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4-color printing machine/press – a machine that prints on one side of a sheet in four colors in one pass through the machine.
4-color process – color printing by means of the three primary colors (yellow, magenta and cyan) and black superimposed. Each plate is produced from separations, which have been made from the originals on a scanner or a process camera.
4-up, 8-up – denotes 4 page or 8 page form, signature, or “flat” and thereby size of computer to plate device or press; generally four A4 pages or eight A4 pages.
Additive color theory – of or relating to the reproduction of colors by the superimposition of primary colors.
Additive primaries – in color reproduction, red, green and blue. When lights of these colors are added together they produce the sensation of white light.
Analog – relating to or using information represented by a continuously variable physical quantity (such as spatial position, voltage etc.) rather than digitally.
Angular gears – are machine elements that transmit motion by means of successively engaging teeth set at an angle. The gear teeth act like small levers.
Anilox – the engraved roller that carries ink to the printing cylinder in the flexographic printing technique.
Armature – the rotating coil or coils of a dynamo or electric motor.
Art paper – paper that has received a coating of China clay and size. It has a very smooth surface that may be matt, but is usually shiny. Also called coated stock in some countries. esp. North America
ASCII – more accurately US ASCII, USA Standard code for Information Interchange. A more or less standard interpretation of the ISO data codes, it gives 128 seven-bit codes and is used by almost all electronic equipment not made by IBM, who use EBCDIC.
Assembly-line – a series of workers and machines in a factory by which a succession of identical items is progressively assembled.
Banding – The presence of extraneous lines in a printed page. Banding generally occurs when a color printer needs to pass the print head over a page multiple times to print each color. If the page isn’t exactly lined up for each pass, lines may appear. Such printers are called multi-pass printers. Because of the banding problem, single-pass printers – those that print all the colors in one pass – are generally better.
Bandwidth – the transmission capacity of a computer network or other telecommunication system.
BCM – Billion Cubic Microns.
Bearers – in presses the flat surfaces or rings at the end of cylinders that come in contact with each other during printing and serve as a basis for determining packing thickness.
Bevel gear – a gear working another gear at an angle to it by means of bevel wheels.
Bevel wheel – a toothed wheel whose working face is oblique to the axis.
Bezier curves – A Bezier curve in its most common form is a simple cubic equation that can be used in any number of useful ways. Originally developed by Pierre Bézier in the 1970’s for CAD/CAM operations, it became the underpinnings of the entire Adobe PostScript drawing model. If you’re a regular user of Adobe Illustrator, Macromedia Freehand or Fontographer, any number of spline-based 3D programs, etc., you’ve probably used Bézier curves.
Bitmap – a representation in which each item corresponds to one or more bits of information, especially the information used to control the display of a computer screen.
Blanket – a fabric coated or laminated with a rubber or synthetic compound of an appropriate shore-hardness on the blanket cylinder of an offset press.
Blanket cylinder – the cylinder on an offset machine on which the blanket is carried and by means of which the printing image is taken from the plate and transferred to the paper or other material.
Bleed – 1. Printed matter designed to run off the edge of the paper. Also used by book binders to describe over-cut margins. 2. An ink that changes color or mixes with other colors, sometimes caused by lamination.
Board – a cellulose-based material which is usually above 200 g/m2 (UK), 10 points (US).
Book sewing – is carried out at a sewing frame which carries tapes or cords. The pages of each section are sewn through and to each other incorporating the tapes/cords in the structure of the sewing.
Broadsheet / broadside – Any sheet in its basic size (i.e. not folded or cut). In newspapers the large form equivalent to The Times (UK) and USA Today and double the size of tabloids like the Daily Mirror (UK).
Caliper– the thickness of the Substrate or the device used to measure it.
Case binding – the normal style for the binding of printed books for hardback editions.
Cell – Indentation in the surface of a gravure cylinder that holds the ink.
CFC – Corrugated Folding Carton.
Chill roller – A cooled roller, used for setting ink after drying in a web-offset machine.
CIELAB colors – CIE Lab is a color space introduced by CIE in 1976. It’s a new incorporated color space in TIFF specs. In this color space you use three components: L* is the luminancy, a* and b* are respectively red/blue and yellow/blue chrominancies. This color space is also defined with regard to the CIE XYZ color spaces.
