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Print Technology Warehouse - Printing glossary Category: Agriculture and Industry > Printing Date & country: 15/12/2007, UK Words: 1575

CPU
Central processing unit - the microprocessor chip that is the 'brains' of a computer.

Crash finish
A variety of paper that has a surface like coarse linen.

Creasing
Machine made linear indentation in thick paper to create a hinge.

Creep
The movement of the image-area towards the fore-edge in a saddle stitched book/magazine, to a maximum at the centre spread. Can be compensated for by careful measurement of paper width (thickness) with a caliper and moving the image areas progressively throughout the document in the appropriate direction by fractions of a mm.

Crocking
Transfer or smudging of dry ink on the finished product.

Cromalin
Widely-used dry colour laminate proofing system, made by Dupont, whereby powder - instead of ink - is used to reproduce colour on a proofing sheet.

Crop Marks
Marks made on the outer edges of artwork to designate the area to be printed.

Cropping
The elimination of parts of a photograph or other original that are not required to be printed. Cropping allows the remaining parts of the image to be enlarged to fill the space.

Cross direction
The direction across the web. Papers are weaker and are affected more by changes in relative humidity in the cross direction than the grain direction.

Cross head
A heading set in the body of the text used to break it into easily readable sections.

Crossover
When a photograph, rule or piece of line art crosses over from one page of a bound job to the other.

Crush cut
A cut made by a rotary blade in contact with an anvil or base roll.

Crush score
See score.

Cure
To change the properties of an adhesive by chemical reaction or heat alone or in combination with or without pressure.

Curing
Preparing paper for the printing process by bringing it to the same temperature and humidity levels of the pressroom.

Curl
The waviness of a sheet of paper generally seen along its edges. Curling is generally the result of physical stresses or changes in humidity, and may occur at the paper mill, in the pressroom, on press, or after binding. Paper tends to curl along, rather than across, the grain of the paper. Recycled and recycled content papers have fewer tendencies…

Cursive
Used to describe typefaces that resemble written script.

Cut edge
The three edges of a book after trimming with a guillotine.

Cut flush
A method of trimming a book after the cover has been attached to the pages - also know an trimmed flush.

Cut rule
Steel rule blades designed to cut material being produced on flatbed die cutting equipment.

Cut-off
In web printing, the cut or print length corresponding to the circumference of the plate cylinder and/or die cutter: equipment.

Cut-size
Writing or business papers that are cut to a finished size of 8.5'x11', 8.5'x14', or 11'x17'. Cut-size papers, like Champion Inkjet, are usually packed in reams of 500 sheets before leaving the mill.

Cutout
A halftone where the background has been removed to produce a silhouette.

Cutter Grinder
A machine used to sharpen and tip engraving cutters.

Cutter Shank
The main body of an engraving tool.

Cutters
An all-inclusive term used to describe the rotating cutting tools used in the engraving operation. Cutters can be manufactured from high-speed steel or carbide and are available in a variety of configurations for specific applications. Typically, engraving cutters are single-flute tools, which means they have only one cutting edge.

Cutting Angle
The angle formed between the cutter's axis of rotation and its cutting edge and determines the shape of the 'V' groove produced by conical cutters.

Cutting Feed
The speed at which the cutter penetrates the material being engraved is called the 'down feed.' The speed at which the cutter moves from one point to another during engraving is called the 'lateral feed.'

Cutting Fluid (Oil)
Liquid or gaseous material used to cool or lubricate the material or the cutting tool when rotary engraving or machining some surfaces.

Cutting Speed
The speed with which a rotary spindle turns while it is engraving. The rpm of a spindle.

Cyan
Blue process colour.

Cylinder
Most rollers in the printing press are called rolls with the exception of ones on which the rubber plates are mounted, and the one which receives the impression. These are usually referred to as cylinders, i.e., plate cylinder, impression cylinder.

Cylinder Machine
A type of papermaking machine. Wire covered cylinders are rotated through a vat of pulp, and paper is formed as the water drains from the cylinder. Cylinder machines are mostly used for manufacturing paperboard. Multi-cylinder machines are capable or producing multi-layered paperboard (one layer for each cylinder). See also paperboard, papermaking.

CYMK
See CMYK

Dagger and double dagger
Symbols used mainly as reference marks for footnotes.

Dampening
The necessary process in offset lithography of wetting the printing plate to prevent ink from adhering in the non-image areas.

