The COVID-19 pandemic has had such a far-reaching impact that it even changed the way that Pantone delivers its statements on colors to use in fashion.

Pantone, based in Carlstadt, N.J., regularly gets headlines for naming the annual color of the year, as well as being one of the world’s leading suppliers of color-management systems for fashion designers and other creatives. On June 30, it announced the launch of Pantone Connect. It’s a digital platform for designers, and, yes, those working under stay-at-home orders. It allows them to measure color without working with more sophisticated computers in an office.

Pantone Connect features the Pantone Color Match Card, which calibrates a phone camera’s abilities to capture color, match it to Pantone Colors, then save the color to the designer’s palette, said Nick Bazarian, senior product manager for the company’s Pantone Digital Solutions division.

“While designers have previously taken photos with their phone to capture Pantone Colors from images, the results were more inspirational vs. accurate due to factors like poor lighting and camera performance,” Bazarian said. “With the Color Match Card and Pantone Connect app, a designer’s phone has now become a legitimate color capture device to match the physical world more accurately to Pantone Colors.”