color, and Adobe Capture will be removed from future software updates. To minimize the impact of this change, we are working on an alternative solution for the affected products. Stay tuned for updates.
Translation: In March 2022, the Pantone colour libraries pre-installed in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Adobe Color and Adobe Capture will be removed from future software updates. To minimise the impact of this change, we are working on an alternative solution for the affected products. Stay tuned for updates.
How is this news to be assessed?
The entry is tantamount to an earthquake in the colour and design industry. It is not only the case that many Adobe users work with Pantone colours and will soon resort to alternative solutions (which ones?). It is probably due in large part to the firm integration into Adobe products since the 1990s that Pantone now plays the leading role among colour systems worldwide. Pantone is so well established today that one can no longer do without it. Multinationals, independent institutions, entire countries (even the EU!) use Pantone. - see here) have defined their corporate design according to Pantone. This was probably under the assumption that Pantone colours would be readily available for all times. But this is a fallacy, which should now become clear to many.
As soon as the Adobe software no longer contains Pantone colours, this will initially trigger a run on Pantone Connect, where you can download the latest Pantone ACB colour palettes. This is more complicated than direct integration in the programme, and the question arises as to whether this will be possible permanently free of charge, as this would not be a lucrative model for Pantone. (Currently, a distinction is made between free basic access and paid access with extended components). It can be assumed that Pantone users will reorient themselves. It can also be assumed that other software manufacturers will follow Adobe's example, primarily for reasons of licence costs. So the importance of Pantone will decline... sooner or later, Pantone will prove to be what it has been at its core since Lawrence Herberts set out in the 1950s as a part-time employee of a printing ink manufacturer to change the world of colour with his system: a brainless dinosaur that at some point will no longer be able to cope with the demands of a changing world - so the rampant marketing with „Pantone Hotels“ and the „Colour of the Year“ is of little use.
The lack of quality of the system should be known to most readers of these lines:
- confusing variety of colour guides and the colour shades they contain
- associated patchy software integration
- Lack of accuracy and high metamerism of the colour fans and shades, due to diverse manufacturers with different papers and pigments.
- Very restrictive licensing policy, no freely accessible source for colour values
Why should Adobe users be willing to pay money for access to Pantone colours, which has always been free? Why should Pantone be willing to make its colour collections available to Adobe users for free, while numerous other software houses pay a licence fee?
Where will the road lead?
It should become clearer: calculated and freely available colours are far more useful than colour collections from commercial providers. You can work much more systematically with them, you don't need to pay a licence fee for them, they are available free of charge in virtually any software, and above all: you don't make yourself dependent on rights holders who are mainly concerned with „protecting“ „their“ colours... We recommend RGB as a simple solution, and CIELAB, especially CIE-HLC, as a better quality solution.
Many gaps in the market are opening up!
What now?
We will try to contribute to the discussion and the upcoming developments. At the moment, an initial idea is to contact Adobe to collaborate on the „alternative solution for the affected products“.
More ideas will follow, we will keep you posted.
Join the colour liberation - it's more exciting than ever.
freieFarbe e.V.
The Board of Directors
Further information
Note in the Adobe Help system
A more in-depth article from Printweek on the topic with several opinions
Pantone by Wikipedia
Pantone Connect
Description of several Pantone/Adobe integration errors
List of Pantone licensees in the software sector
Pantone Hotel Brussels
Colour of the year
Portrait of the company founder Lawrence Herbert
Article and podcast: Episode of Thrilling Tales of Modern Capitalism
