Accordion Fold
Two or more parallel folds that alternate direction, allowing the piece to open and close like an accordion.
Print Knowledge · Made Useful
Printing Terms
Made Clear.
Plain-language explanations of the words you may hear while planning, designing, printing, binding, and finishing a project.
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A
Against the Grain
Folding or feeding paper at a right angle to its fiber direction. This can make folding harder and may cause cracking on heavier stocks.
B
Bitmap
A digital image built from a grid of individual pixels. Its quality depends on the number of pixels available at the final printed size.
Black and White (B/W)
Artwork or printing produced without full color, typically using black ink or shades of gray.
Bleed
Artwork that extends beyond the final trim edge, commonly by 0.125 inch, so color or images reach the edge after cutting.
Brightness
A measurement of how much blue light a paper reflects. Brighter papers often make colors appear cleaner and more vivid.
Brochure
A printed marketing or informational piece, often folded or bound, used to explain a product, service, organization, or destination.
C
Caliper
The physical thickness of paper or board, usually measured in thousandths of an inch, also called points or mils.
Case
The rigid outer cover of a case-bound or hardcover book.
CMYK
Cyan, magenta, yellow, and black: the four process inks used together to reproduce full-color images in commercial printing.
Coated One Side / Two Sides (C1S / C2S)
Paper or board with a coated printing surface on one side or on both sides.
Coated Paper
Paper treated for a smoother, less absorbent surface. Coatings can improve detail, color density, and finish consistency.
Collate
To gather sheets or sections in the correct sequence before binding, inserting, or packaging.
Contrast
The visible difference between light and dark tones, colors, or neighboring design elements.
Copy
The written content or supplied material intended to appear in a printed piece.
Cover Paper
A heavier paper category commonly used for covers, postcards, folders, cards, and other pieces that need more rigidity.
Crop
To remove unwanted portions of an image or artwork, either during design or at final trimming.
D
Die
A custom metal tool used to cut, score, perforate, emboss, deboss, or shape printed material.
Digital Color Proof
A color proof produced directly from digital artwork to preview content, color, and layout before production.
Digital Printing
A plateless printing process that images each sheet from digital data. It is well suited to shorter runs, fast turns, and variable content.
Dots Per Inch (DPI)
A measure of output resolution describing how many printed dots a device can place within one inch.
Duotone
An image reproduced with two ink colors to increase tonal range or create a distinctive visual effect.
E
Electronic Printing
A broad term for technologies that reproduce pages from digital data without traditional film and plate preparation.
Embossing
Pressing paper between dies to create a raised design. A recessed design is called debossing.
EPS (Encapsulated PostScript)
A legacy graphics file format often used for vector logos and illustrations. PDF is now preferred for many print workflows.
F
Flush Left / Flush Right
Text aligned evenly along the left or right margin while the opposite edge remains uneven.
Foil Stamping
Applying metallic, pigmented, or specialty foil to a surface using heat, pressure, and a die.
Folio
A page number, or the placement of page numbers within a publication.
Font
A specific style and weight within a typeface family, including its letters, numbers, punctuation, and symbols.
Format
The overall physical and production specifications of a piece, including size, orientation, page arrangement, and finishing.
G
Gamma
A setting that influences how midtones appear on a monitor or in a digital image.
Gloss Finish
A smooth, reflective surface that can increase color saturation and image contrast.
Grain
The predominant direction of fibers in a sheet of paper. Grain direction affects folding, binding, feeding, and curl.
Grayscale
An image made from shades of gray ranging from white to solid black, without color information.
Gutter
The inside margin between facing pages or the space near a binding edge where content can become difficult to see.
H
Halftone
A pattern of dots that simulates continuous tones, allowing photographs and shading to be reproduced with ink.
Hard Proof
A physical proof printed on paper or another substrate, as opposed to a PDF viewed on a screen.
I
Imposition
Arranging pages on a press sheet so they appear in the correct order after printing, folding, binding, and trimming.
