GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND DEFINITIONS

Bleed - An extra amount of printed image that extends beyond the trim edge of a page.

BMP - Bitmap - A generic term for any image which has been scanned into a grid of pixels.

CD-ROM - A laser-encoded, optical storage disk.

CMYK - The use of cyan, magenta, yellow and black dots to simulate a wide variety of colours.

Collecting or Collect for Output - The process of gathering all elements of a digital printing job (i.e. fonts, images, application files, etc.).

Continuous Tone - Photographic images which contain varying shades of colour or black and white.

CRA (Camera-Ready Art) - Any artwork or type that is ready to be submitted for conventional prepress and printing.

CTP (Computer-to-Plate) - A computerized system which eliminates the need for traditional film-to-plate exposures.

DCS (Desktop Colour Separation) - A five-file EPS file format consisting of four high-resolution colour separations and a fifth position-only file for placement within documents.

EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) - A standard format for saving an image as a mathematical definition which allows it to be moved from one program or platform to another. The EPS format is normally used for vector images.
Folio - Page number.

Fonts - A set of letters, numbers, punctuation marks and symbols that share a unified design. The design is called a typeface, a group of related typefaces is called a type family.

FPO (For Position Only) - A low resolution image placed in an electronic document which will be later replaced with a high resolution image.

GIF (Graphic Interchange Format) - An image file format appropriate for on-screen viewing and use on the World Wide Web. This is not an appropriate file format for printing.

Hairline Rule - Rules that print at the lowest possible resolution of the output device. When preparing files, you should use a predetermined Hairline Rule (i.e. 0.25 pt.) or the output device may produce a line that is unprintable.

Halftone - A continuous tone image broken down into a series of dots, which are printable in offset lithography processes.

HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) - The coding language used to create documents for use on the World Wide Web.

Imagesetter - A high resolution printer used to prepare high quality page art on film or paper, usually at resolutions between 1200 and 5000 dots per inch.

Imposition - The positioning of pages so that when the printed page is folded, trimmed and collated, all pages will be in proper sequential order.

Jaz - A storage medium which comes in 1 or 2 GB capacities.

JPG or JPEG (Joint Photographic Expert Group) - An image file format appropriate for on-screen viewing and use on the World Wide Web. This is not an appropriate file format for printing.

Kerning - The adjustment of space between character pairs.

Leading - The space measured from the baseline of one line of text to the next baseline below.

Media - A type of disk used for storage or portability of files (i.e. floppy disk, CD-ROM or Zip disk).

Metafile - An image file that can contain both vector and bitmap information.

PDF (Portable Document Format) - A locked file format developed by Adobe for transferring files across multiple platforms, regardless of the platform and application used to create it.

Platform - Type of computer operating system (i.e. Macintosh, PC (Windows) or UNIX).

PMS (PANTONE Matching System) - A commonly-used system for specifying ink colours.

PostScript Files - A robust general purpose page description language that has become the defacto standard in the prepress industry. Used in most imagesetters and many laser printers.

Preflight - The process of analyzing a digital file for print production.

Printer Font - A font that is used to drive the printer or output device.

Registration Marks - Reference symbols placed on composed pages to align overlaying plates and mark trims and folds.

Resolution - The quality of image printouts based on the quantity of dots per inch.

RGB (Red, Green, Blue) - The additive primary colours used to create images on a computer monitor.

RIP (Raster Image Processor) - Part of an output device that rasterizes information so that it may be imaged onto film or paper.

Screen Fonts - Fonts that are used only for display.

TIFF (Tag Image File Format) - A file format for exchanging bitmapped images (usually scans) between applications.

Trapping - A prepress technique which allows for slight variation in registration during the press run. A trap is created by overlapping adjacent colours in the type and linework.

Trim Marks - Marks placed on the copy to indicate the end of the page.

Vector Files - An image file containing mathematical descriptions for drawing objects.

WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) - What appears on the screen will generally be the same as hardcopy output.

Zip - A storage medium which holds 100 MB or 250 MB of data.

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