Pantone is new, & not really set up for soil science (& would probably cost
almost the same to get the high-quality chips we use anyway: the price
reflects the accuracy & precision & control of printing standards, whether
we like it or not); Munsell is a also a huge system, with just one small
book devoted to soil colours; William Smith used something similar about 200
years ago, but looking at this from an international perspective, Munsell
seems to be the standard
The question might be whether you need Munsell for beads; Pantone might be
better there, or you might want to look into a system some Swedes set up for
art conservation; or get a colorimeter (which might cost about the same as
Munsell anyway) & record everything as RGB or CMYK values (or these plus
some other system)
I'll try to remember to send you some stuff offline, later

-----Original Message-----

> I'm doing a master's thesis research project with trade beads  
> assemblages
> from some Alutiiq sites we have investigated on the outer Kenai coast.
>
> What do people think about using the Pantone color reference?  Seems  
> to be
> more readily available.