Printing and Graphic Design Terms-Andrew Steinberg

Cover

Printing
and
Graphic
Design
Te r ms

Andrew Steinberg



Table of Contents:
Kerning......................................................................3
Leading......................................................................4
CMYK.......................................................................5
RGB...........................................................................6
Raster Image.............................................................7
Glossary...............................................................8-15

Kerning

Kerning is a typography
process by which the space
between the characters
of text are squeezed or
stretched.

To kern something -10
would shrink the space be-
tween each letter.
Conversely, kerning some-
thing +10 would create

Leading

Leading is similar to kerning
but in the opposite direction.
Leading doesn’t effect the
space between letters but in-
stead controls the spacing be-
tween lines of text.

Word word word.

Word word word.
Word word word.

So to lead something -10
would bring each line of text
closer to the lines above and
below it. Leading +10 would
space the lines further apart.

CMYK

“Cyan Magenta Yellow Black.” These are the four basic col-
ors used for printing color images.

Unlike RGB (red, green, blue), which is used for
creating images on your computer screen, CMYK colors are
“subtractive.” This means the colors get darker as you blend

RGB

“Red Green The RGB color model is an “additive”
Blue.” RGB refers model. When 100% of each color is
to three hues of mixed together, it creates white light.
light that can be When 0% of each color is combined,
mixed together no light is generated, creating black.
to create different
colors. Combin-
ing red, green,
and blue light
is the standard
method of pro-
ducing color im-
ages on screens,
such as TVs,
computer moni-
tors, and smart-
phone screens.

Raster Image

Most images you see on your computer screen are raster
images. Pictures found on the Web and photos you import
from your digital camera are raster images. They are made
up of grid of pixels, commonly referred to as a bitmap.
The larger the image, the more disk space the image file
will take up. For example, a 640 x 480 image requires infor-
mation to be stored for 307,200 pixels, while a 3072 x 2048
image (from a 6.3 Megapixel digital camera) needs to store
information for a 6,291,456 pixels.

Glossary:

Alignment

Alignment is the way that the different elements in a design are arranged, usually in
relation to a page or document. In typography, alignment, which can also be called range, is
the setting of text relative to a column, tab or page.

Alley

Ascender

Ascenders refer to the parts of lower case letters that extend above the x-height of a
typeface. If you look back at that first sentence, you’ll see loads of them—and that one too. In
a majority of typefaces, the lowercase letters b, d, f, h, k and l are ascenders. Careful though,
the letter t is not an ascender. In certain fonts, such as Garamond, the ascenders rise above
the cap height.

Baseline

In typography, the baseline is the invisible line that text sits on—think of it as the
floor, but for text. It’s also the place that x-height and other important parts of a font are
measured from.

Glossary:

Bleed

That little bit extra—the bleed is a printing term that refers to the edge of the sheet
that will be trimmed off. In design terms, the bleed is the artwork or background colour that
extends in to this area, in case the cut made to the design or sheet isn’t exact. It’s a way of
ensuring that none of the design gets accidentally cut off or there’s no unexpected borders.

CMYK

“Cyan Magenta Yellow Black.” These are the four basic colors used for printing color
images. Unlike RGB (red, green, blue), which is used for creating images on your computer
screen, CMYK colors are “subtractive.” This means the colors get darker as you blend them
together.

Concept
The mechanism through which an audience understands a communication.
Creep

Creep, alternatively known as shingling, is the inside margin of a book, magazine
or other publication. With some bindings, the creep often has to be made larger so that no
content is covered when it is being read.

CSS

Cascading Style Sheets are used to define the look and feel of a web site outside of the
actual HTML file(s) of the site.

Glossary:

Descender

Descenders are the opposite of ascenders, they’re the tail of letters—the part of the
letter that descends below the baseline. Generally, only the lowercase letters g, j, q, p and y
are descenders. Though, in some fonts, the lowercase f, capital Q and J and certain numbers
are also descenders. Both ascenders and descenders increase the recognisability of words to
the extent that British road signs stopped using all capital letters and instead opted for their
specialised font.