CIM – Computer Integrated Manufacturing.
CIP3 – International Cooperation for the Integration of Prepress, Press and Postpress
Clearing house – in digital distribution of advertising, a digital repository that will simultaneously distribute ad materials and electronic release orders to publishers from advertisers, and will potentially distribute soft proofs to advertisers.
CMYK – Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black- subtractive primary colors. Printing colors for process color reproduction.
Cold foil transfer – A new process used on narrow web label presses whereby only mechanical pressure transfers the foil where needed.
Colorimeter – A device that measures the luminosity of a few (typically three to eight) specific colors. A colorimeter can be used with software that creates ICC device profiles for monitors. A monitor with an attached hardware calibrator uses a colorimeter.
Color management – A system-level framework that may be used by applications for translating colors from the gamut of one device to the gamut of another device. Apple ColorSync for Mac OS and Microsoft ICM 2.0 for Windows are each an example of a CMS
Color separation film – the negative or positive film produced by a process camera or scanner.
Color space – A particular variant of a color model with a specific gamut or range of colors, which is one of its chief characteristics. For example, within the RGB color model are a number of color spaces like Apple RGB, Adobe RGB (1998), sRGB, etc. While each of these define color by the same three axes (R, G, and B), they differ in gamut as well as other specific characteristics.
Color space – A particular variant of a color model with a specific gamut or range of colors, which is one of its chief characteristics. For example, within the RGB color model are a number of color spaces like Apple RGB, Adobe RGB (1998), sRGB, etc. While each of these define color by the same three axes (R, G, and B), they differ in gamut as well as other specific characteristics.
Color swatch – A series of color guides, which may be graded in a standardized fashion as in the pantone matching system.
Contone / Continuous tone – as opposed to halftone screened, or linework. A photographic image that has not been screened and contains graded tones from black to white.
Copydot – The practice of scanning pre-secreened (halftone) film for use of legacy material in full digital workflows. Generates large files and also called “dot to dot” scanning. First used by Kjeld Moselund of P-E. Corona treater-Generally used in web fed machines for neutralising electrical charges of the substrate. In the past also used in sheetfed deliveries.
CPC – Computer Process Control console, Heidelberg. Sometimes used generically for computerised remote inking and registration consoles.
Crank shaft – rotational mechanical drive component bent out at right angles for converting reciprocal to circular motion and vice versa. Used in engines as well as web press folders.
Crease stiffness – attribute of packaging board to resist cracking when creasing rules are used in folding cartons.
Crush-cut – one of the methods of die-cutting board, pertains to die blade design. As opposed to pressure cut.
CtF – Computer-to-Film. Nowadays generally denotes output of full form.
CtP – Computer-to-Plate
Cylinder – In flexography most rollers in the printing press are called rolls with the exception of that upon which the rubber plates are mounted, and the one which recieves the impression, and these are usually referred to as cylinders (i.e.plate and impression cylinders).
Cylinder engraving – for creating intaglio surface for gravure printing.
Cylinder layout – imposition for gravure.
Cylinder(s) – (printing, blanket, impression, cutting, pinning, jaw, bearerless)- in printing generally containing the image carrier (plate or image as in gravure) or transfer material such as blankets.
Dampening unit – in lithography, mechanism on a press for transferring dampening solution to the plate during printing.
Database – virtually any information stored on a computer in a systematic fashion and thus retrievable.
Dedicated – a system designed to carry out a specific task.
Delivery – on a sheetfed press the mechanism that takes the sheet from the printing unit and stacks it in an orderly fashion.
Densitometer – an optical instrument used to measure the intensity of tone on film or reflection copy as well as of printed images. Special instruments are required for color and are included in automatic controls.
Density – the weight of tone or color in any image, measurable by a densitometer. The printed highlight can be no brighter than the base paper or board, while the shadow can be no darker than the quality and volume of the ink the printing process will permit. A greater range is possible in film and color transparencies than in printing.
Die-cutting – using a die to cut holes or irregular outlines
Digital – relating to or using signals or information represented as digits using discreet values of a physical quantity such as voltage or magnetic polarization.
Digital archiving – storing of information off-line from a computer , word-processor or typesetting front-end system. This can be on any magnetic media, such as floppy disk, magnetic tape, cassettes, cartridge or removable rigid disk.
