COLOR TOLERANCING 101

Is it good enough or not?

Presented by: Tim Mouw

Applications Engineering & Technical Support Manager
 TOLERANCING 101

- What is a tolerance?
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- What is a tolerance?
- How much difference is OK?
- Customer defined…

Use specification…
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- Color tolerancing can be done with a large variety of methods

- Agreement to visual is key
- So why not just use visual only?
- Are A and B the same color?
- So our eyes can be fooled
• Retinal Fatigue
• Background Effects
• Poor Color Memory
• Color Deficiency
• Lighting Conditions
• Age
• Recordability

• But visual is still the ultimate method – just think about when
you go shopping, for anything…
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- The color spaces we use for color measurement

CIE L*a*b* CIE L*C*h°

 TOLERANCING 101
- Don’t forget to specify illumination – to meet agreement with visual

Daylight TL84 Incandescent

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- Typical Tolerance Methods

- Visual only
- L*a*b* (75%)
- L*C*H* (85%)
- Elliptical (95 - 98%) - DEcmc, DE 94, DE 2000

L*a*b* L*C*H* Elliptcal

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- Applying a tolerance and assessing the results
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- What if I pass my tolerance, but the customer still rejects it?
- Ensure that the same parameters are being used by everyone assessing the
color
- Lighting / Illuminant mismatch?
- Tolerance metrics (which kind) and limits?
- Instrument geometry or settings?
- Measurement location or process?
- Maybe time to reassess the tolerance being used
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- Adjusting the tolerance
- Build the tolerance on real samples – some that are good, some that are bad
- Base the good/bad samples on visual assessment and/or customer approval
- Measure these samples and evaluate the data to determine the proper limits
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- Here are the samples we measured before
- Now lets assume that samples 0001 and 0004 were approved by the customer
 TOLERANCING 101
- Here are the samples we measured before
- Now lets assume that samples 0001 and 0004 were approved by the customer
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- Make your tolerance actionable
- The difference between good color and bad color is not a knife edge
- Set your tolerance to alert you when your color is drifting toward failure
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- If necessary, use an internal tolerance in addition to a customer specified
tolerance
- This can be done by adding a Delta L*a*b* (or L*C*H*) tolerance to our DEcmc
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Select a tolerance type that agrees with your

1 customers assessment of your product and

meets their needs
Use margins to alert you when your color

2 is trending toward failure

Use 3-dimensional color metrics to help

3 direct you in correcting color issues

15
 QUESTIONS

Thank you for joining us today.

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•Call: 1.800.248.9748
•Visit: www.xrite.com

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THANK YOU!

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