Monday 27 June 2011

Printing Methods: Introduction to Printing

Type and Materials

The tools used by a compositor have been much the same for generations: indeed they do not differ in essentials from the equipment used more than five hundred years ago by Gutenberg who is thought to be the first printer to have worked with movable type.

Type is cast from a master letter which has been cut on the end of a piece of steel. The steel punch is driven into a piece of copper called a matrix: molten metal is pressed against the matrix reproducing exactly the shape of the letter which was originally cut on the steel punch.

This is the basic principle of making type letters whether they are cast by hand or produced by a casting machine.
The metal used is a mixture of lead, Tin and antimony and is fairly hard; but it can be melted at reasonably low temperatures. This is necessary requirement as type metal cast on a machine is eventually put back into the 'pot' and re-melted after it has been used and cast into ingot form to be used again. The printing surface is known as the face and letters are cast on a body or shank:
the height to paper from the face to the foot of the shank is 0.918 of an inch.

When a printing office is set up, whether it be in an attic or on a more extensive scale,
the first step taken must be to secure some founts of type.

The book under review is "Introduction To Printing" by Herbert Simon. This easy to read book provides lots of information for newbie printers.

Quote Of The Day:
Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.
Rabindranath Tagore

1 comment:

Printing is an art more than a knowledge. Printing is a practical work. A knowledge can be learned from good books or good teacher delivers it in a most convenient manner, but an art especially printing can be best learned in practice.