Digital Contract Proof – A means of communicating to printers what they are expected to achieve. It is named so because it can form a legal binding contract between the supplier and the recipient, and, because of this , it cannot be a subject of individual interpretation by either party.
Digital engraving – of gravure cylinders using bit-map driven laser.
Digital offset – refers to digital presses that use a blanket cylinder. Examples include Indigo and Nexpress.
Digital printing – Printing directly from Computer files rather than through the physical media of films or plates using machines such as the Xeikon, Indigo, or DocuTech. Can include digitally imaged offset presses.
Digital-to-Press – Intregration of the press in the network, either for imaging on press, or for ink-settings or job related information as in CIP3.
Distribute-and-print – sending entire documents including color, layout and typography over Wide Area Networks for printing required number of copies on demand.
Doctor blades – a flexible metal plate on a gravure press that removes surplus ink from the surface of the printing cylinder before the impression is made.
Dot-gain – during the reproduction age from original to printed image there is a tendency for the halftone dots to grow. This leads to inaccurate results, but if a particular press’s dot gain characteristics are known it can be compensated for during reproduction.
Double-truck printing – a double truck / page spread occurs when an illustration fills two pages, which can only take place on the center pages of a section. elsewhere it is a ‘false double’.
Dryer – on a printing press the drying mechanism usually fitted near the delivery, or outfeed. Heat may be in the form of electric elements, lazy-flame gas, ultraviolet or infrared radiation.
Dummy – A sample for a job made up with the actual materials and to the correct size to show bulk, style of binding, and so on. Also a complete mock up of a job showing position of a typematter and illustrations, margins and other details.
Duplex board – paper of two qualities or colors that have been brought together and combined, usually by lamination, but sometimes while the paper is still in the wet state on the papermaking machine.
Dye sublimation technology – transfer of pigments from ink ribbons using heat.
eBooks – the issuing of texts in machine-readable form rather than on paper.
eCommerce – Conducting business on-line. This includes, for example, buying and selling products with digital-cash and via Electronic Data Interchange(EDI).
Electrophotography – image transfer systems used in copiers to produce images using electrostatic forces.
Engraving machine – for gravure cylinders, formerly using diamond-tipped tools, now using lasers and generally computer driven.
EOQ – economic order quantity.
ERP – Enterprise Resource Planning.
Exsiccation – The process of being dried up, desiccation; Removal of water of crystallization
FBB – Folding box board. Folding box board- High Quality Carton maker’s board which has good scoring and folding characteristics.
Feeder – that part of a sheetfed printing press or folder that transfers the sheets of a paper to the printing / folding units.
Film negative / positive – sheets or rolls of a clear and stable plastic with a monochrome photographic emulsion and containing line and / or tone reproductions of the image. Used during the making of printing plates and cylinders.
Film-to-Plate – conventional exposure of litho plates using films.
Finishing – 1. All operations after printing. 2. Traditionally the hand operations of lettering and ornamenting the covers of a hand-bound book.
Flat – 1. an assembly of imposed film or photographic paper. 2. A half tone of insufficient contrast, perhaps lacking in density.
Flatbed dies – the traditional dies for creasing and cutting labels and boards using metal creasing and cutting rules embeded in a flat wooden or synthetic board as opposed to the more modern flexible and solid rotary dies used on web presses.
Flexography – a relief process using rubber or plastic plates on a webfed press and solvent-based liquid inks. Mainly used for printing packaging film, but also for some newspapers where it may also be called anilox and can be retro-fitted to letterpress equipment.
Foil-stamping – In bookbinding, short for stamping foil: a plastic film coated with clear or colored lacquer and a thin layer of condensed aluminium, which is used to block covers. The aluminium layer and colored lacquer on top of it detach from the plastic carrier under heat and pressure from a blocking brass during the blocking process, leaving the design or lettering engraved on the block transferred into the surface of the case material with the thin colored metallic layer on top of it.
Font – a set of type characters of the same design (and with hot metal typesetting, the same size); for example upper case and lower case, numerals, punctuation marks, accents, ligatures. Part of a family which may include italic and bold fonts. Maybe in the form of metal matrices for hot metal, film matrices, strips, grids, or discs for the earlier phototypesetters, or a digital font for current systems.