Dandy Roll
A wire mesh cylinder used to smooth the top of paper as it forms. Enhancing surface smoothness and formation, the dandy roll may also carry a design, which will create a water- mark, identifying the sheet.

Dash
A short horizontal rule used for punctuation, either as an em or an en dash.

DCS
Acronym for Desktop Colour Separation. Originally introduced by Quark, it splits an image into five separate files: a low-res preview plus the four process channels, CMYK. Uses - bureaus can supply a designer with the low-res image only, at about 10% the total file size, these files are imported as FPO (For Position Only) into the layout. The FPOs …

De-bossed
An indent or cut in design or lettering of a surface.

De-bossing
Pressing letters or illustrations into a sheet of paper using a metal or plastic die to create a depressed (debossed) image.

De-inking
removing ink and other finishing materials, like coatings, sizings, and adhesives from printed-paper. The complex de-inking process is what makes recycling paper difficult and ultimately adds to the cost of a recycled sheet of paper. To produce high-quality recycled or recycled content papers for printing and writing, the de-inking process needs to…

De-lamination
The separation of a material into layers in a direction approximately parallel to the surface. The partial or complete separation of the layers of a laminate.

De-staticisation
Treating plastic materials to minimize their accumulation of static electricity.

Deckle edge
The feathery edge on a sheet of paper, created as the paper machine sprays a stream of water or a jet of air across the paper as it's being formed. Deckle edges can also be created after the paper is made, using a die. This method creates a less feathery, harder-edged deckle.

Deep etching
In 'old' technology the removal of unwanted material by routing away unwanted half-tone dots, now generally refers to applying a clipping path that masks unwanted areas. Digitally, the end is the same, the means a little different.

Densitometer
A photomechanical tool used to measure density of colour density in a transparency or in printed colour.

Density
The weight of a sheet of paper as compared to its bulk. For example, a paper that weighs more than another paper but is thinner has a higher density. Compacting the fibers creates a dense paper. See also bulk, weight.

Depth Regulator Nose
A metal or plastic assembly mounted on the bottom of the spindle and used to control the depth of the cut when rotary engraving.

Descender
Any part of a lower case letter that extends below the x-height, as in the case of g, p, q y and j.

Desensitizer Chemicals
Used in plate making making non-image areas of the plate unresponsive to ink.

Desktop Publishing
A process for creating camera ready and plate ready artwork on a personal computer.

Diamond Engraving
A method of engraving metals using a non-rotating diamond tipped tool called a 'diamond graver.' As downward spindle pressure is applied, the point of the graver penetrates the surface of the material and scribes a fine line as the character is formed. This type of engraving is sometimes referred to as 'diamond drag' or 'scratch' engraving.

Diamond Graver
The tool used for diamond engraving. It consists of a steel shank with a diamond set in one end that is ground and lapped to a conical point it is a non-rotating tool that is used without a depth nose.

Diazo
Direct positive proofs made by contact exposure to film positives, can be made on paper or film.

Didot point
One Didot point = 0.0148 in, one English point = 0.013837 in.

Die
Any of various tools or devices used for imparting or cutting a desired shape, form or finish to or from a material. A device in converting machinery used for cutting only the face material of a pressure sensitive laminate or for punching out shapes from the entire laminate or any other material.

Die adaptor
A device used to modify a die station of one type of press so that it will accommodate dies originally designed to be used on different presses.

Die blades
Sharpened, thin steel blades used in flat or rotary dies. Also refers to blades on machine engraved or EDM manufactured rotary dies.

Die Cut
The line of severance between a pressure-sensitive label and its matrix or adjoining label made by the cutting edge of a die.

Die Cut Label
Pressure-sensitive labels mounted on a release liner from which the matrix has been removed.

Die cutting
Using a formed, meta-edged die to precision cut, or to cut shapes into a piece of paper. If a printing project requires a custom-made die, the total cost of the job will increase. See Laser Engraving.

Die hold-down assembly
A steel block incorporating bearing which apply pressure to the bearer surface of a rotary die cutter through pressure screws.

Die life
Mileage expected from a new die and that expected following a re-sharpening of a die.

Die lines
A hand drawn or computer-generated layout of the die cut shape or shapes on a clear or matte finish acetate or mylar.

Die Stain
Used to check die cutting accuracy. Usually done with diluted ink applied to the die cut surface of the backing or liner material. The ink wicks into any fractures of the silicone coated surface, thereby exhibiting the problem areas.

Diffusion dithering
See Stochastic screening.

