The National Coil Coating Association’s Color Experiment: Potential for Converting to CIE Color Space and ΔE2000

By David A. Cocuzzi, Kristine Rosek Bertucci

Over the decades, the North American coil coating industry has depended on the use of Hunter color space to measure and control color. The National Coil Coating Association (NCCA), now in its 57th year, recognizes that many others are using CIE* color space for day-to-day color control, and that ΔE2000 is considered a superior methodology to describe color difference, rather than ΔEHunter.

After using Hunter color space for nearly 60 years and relying on the opponent-color-theory coordinates ΔL, Δa, and Δb for color control and ΔEHunter to define exterior weathering performance, one can assume that the current methodology is suitable, otherwise color issues would abound. But what if using CIE color space and ΔE2000 is a better approach?

This article discusses the experiment that NCCA ran to evaluate the potential advantages of CIE color space andΔE2000.