Form – in letterpress the form comprises all the type and blocks in a chase and ready for printing.
Fountain solution – Solution of water and chemicals used in litho to prevent the non-printing areas from accepting ink.
Galley proof – a proof in which type is proofed in a column as it comes from the hot metal type caster onto a galley tray – so now a long narrow proof from a phototypesetter.
GATF – Graphic Arts Technical Foundation, Pittsburg, PA
Ghosting – occurs when there is a very heavy area of color of a regular shape being printed and the inking system of a press is not sufficiently powerful to supply enough ink to all areas.
Gravure – a printing process in which the printing areas are below the non-printing surface. These recesses are filled with a liquid ink with the surplus removed from the non-printing areas by the doctor blade before the paper ‘sucks’ the ink from the cells. Also called photogravure (UK) and rotogravure (US).
Gsm / g/m2 – grams per square meter. A method of indicating the substance of paper on the basis of its weight, regardless of its sheet size. Spoken (and sometimes written) as gsm.
GUI – Graphical User Interface. 1.Used to refer to software applications that are easier to use than their text-based predecessors. GUI programs use icons, toolbars, taskbars and other friendly, point-and-click functions.2. A computer environment or program that displays, or facilitates the display of, on-screen options, usually in the form of icons (pictorial symbols) or menus (lists of alphanumeric characters) by means of which users may enter commands. Options are selected by using the appropriate hardware (e.g., mouse, designated keyboard keys, or touchpad) to move a display cursor to, or on top of, the icon or menu item of interest. The application or function so represented may then be selected (e.g., by clicking a mouse button, pressing the “enter” key, or by touching the touchpad).
Guillotine – a device to trim paper or board before or after printing. Fitted with a powerful clamp to ensure that the paper is kept absolutely square during the cut, and maybe computerized to carry out a complex sequence of cuts.
Halftone– a photograph printed by any of the printing processes that, while they cannot actually print intermediate tones, can adequately represent them by using dots of various sizes generated by a scanner or halftone screen. A mid-gray is thus depicted using a dot that is 50% of solid.
Halftone screen – conventionally a glass plate cross-ruled with opaque lines leaving a grid of transparent squares and used to split a photographic into halftone dots.
Hardcopy / proof – typed or printed copy from a computer, word-processor or front end, as opposed to the soft copy / proof on the VDU.
Heatset inks – are quick drying inks. The solvents are vaporized as they pass through a heating chamber, leaving the pigment and binding resins fixed to the paper in such a manner that there is no chance for ink to spread or excessive penetration into the paper. Therefore, presses must be equipped with a heating unit and exhaust system to drive off the solvents, and chill rolls to cool the heated resins.
Hopper – Station on machine (especially in binding) where printed sections are stacked and dropped onto a conveyor belt.
Hot metal typesetting – method of typesetting used in monotype and slug caster typesetting. In either system a liquid alloy of lead, tin and antimony is pored into the matrices to form the letters required.
ICC profiles – International Color Consortium. The group established by eight industry vendors (including Adobe Systems) for the purpose of creating, promoting, and encouraging the standardization and evolution of an open, vendor-neutral, cross-platform color management system architecture. Imagesetter- in computer imaging a device that outputs type, line-art and photos in position.
Impose (digital) – the arrangement of pages to be printed in the correct sequence with the appropriate margins before making plates and printing.
Imposed proof – Usually in book printing, a proof that may be printed on only one side and in which all the elements are combined so that the paper can be folded into its final form.
Impression – 1. The act of placing a printed image on paper – in letterpress, impressed onto the type. 2. All the copies of a job printed to one order.
Impression cylinder – that part of any press that brings the paper, board, or other surface to be printed into contact with the printing plate, cylinder or other surface.
Induction thyristor – A four-layered semi-conductor rectifier in which the flow of current between two electrodes is triggered by a signal at a third electrode.
Ink preset curves – ink key settings and changes generated by algorithms for various combinations of coverage, speeds and substrates.
Inkjet printer – a printer in which the characters are formed by minute jets of ink.
Inline – Usually of finishing, but any operation taking place as an adjunct to the main printing – such as folding, numbering, glueing – and not involving a separate operation.
