Leighton Hubbell - Illustrative Designer

Well, a few years ago I was pondering that very issue. I needed some inspiration. At the time, I was working for a rather large branding agency and finagled my boss into letting me go to one of those industry seminars put on by Pantone®. This particular one was presented by Leatrice Eiseman, the executive director of the Pantone Color Institute and a person engrossed in everything color each and every day. It was a very insightful and interesting presentation and definitely helped me understand where (and who) the colors of our time come from and their influences.

Of course, there is always going to be something for them to plug and in that case it was a new book, Pantone Guide to Communicating with Color. I picked one up and still use it quite a bit. With any Pantone product, the printing was top notch and the color very accurate. I did notice that afterward my color work was showing some good diversity and I was trying color combinations well out of my usual realm. And that was the whole idea in the first place.

With color, like anything in our industry, you have to keep up with the trends. And of course, there is a follow-up book. It's entitled, Color - Messages & Meanings: A PANTONE Color Resource. This one follows the same idea, with lots of color reference, work samples and swatches, including PMS to CMYK conversion formulas. I would highly recommend these books to anyone who needs to work with color and needs a little boost in their inspiration. Check them out.