PRINTING IMAGES AND THEIR METHODS OF PRODUCTION
ABSTRACT
The invention of printing in the middle of this century represents one of the great landmarks in human history. A product of the rebirth of culture and society known as the Renaissance, printing made possible the wide dissemination of knowledge, the rapid flow of ideas from one country to another, and the popularization of learning. This discovery is credited to Johann Crutenbery a German printer, but actually his great contribution lay in assembling all the elements, that make up printing and that had been known, at least in the far east, for centuries. Generally, printing is the art and technology of reproducing words and pictures on paper, cloth or other surfaces. Although, there is considerable variation in printing plate or similar image – bearing surface to the material being printed; most all printing is done by one of five major printing methods – letterpress, offset lithography, Gravure, screen printing or collotype process. A series of inventions in the 19th century, spurred by the technological advances in all fields that marked the industrial revolution, brought about sweeping changes in the art of printing. Most of these involved radical improvements in presses, new method of paper manufacturers, plate making, phototypesetters, computers for automatic justification, electronic, scanning machines for use in colour printing and electrostatic screen printing. The choice of using a particular process in printing may be summarized into two influential points. (1) Specialized printing process that prints more perfectly than other printing methods on a specific substrate. (2) Predetermined product and the taste of both customer’s and the publisher’s among other factors. Lithography is the dominant printing processes but its growth is being challenged by Gravure. Letterpress is also expected to continue to decrease in use, as flexography replaces letterpress and even lithography in the newspaper field, and will also be used in other publishing areas such as newspaper inserts and low budget machines. Screen and other related processes are also expected to grow as inkjet and electronic printing increase in use, as well as reprography, which is the basic of quick and in-plant. Electronic and inkjet printing will continue to pose threats so traditional printing’s markets.