Intellectual property – intangible property that is the result of creativity, e.g. patents or copyrights.
IR Dryer – accelerated drying of specially formulated inks or varnishes by ultra violet or infra red radiation that excites the molecules in the medium, or vehicle, of the ink or varnish, and dries, or cures it instantly. Radiation drying units can be fitted to printing presses and to special lacquering equipment that is designed to apply a thick layer of high-gloss varnish.
ISDN – Integrated Services Digital Network. An Integrated Digital Network in which the same time-division switches and digital transmission paths are used to establish connections for different services. ISDN services include telephone, data, electronic mail, and facsimile . The method used to accomplish a connection is often specified: for example, switched connection, non-switched connection, exchange connection, ISDN connection.
Job bag – envelope for artwork, originals, paper samples, films, proofs, generally containing specification of job and instructions and schedule.
Job ticket – The job ticket gives you a chance to tell know exactly how you want your job produced and handled.
JPEG – Joint Photographic Experts Group is a graphic file in a bitmap format mainly used for displaying photographs on the Web. A “lossy” technique that compresses color image files to about 5 percent of their normal size by “losing” detail.
Kerning – the adjusting of space between individual letters so that part of one extends over the rectangular area covered by its neighbour.
Laminating – applying transparent or colored plastic film, usually with a high gloss finish, to printed matter to protect or to enhance it. Various films are available with different gloss, folding and strength characteristics.
Lamitube – flexible laminate used for packaging pastes; replacement for metal and foil tubes.
LAN – Local Area Network. Method of connecting a variety of electronic devices from VDUs to disk drives and impact / non impact printers. The table may be a twisted pair, coax or a special purpose cable and the network will be monitored by a network controller. Special software ensures that only one pair of devices is online at a time. Very high speeds are possible, which means that the user will not normally notice any delay while other devices are using the net.
Layout – an indication for the organization of text and pictures with instructions about sizing and so on for reproduction and printing.
Letterpress printing – the original printing process. The inked printing surface of a metal, rubber or plastic is above the non printing surface. The inking rollers touch only the raised printing surface which is then impressed onto the paper or board.
Line art – artwork entirely in black on white with no intermediary tones and thus not requiring halftone reproduction.
Makeready – Preparation of a printing press before the run, setting it up for color, size, and substance of paper, register and so on.
Metallic inks – Inks in which the normal pigments are replaced by very fine metallic particles, typically, gold or silver in color.
Metallurgy – the branch of science concerned with the properties, production and purification of metals.
MIS – Management Information Systems
Modular technology – technology involving modules i.e. sets of standardized parts or independent units that can be used to construct a more complex structure.
Moiré – a pattern, like that in watered silk, which is created when a photograph that already has a halftone screen has to be rescreened rather than being reproduced dot for dot. It can also happen when screen angles are not set correctly in color work.
Nearline finishing – the practice of using portable finishing devices that can be connected one of several machines.
Negative – a photographic film or paper in which all the dark areas appear light and vice-versa and used in the reproduction process. It is made either direct from the artwork or from a positive.
Nip – Line of contact between two rolls.
Nyloplates – (BASF) A flexible intaglio plate used for letter press
Offline – not controlled by or directly connected to a computer; with a delay between the production of data and its processing.
Offline production – computers and phototypesetters are offline when the connection is made by transferring the disk or other magnetic media between the devices.
Offset – a lithographic (and sometimes letterpress) method of printing in which the ink is transfered from the printing plate to the offset blanket cylinder and then to the paper, board, metal.
Online production – computers and phototypesetters are online when they have direct access to another piece of equipment.
Optical density – the degree to which a refractive medium retards transmitted rays of light.
Overprinting – to print a second image ( not always in an additional color) on a previously printed sheet.
Packaging – Packaging is a technique to provide proper materials and containers together with the condition that such materials and containers provide for protecting the value and the state of products when they are transported, stored, transacted, or used.
Panorama plate – denoting a litho plate covering the full width of a web offset press, can be two newspaper broadsheet pages or more.
Pantone – Pantone Inc’s check-standard trademark for color pre-production and color reproduction materials. Each color bears a description of its formulation (in percentages) for subsequent use by the printer.