Die cut

Die-Cutting is a process of creating sharp metal rules to cut shapes out of paper.

Dummy

Printers and designers use them to help see how a print project will look when it is
complete. A dummy is a print prototype.

Grid

Grids are an underlying system of horizontal and vertical columns and guides used to
provide structure, consistency, accuracy in any design.

Gutter

The inside margins closest to the spine of a book or the blank space between two
facing pages in the center of a newsletter or magazine is known as the gutter.

Hex Code

A hex code is a six digit code used to represent a colour.

Glossary:

HTML5

HTML5 is a markup language used for structuring and presenting content on the
World Wide Web.

Kerning

Kerning is a typography process by which the space between the characters of text are
squeezed or stretched. To kern something -10 would shrink the space between each letter.
Conversely, kerning something +10 would create more space between each letter.

Knockout

The process of removing one color ink from below another to create a clearer image
or text.

Leading

Leading is similar to kerning but in the opposite direction. Leading doesn’t effect the
space between letters but instead controls the spacing between lines of text. So to lead some-
thing -10 would bring each line of text closer to the lines above and below it. Leading +10
would space the lines further apart.

Ligature

A ligature occurs where two or more letters are joined together as one character.

Glossary:

Margins

The margin helps to define where a line of text begins and ends.

Offset Printing

Offset printing, also called offset lithography, or litho-offset, in commercial printing,
widely used printing technique in which the inked image on a printing plate is printed on a
rubber cylinder and then transferred (i.e., offset) to paper or other material.

Orphan

Orphan is a single word, part of a word or very short line, except it appears at the
beginning of a column or a page.

Pantone Color (pms)

Pantone colors are color codes that stand for a specific shade.

Presentation

An array of ideas, stories, words, and images into a set of slides that are arranged to
tell a story and persuade an audience.

Glossary:

Raster image

Most images you see on your computer screen are raster images. Pictures found on
the Web and photos you import from your digital camera are raster images. They are made
up of grid of pixels, commonly referred to as a bitmap. The larger the image, the more disk
space the image file will take up. For example, a 640 x 480 image requires information to be
stored for 307,200 pixels, while a 3072 x 2048 image (from a 6.3 Megapixel digital camera)
needs to store information for a 6,291,456 pixels.

Resolution

Resolution refers to the detail of the image.

RGB

“Red Green Blue.” RGB refers to three hues of light that can be mixed together to
create different colors. Combining red, green, and blue light is the standard method of pro-
ducing color images on screens, such as TVs, computer monitors, and smartphone screens.
The RGB color model is an “additive” model. When 100% of each color is mixed together, it
creates white light. When 0% of each color is combined, no light is generated, creating black.

River

In typography, rivers (or rivers of white) are gaps in typesetting which appear to run
through a paragraph of text due to a coincidental alignment of spaces.

Glossary:

Slug

The slug is an optional space that a designer can add to a document that can be disp-
lyed but is not intended to be printed.

Spot Color

Refers to a method of specifying and printing colors in which each color is printed
with its own ink.

Spot Varnish

Spot varnish is a great way to maximize the contrast between matte and gloss surfac-
es. It allows you to apply varnish to a certain image or graphic on your printed piece, such as
a logo or photo, while leaving the rest of the piece unvarnished.

Trap

Trapping is a method of adjusting areas where two distinct, adjacent colors meet so
that press misregistration won’t cause white spaces.

Vector Image

Vector graphics are computer graphics images that are defined in terms of points on a
Cartesian plane, which are connected by lines and curves to form polygons and other shapes.

Glossary:

Widow

A widow is a very short line – usually one word, or the end of a hyphenated word – at
the end of a paragraph or column.

X-height

In typography, the x-height, or corpus size, is the distance between the baseline and
the mean line of lower-case letters in a typeface.