Glossary
Binding
This is the work required to convert printed sheets into books, magazines, catalogs, and folders. Included in the process are the steps for scoring, folding, collating, stitching, and trimming.
When planning your job, you need to decide if it will be bound and how. Talk about the bindery requirements with your service provider before beginning your document. Listed below are some common bindings and their definitions.
- Saddle stitching
- Folded into a booklet and stapled through the spine.
- Side stitching
- Stapled through stack, parallel to spine.
- Spiral binding
- Wire spiral inserted through hole-punched stack.
- Comb binding
- Plastic comb binding inserted through hole-punched stack.
- Wire comb binding
- Double loops of wire shaped into a comb and inserted through hole-punched stack.
- Perfect binding
- Hot glue is applied to the spine and the cover is pressed against it for perfect bound books.
- Tape binding
- Colored tape applied with hot glue to the side of the document.
Facing Pages
Refers to how pages in a publication appear when open. The left (or even-numbered page) faces the right (or odd-numbered page).
Fonts
These are the electronic files that contain typefaces. A single typeface is made up of the upper and lowercase letters of the alphabet, the numbers zero through nine, punctuation marks, and special characters, all in a particular style, such as Times Roman or Helvetica. If the font is scalable—and most fonts are these days—you can use your application to change its size, from tiny to big enough to see across the street.
Kerning
This is the adjusting of space between letters (particularly those that don’t fit together well like Yo or AW) to make for better looking words. Most software today automatically kerns letter pairs such as this. This kerning may not be apparent on the computer screen, but will show up when printed.
Leading
The space between lines of text is called leading because in the days when metal type was used, the space between lines was achieved by using thin strips of lead hammered to a precise thickness. The general rule for determining leading is to add 20 percent to the type size—for example, if you have 10-point text, you should have 12-point leading. It’s not unusual to add more leading, but you never want to use less because it can make type much more difficult to read.
Offset printing
The basic principle of offset printing is this simple: ink and water don’t mix. Early lithographers (printers) etched images onto flat stone. These images would accept ink, while the porous stone accepted water. When ink was applied, it stayed on the greasy image area and avoided the rest of the stone. Modern lithography uses the same concept but adds one important element. In modern presses, the image is transferred from the printing plate to a rubber blanket and then to the paper. Hence the name “offset.”
When the printing plate is exposed, an ink-receptive coating is activated at the image area. On the press, the plate is dampened, first by water rollers, then by ink rollers. Ink adheres to the image area and water to the non-image area. As the cylinders rotate, the image is transferred to the blanket. Paper passes between the blanket cylinder and the impression cylinder and the image is transferred to the paper.
The major types of offset presses are sheet-fed and web. In a sheet-fed press, cut paper is delivered into the machine. In a web press, paper comes on a large roll and is cut after printing.
Paper grades and weight
Printing is more than reproducing words and images on paper. It is the physical experience itself that printing is concerned with, As such, paper is of prime importance. Understanding paper and picking the right sheet for your job can make or break your job. Check with your service provider for advice on selecting paper.
There are five basic grades of paper: bond, offset or uncoated book, coated book, text, and cover. Within each grade there are other distinctions, based on brightness, opacity, and fiber content. For instance, there are matte, premium, and ultra gloss finishes to coated paper. Finishes like smooth/vellum, felt/embossed, laid, and linen distinguish text papers.
People also identify papers in terms of their basis weights. Since coated papers are more compressed you can’t necessarily keep the same weight when switching grades. For instance you may go from a 60# uncoated to a 70# coated sheet to keep the same thickness. That’s why papers are usually referred to by weight and grade. Laser printers cannot print on paper that is too heavy (maximum 53#).
Basis weight is the weight of 500 sheets of paper cut to a standard size. So, 500 sheets of 25 x 39, 60# offset weigh 60 pounds. The standard size for bond is 17 x 22; for text, offset, and coated 25 x 38; and for cover 20 x 26. That’s why two similar sheets of different grades may have very different basis weights, for in-stance, 24# bond and 50# offset. Different grades cover different ranges of weight.
| Paper | Use | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| Bond | Usually reserved for letter-heads, business forms, and quick printing jobs | 20# for copying and 24# for stationery |
| Offset or uncoated book | Probably the most common sheet for offset printing, offering a smooth, uncoated look | Usually a 60# or 70# stock |
| Coated book | A glossy sheet that yields vivid colors and excellent reproduction | Generally goes from 30# to 70# for web, 60# to 110# for sheet-fed |
| Text | A high-quality sheet with a lot of texture; it gives soft, gentle colors and a look of class | Ranges in weight from 60# to 100#, but the most com-mon weights are 70# or 80# |
| Cover | Used for book covers, post-cards, business cards; it is available as a coated or un-coated sheet | Comes in 60#, 65#, 80# or 100# weights |
Points and Picas
Printers use this for measuring. There are 12 points in one pica, six picas in one inch, 72 points in one inch.
Resolution
This term is often used in conjunction with photographs and computer screens. It refers to the number of dots (or pixels) per inch. The larger the number, the better the resolution, which translates into a better looking photograph. Of course, this also means a larger file size. Computer screens are generally 72 dpi (dots per inch) so photographs used for screen presentations need only be 72 dpi. How-ever, depending on the printer, printed material requires a much greater resolution, 150 dpi being the minimum for laser printers and 300 dpi for offset printing.
Rivers
Obvious vertical lines of white space running through a document.
Scanning
When scanning items, scan them at the size they will appear in the document. Resizing after you place the photo in the document can affect the resolution.
| To scan for: | Use this resolution: |
|---|---|
| PowerPoint or Web | 72 to 150 dpi |
| Laser Printer | 150 to 200 dpi |
| High quality offset printing | 300 dpi or higher |
Serif and sans serif
From the Dutch schreef (fine line in writing), serifs are the little vertical and horizontal lines at the end of letter strokes. Sans is French for “without” and indicates a typeface doesn’t have these lines.
Tumble
In printing this means setting up a job so that it prints on one side, then turns over top to bottom and prints on the other side. The top of page two is printed at the bottom of page one.
Widow and Orphan
A widow is the first line of a paragraph alone at the bottom of a column. An orphan is a single line (or last line of a paragraph) at the top of a column.
Work and turn
In printing the sheet is flipped from side to side so that you read it like a book.