PCM – Print Color Management
PDF – Portable Document Format. PDF stands for Portable Document Format. It was developed by Adobe Corporation to allow efficient electronic distribution of large documents. A PDF file will look the same on the screen and in print regardless of what kind of computer you are using or which software package it was created from. A large document can be compressed small enough to download quickly, and displays text and pictures as if you were looking at the original book or brochure.
Perfect Binding – Adhesive Binding. Style of unsewn binding in which the backs of gathered sections are cut off and the leaves are held together at the binding edge by glue or synthetic adhesive and (in a case binding) a suitable lining.
Personalized mailing – direct mail products that contain text or visual information from a database particularly targeting the recipient.
Photopolymer – a light-sensitive polymer or plastic used either as a coating for litho plates or as a relief printing plate in its own right for letterpress or flexo, in which case it may have the non-image areas developed away by a solution of alcohol.
Phototypesetting – the setting of typematter and sometimes other images on film or photographic paper, from a film matrix font or a digital font, as opposed to strike on and hot metal setting.
PID – Printing Ink Distillate.
Piezo-based inkjets – piezoelectric- electric polarization produced in certain crystals by the application of mechanical stress.
Pigment – the mineral, vegetable or synthetic material that gives color to an ink.
PJTF – Portable Job Ticket Format
Planning – Film assembly / stripping. The bringing together of all the elements of a foil during imposition, also the incorporation of correction film / paper.
Plate (thermal, polyester, paper, silver-halide) – Usually metal but possibly plastic and paper, image carrier used to transfer ink to paper in letterpress printing or to the blanket in litho and (rarely) in gravure.
Plate processor – automatic device for developing, washing, gumming of litho plates.
Platesetter – Digitally driven bitmap recorder or a CtP device which exposes the plate using various spectra of lasers and imaging techniques
Plotter – A device that draws pictures on paper based on commands from a computer. Plotters differ from printers in that they draw lines using a pen. As a result, they can produce continuous lines, whereas printers can only simulate lines by printing a closely spaced series of dots. Multicolor plotters use different-colored pens to draw different colors.
Plug-in – a module or piece of software which can be added to an existing system to give extra features.
Pneumatic – containing or operated by air or gas under pressure.
Positive – a photographic reproduction on film, made from a negative or on a duplicating film in which the highlights in the original are clear and the shadows are solid.
Postpress – perforating, numbering, folding, gluing, collating, stitching, gilding, binding, lamination etc.
Postscript – a computer description language that allows a programmer to create complex pages using a series of commands.
Powder spray – granules sprayed on each sheet surface to prevent set-off in press deliveries. Generally made of cornstarch. FLAMABLE!
PPF – Print Production Format
Preflighting – Preflight is the process of checking a document before it goes to film. The process makes sure that all the elements are correct and within the demanding specifications of the printing environment.
Prepress – refers to the variety of procedures through which text and graphics must pass between being generated and being ready for duplication via a printing press.
Presensitised plate – a Litho printing plate on which the coating is factory-applied, as opposed to wipe-on plates and the older plates that required careful coating before use.
Press – device for making paper, wine and printing.
Pressure-cut – traditional method of cutting and creasing dies for board.
Print characteristic curves – graphic representation of the interaction of inks, dampening solutions, substrates at various press speeds.
Print-on-demand – single copy production from a publishing database. Also described as the “run of one”. Relevant for short runs.
Process color – halftone color printing created by the color separation process whereby a piece of copy is broken
Process house – organization for scanning, color correction, color enhancement, typesetting, layout, for supplying film output and proofing. Also known as prepress or trade house.
Proofer – This is the device used to look at the image and work on it. Often this is the monitor that you are using to look at the image. Sometimes, the proofer can be a printer that you are using as a proofing device to preview what the printout from a final device will look like.
Proofing – The process of printing the plates in sequence, in color, before making a firm decision about the choice of colors for the final edition.
Raster – in most phototypesetters and VDUs the image is ‘drawn’ with each image being made up of a series of parallel (rasterized) lines that are switched on and of as they cross the image area. The alternative method used on some display terminals is for a vector to draw the outline only of each letter.
Reelstand – The unit housing a reel of paper at the feed end of a web offset press.
Register – To print two or more images so that they fit together perfectly if printed on the same side of the sheet.
