Production Terms
4/1
Stands for 4 colors on the front of a page and 1 color on the back. When 4 is used, mostly it refers to CMYK colors or "full color." The 1 means it will be a spot color, such as a Pantone color. 4/4 stands for 4 colors ("full color") on the front and back of a page. The numbers can be of any number, such as 6/3, meaning 6 different spot colors on the front and 3 on the back.
Accordian Fold
Parallel folds in a print piece, each folding in the opposite direction than the one before it so that the entire piece folds and unfolds like an accordion, but probably won't sound like one.
Bleed
Bleed is the extra area outside of a finished document that designers must allow if they want images, that are butting up to the edge of the page, to be cropped properly.
Brochure
A promotional piece of literature in any shape or size (within reason).
Business Card
A card that bears company information and contact information, including company name and logo.
Coated Paper / Coated Stock
Paper that has a finish applied to it post-printing that gives the surface a shine.
Cover Stock
A category of papers that are thicker, usually used as the cover of books and magazines since they are sturdier and more resistent to wear and tear.
Crop / Trim
To crop an image is to trim it to a size that best enhances the contents or to make it fit into the allocated space in the design.
Die cut
A specialized printing technique that involves a sharp steel rule that cuts designed shapes directly into one or many sheets of paper.
Double-page spread
A double page spread refers to a magazine design layout that spans across two pages. Usually, the design editor will arrange to spread the layout across the centre pages of the magazine, so as to ensure that the design lines up properly.
Drop Shadow
A drop-shadow is the shading effect used to give the appearance of raised type or graphics on the designed page.
Duotone
A black and white photographic image that has been given a color tint, by duplication the image onto a second color channel.
Embossing
Embossing is the creation of a raised, three dimensional area on a printed sheet. The effect can also be simulated using graphics software such as Photoshop.
Flyer / Leaflet
Usually a single sheet or handbill designed to be handed out or picked up by consumers.
Gloss Finish
A highly reflective clear finish applied to the paper of a printing process to aide in the readability of images and writing on the page. There is also a semi-gloss for half the shine and matte finish with minimal shine.
Halftone
Process used in print for Photographs, paintings, and drawings. Because most printing presses cannot produce continuous tones, images are converted to halftones to simulate continuous tones. Using fine dots of varying size and spacing, halftones can reproduce the shades and textures of the original image.
Hairline
Very thin rule or keyline. There is no agreed measurement amongst designers and printers, but somewhere between 0.125pt and 0.25pt would seem to be generally agreed measurements.
Keyline
A keyline is another term for a rule, line, or even a frame border, used in graphic design. Keylines can be set in many graphic design software applications to different widths, to be solid or dotted, or even with various patterns.
Mechanical
A camera-ready original, ready for reproduction by offset printing.
Metallic Ink
A special printing ink that has flecks of metal combined into it to simulate a gold, silver or bronze surface.
Offset
Printing method in which an image is developed on one surface and transferred (offset) onto another, and eventually onto the paper.
Paper Weight
The paper weight is determined by its thickness (how much pulp each sheet of paper contains). The higher the weight, the thicker the paper. The normal paper weights are 80#, 100# and 120#. These paper weights can be expressed as "text," which is a thinner sheet or "cover," a thicker version normally used, as its name implies, for covers because of its durability.
Perfect Bound
A method of binding that stacks the paper together and uses a plastic glue on the spine of the cover to hold all the pages in place. This results in a flat, square spine to a book.
PMS / Pantone Matching System
Pantone is the industry-standard way to ensure that colors are reproduced in a expected way. Pantone colors are custom ink colors that cannot be reproduced exactly with CMYK, sometimes referred to as spot colors.
Print Run
Also called a press run, this refers to the number of pieces to be printed in one printing session.
Printing Plate
A surface that bears the likeness of the image to be printed. This plate involves most of the cost of print runs, which is why it always saves you money per piece to go with a higher quantity.
Registration
The fitting of two or more images to be in exact alignment with each other or one another. This is very important in the printing process when more than one ink is involved. Each printing plate has a different coverage area that contributes to the overall image being printed.
Saddle Stitch
A basic binding method that involves putting all the signatures of a book together and either sewing a wire through all their centers or stapling them.
Signature
A printed sheet folded at least once, possibly multiple times in order to be bound together to be made into multiple pages of a book.
Stock
The term that is used to describe the specifics of the paper to be used for printing: The type of paper, its opacity, weight, texture, etc.
Subtractive Color / Reflective Color
Subtractive color is the process in color theory whereby color is seen as the result of light reflecting from a printed surface. Cyan, Magenta and Yellow inks are subtractive colors, as are any printed or 'solid' colors - as opposed to additive colors such as those produced by RGB computer monitors. Cyan, Magenta and Yellow are known as subtractive colors because the more of each ink that is added the darker, or less reflective, the resultant shade. In theory, the application of a 100% mixture of Cyan Magenta and Yellow inks will produce a solid black.
Spot Color
Spot color refers to a color that does not go through the CMYK process to obtain color values. Instead, each color in a document is created using that exact color, not a mixture of CMYK halftone values. Spot colors are used most often in limited color jobs where the cost of ink is too high for 4-color CMYK printing, or where a particular color (say for a logo) used must be exact.
Tabloid
A tabloid is a format normally reserved for newspapers, measuring half the size of a broadsheet.
Text stock / Text Weight
Refers to the lighter version of a type of paper, normally used for the inside pages of a book (for the "text pages"). The text stock is usually wrapped by a sturdier cover stock.
Thermography
Thermography is a printing technique that reproduces the effect of raised lettering, similar to embossing. The effect is produced using special inks and by drying the inks at the same time as applying a powdered resin. The document is then heated so that the ink and powder mixture melts and produces a raised waxy appearance.
Tip-In
Adding an additional leaf of paper or card into an already formatted printed booklet or magazine. Tip-in cards are added to commercial magazines in the magazine industry to add in advertising and promotional cards. A tip-in technique sometimes has to be done unintentionally, as the result of a mistake by either the printer, designer, or client.
Uncoated Paper
Paper that has not been coated with clay to give it a shiny, or 'coated' finish.
UV Coating
A UV varnish is a shiny coating that is applied to the printed sheet and fixed with an ultraviolet light. It can be used to cover the complete sheet of paper, or just applied to areas of the printed sheet, such as photographs.
Varnish
A matte or gloss liquid varnish, sometimes applied as a spray, to seal a printed substrate. Can be used either on the cover of a publication to finish it, or as a spot varnish on images or to seal pages that have been printed with a heavy coating of ink.
Vellum
Vellum is a textured and bulky paper stock, generally used for book covers. Vellum can also be used to refer to heavy translucent drawing paper.