Digital Imaging
The process of creating a digital output of an illustration, photographic image, computer file or other computer-generated materials. Output media can be film, paper, transparencies, vinyl and other materials.

Digital Photography
The process of recording images using a digital camera or a conventional camera with a digital adapter, it records on a disk or on microchip which can then be downloaded directly to a computer in tiff, pict or eps format.

Digital Printing
A type of printing which uses digital imaging process that transfers the image directly onto plain paper immediately, without traditional offset rollers and plates.

Digital signature
ensures that a message was actually sent by the person claiming to send it.

Dimensional Stability
A measure of paper's tendency to stretch or shrink, especially when affected by changes in moisture content from humidity, the printing process, or even the passage of time. Paper that maintains its original dimensions has a high degree of dimensional stability. See also grain, relative humidity, resilience, and runnability.

Dingbat
Ornaments used to embellish printed text.

Discrete code
A bar code or symbol in which the spaces between characters (inter-character gap) are not part of the code.

Dispenser
A device that deeds pressure sensitive labels, either manually or automatically, making them ready for application. It can serve as a package for the labels as well (dispenser boxes).

Dispensing edge
A relatively sharp edge around which a backing material is pulled in order to dispense a pressure sensitive label from that backing. Sometimes referred to as a peeler plate.

Dispersion
See de-inking

Display type
Larger type used for headings etc. Normally about 18 point or larger.

Dithering
Utilised when images are reduced from 24-bit to 8-bit colour. The dithering algorithm combines pixels of adjacent colours into a dot pattern, simulating unavailable colours. It reduces the posterisation effect that colour depth reduction can create. Photoshop offers two dithering options - the best is Diffusion Dithering.

Domain name
The unique name refers to an electronic web address, registered to the owner.

DOS
Disk Operating System (DOS in Windows environment, MacOS in Apple Macintosh environment and Linux et al): Software for computer systems with disk drives that supervises and controls the running of programs. The operating system is 'booted' into the computer from disk by a small program that permanently resides in the memory.

Dot
The smallest element of a halftone.

Dot area
Pattern of a halftone that consists of the dots and the spaces in between.

Dot Compensation
Adjusting the size of the dots in halftones or four-colour images to allow for dot gain and to ensure that the colour and detail of the image print as intended. See also dot gain, four-colour process, halftone, ink holdout, screen.

Dot gain
A printing term that describes wet ink coming in contact with paper and spreading, as it is transfers. As the halftone dots are applied to the paper, the wet ink spreads, causing the dots to increase in size and halftones to appear darker. Paper weight, type of paper (coated or uncoated), press type (especially web presses), affects the amount of d…

Dot loss
When the image on the printing plate is less, or sharper, than that shown on the proofs. (The opposite of dot gain.)

Dot matrix printer
A printer in which each character is formed from a matrix of dots. They are normally impact systems, ie a wire is fired at a ribbon in order to leave an inked dot on the page, but thermal and electro-erosion systems are also used.

Dot-for-dot reproduction
The method of producing printing film by photographing previously screened image - a maximum 10 percent enlargement or reduction can be achieved.

Double burning
Combining multiple film images onto a single film to create a single image.

Double coated
A pressure sensitive product consisting of a carrier material with similar or dissimilar adhesives applied to the two surfaces and wound with a silicone release paper.

Double density
A method of recording on floppy disks using a modified frequency modulation process that allows more data to be stored on a disk.

Double digest fold
One of four basic folds in web printing that forms a sheet into a signature.

Double page spread
Two facing pages of newspaper or magazine where the textual material on the left hand side continues across to the right hand side. Abbreviated to DPS.

Double-dot duotone
When two halftone negatives -a shadow halftone and a highlight halftone - are combined onto a single plate. An image printed from this plate carries a much wider tonal range than a normal halftone.

Double-dot halftone
The combination of two halftone negs made from one con-tone image using different screen angles for each neg combined to make one printing plate.

Doubling
An offset printing defect - refers to a second set of dots causing a colour shift in the reproduction.

Doughnut
See Hickey.

Down time
Loss of chargeable time due to machine breakdown or other factors.

Downloadable fonts
Typefaces that can be stored on a disk and then downloaded to the printer when required for printing. These are, by definition, bit-mapped fonts and, therefore, fixed in size and style.

DPI (dot per inch)
The number of dots that fit horizontally and vertically into a one- inch measure. Generally, the more dots per inch, the more detail is captured, and the sharper the resulting image. See also halftone, lines per inch, screen.