Resin (phenolic, visco-elastic, hybrid hydrocarbon) – natural or synthetic complex organic substances with no sharp melting point
Resolution – in electronic imaging, the quantification of printout quality using the number of spots per inch.
Retrofit – backwards integration of advanced capability into a device or programme not originally intended for that purpose.
Reverse webturn bar – rollers or bar used for printing or applying foil to the reverse side of a web.
RGB – Red, Green, Blue – additive primary colors.
RIP – a Raster Image Processor device used in some phototypesetters and electronic page composition systems that processes the digital information passed to it relating to individual letters and images and processes them for output and in the correct position and orientation.
ROOM- RIP-Once-Output – Many to filmsetters, proofing printers, and CtP
Rotary dies – (flexible and solid) metal cutting and creasing dies used on narrow web label and carton presses.
Rotary press – a press in which the image to be printed is either a litho plate, a letterpress wrap round plate or a gravure cylinder or plate on which the image is transferred to the paper by a rotary (rather than reciprocal) motion.
Run length – number of impression to be printed
Saddle (wire) stitching – the usual way of attaching pages in brochures by cutting a continuous wire to form staples of a length appropriate to the number of pages and firing them through the fold of the spine and finally closing them on the inside.
Samba screening – (Barco) patented screening that combines stochastic screening in tonal areas with conventional in flat tint and highlight and shadow areas.
SBS – premium quality virgin fibre based Solid Bleached Sulphate board of medium density, generally very high whiteness and cleanliness of surfaces and cross-section.
Scanners – (drum, flatbed, descreening) an electronic device in which the original subject (which can be a transparency or reflection copy) is scanned by a conventional light source, a laser or some other illuminant and the results analysed so that the digital information can be conveyed to an output unit and then onto film. With suitable filtration colors can be separated and output on film or carried electronically into an electronic page composition system.
Screen printing – formerly called silk screen. Rather than print from a plate or cylinder, a stencil is prepared by hand or photographically on a screen or mesh. Ink is then forced through the screen and onto the substrate. Halftones can be reproduced, very thick ink films carried, and printing is possible on difficult surfaces such as the inside of bottles.
Server – a computer program which manages access to a centralized resource or service in a network.
Shaftless systems – (Chucks). These are inserted directly into the reel center from the machine frame that eliminates eccentric rotation of reels and have an advantage of allowing large or heavy reels to be rolled into position between the chucks, without the additional complications of shaft insertion and lifting of the reel and shaft assembly into position.
Sheet-fed rotary – a press on which the printing plate surface is fixed around a cylinder and is fed with single sheets as opposed to a webfed press.
Shore-hardness – scale of hardness, most commonly measured on the Shore Mfg Co’s ‘A’ Scale in which a hammer with a diamond point strikes the material being calibrated (such as an offset blanket and a flexographic printing plate), with a greater degree of bounce being recorded for the harder materials.
Signage (wide and ultra wide format) – public displays of large text and visual information and advertising material, can be outdoors. Wide pertains to devices 48 inches and above. Ultra wide generally denotes devices of 8 feet to 21 feet in width.
Signature – 1. The actual imposition layout denoting the position of pages in a form so that when printed on both sides and folded the pages will follow in consecutive numbering. The number of pages and sheet size determine the number of signatures required. 2. A consecutive number or letter printed at the foot of the first page of a section to enable a binder to check the correctness and completeness of a binding. The letter or number may be accompanied by a rule on the back of each section so that when they are folded and gathered these appear in a stepped pattern.
Slip ring AC motor – a ring for sliding electrical contact in a dynamo or electric motor.
Smartcard – a plastic card with a built-in micro-processor; used for electronic processes such as financial transactions and personal identification.
Soft copy / proof – the display on a VDU, which in the case of a soft proof of typematter should be WYSIWYG.
Spectrophotometer – an apparatus for measuring the intensity of light in a part of the spectrum, especially as transmitted or emitted by particular substances.
Spot color – Color that is usually specified in a document as a particular, often Pantone, color, say, for text or graphical features. This is in contrast to process color.
Spreadsheet – a computer program used chiefly for accounting , in which figures arranged in a grid can be manipulated and used in calculations.
Stochastic screening – a digital screening process that converts images into very small dots (14 to 40 microns) of equal size and variable spacing. Second order screen images have variable size dots and variable spacing. Also called Frequency Modulated (FM) screening
Strip-down maintenance – the practice of taking out rollers and even cylinders for maintenance of entire press units.
Stripping – 1. To insert a correction in film or paper during phototypesetting.
Style sheet – Collectively, a publication’s styles are called a style sheet and are listed in the Styles palette, in the Define Styles dialog box, and on the Control palette (in paragraph view). You can copy style sheets to other compatible software publications and import them from word-processing applications, so you don’t have to re-create styles each time you create a publication. Style sheets can save considerable time when you apply and revise text formatting, and they provide a consistent look to your publication.
Substrate – Any material to be printed on.
Subtractive color theory – subtractive primaries – yellow, magenta, cyan, the hues used for process color printing inks.
Tachometer – an instrument which measures the working speed of an engine, typically in revolutions per minute.
Tack – the degree of stickiness of the medium / vehicle of a printing ink or varnish.
Thermal inkjets – a computer printing device that images a heat sensitive paper.
Thread sealing – method of book binding in which the sections are stabbed with thread, the loose ends then being sealed with adhesive.
TIFF – Tagged Information File Format. These are bitmap files. They are capable of reasonable reduction and enlargement without too much loss of quality and are capable of fine editing within Photoshop or other retouching packages.
Toner – imaging material used in electrophotography and some off-press proofing systems. In inks, dye used to tone printing inks, especially black.
TQM – Total Quality Management
Transparency – in photography, illustrative copy such as a color transparency or positive film through which light must pass in order for it to be seen or reproduced.
Trapping – the ability of a film of ink to accept a subsequent layer, often a problem when printing wet on wet.
True type font – are scalable fonts and incorporate hinting- a new font specification developed with the aim of removing font-compatibility problems.
Turnaround time – the process of completing or the time needed to complete a task.
Typographer – Compositor. The individual who sets type originally by hand but now by all methods.
UV Flexo – Ultraviolet-cured inks for flexography that are 100% solid systems with no solvent component. They do not dry by evaporation like conventional flexographic inks but , when exposed to ultraviolet light , ‘cure’ to form an ink film with very good end use resistance properties.
UV Inks – These are radiation curing inks that consist of liquid prepolymers and initiators which on exposure to large doses of UV radiation release free radicals that polymerise the vehicle to a dry, solid, tough thermosetting resin.
Variable data printing – digital printing where the names, numbers, and images are changed on each impression from a database.
Vignette – effect applied to halftones that instead of being squared up or cutout have the tone etched gently away at the edges.
Vinyl-cutting – a synthetic resin or plastic based on polyvinyl chloride , used e.g. for wallpaper, emulsion paint.
Violet laser diode – energy source for exposing conventional plates digitally.
Virtual document – a document not physically existing as such but made by software to appear to do so.
WAN – Wide Area Network. A computer network in which the computers connected may be far apart, generally having a radius of more than one kilometer.
Wax thermal transfer – heat based process used for creating transfer designs for ceramics, textiles and color proofs on paper using wax based pigments supplied on one ribbon for each ink color.
Webfed – presses that are fed by paper from a reel as distinct from sheetfed machines.
Wide-format inkjet printer – devices used for signage and proofing generally above 48 inch width
Workflow, digital – First, photocomposition replaced hot type, but layout artists still pasted up pages, often using decorative tapes and markers to create illustrations. Gradually, the industry moved to creating pages in the computer; printers worked from sheets of resin-coated paper or even film generated by imagesetters. With the advent of desktop publishing programs, publishers began supplying disks to printers; however, advertising and many illustrations remained separate, often on hard copy. Today publishers can prepare fully integrated digital files containing all content (illustrations, text, and advertising) that printers can receive. the steps in the process of publication may now be controlled, tracked, and subsumed into one continuous electronic system often called digital workflow.
Workstation – a desktop computer terminal, typically networked and more powerful than a personal computer.
WYSIWYG – in electronic publishing, an acronym for What You See Is What You Get which means that the composite page viewed on the screen of workstation essentially represents what the printer will output.
Xerography – (Xerox) Proprietary name for a form of electrostatic printing. An electrophotographic copying process that uses a corona charged selenium photoconductor surface, electrostatic forces and dry or liquid toner to form an image.