Insert
A separate printed piece placed inside another publication, package, envelope, or kit.
J
JPEG / JPG
A compressed raster image format commonly used for photographs. Repeated saving can reduce image quality.
L
Lamination
Bonding a clear plastic film to a printed sheet for protection, durability, texture, or appearance.
Layout
The planned arrangement of text, images, margins, and other elements on a page.
M
Make-ready
The setup work required before a production run, such as loading materials, adjusting equipment, and bringing color into specification.
Mask
A shape or selection used to hide, protect, or isolate part of an image or printing area.
Matte Finish
A low-sheen surface that reduces glare and creates a softer, more subdued appearance.
Mechanical Binding
A binding method that uses wire, plastic coil, combs, rings, or similar components inserted through punched holes.
O
Offset Printing
A process that transfers ink from a plate to a rubber blanket and then to paper. It is efficient for larger quantities and color-critical work.
Opacity
A paper’s ability to prevent printing or images on the opposite side from showing through.
Overprinting
Printing one color or object directly over another instead of knocking out the area beneath it.
Overages
Copies produced beyond the ordered quantity to account for setup, finishing, quality control, or production variation.
P
Pagination
The numbering, organization, and sequence of pages in a document or publication.
PDF (Portable Document Format)
A widely used file format that preserves page layout, fonts, images, and graphics across different systems. A properly prepared PDF is the preferred format for most print jobs.
Perfect Binding
A binding method that secures pages to a wraparound cover with adhesive, creating a clean square spine.
Pica
A typographic unit equal to 12 points, or approximately one-sixth of an inch.
Pixel
The smallest individual picture element in a raster image or digital display.
PMS (Pantone Matching System)
A standardized system for identifying premixed spot colors so brand and specialty colors can be specified consistently.
PostScript
A page-description language developed by Adobe that helped establish modern digital prepress and desktop publishing workflows.
PPI (Pages Per Inch)
A paper-industry measurement indicating how many pages make up one inch of a bound publication; it helps estimate spine width.
Preflight
A technical review of supplied artwork for page size, bleed, fonts, image resolution, color setup, and other production requirements.
Press Proof
A proof produced on the intended printing press and materials before the full run, generally used for demanding color or production requirements.
Print Quality
The overall visual result of a printed piece, including color, sharpness, consistency, registration, solids, and finishing.
Process Color
Full-color reproduction created by combining cyan, magenta, yellow, and black inks in varying percentages.
Q
Quality Control
The checks and procedures used throughout production to confirm that materials, color, content, finishing, and quantity meet specifications.
R
Raster Image Processor (RIP)
Software or hardware that converts page data into the dot pattern a printing device uses to produce the image.
Ream
A package or counting unit of 500 sheets of paper.
Register
The precise alignment of colors, images, folds, cuts, or other production elements.
Registration Marks
Targets printed outside the finished area to help align colors, plates, cuts, and other production steps.
Resolution
The amount of detail in a digital image or output device. For most print images, about 300 PPI at final size is a practical target.
RGB
Red, green, and blue light used by screens, cameras, and scanners. RGB artwork is normally converted or managed for CMYK printing.
S
Saddle Stitch
A binding method that staples folded sheets through the center fold, commonly used for booklets, programs, and magazines.
Scaling
Reducing or enlarging artwork to fit a desired size. Enlarging raster images also lowers their effective resolution.
Score
A compressed channel placed in paper or cover stock to guide a cleaner, more accurate fold.
Signature
A press sheet printed with multiple pages and folded into a section for binding in the correct page sequence.
Spine
The bound edge of a book or publication that connects the front and back covers.
Soft Proof
A digital proof viewed on a calibrated monitor, usually as a PDF, for reviewing content, layout, and approximate color.
Spot Dull Finish
A low-gloss coating applied selectively to contrast with glossier areas and draw attention to specific design elements.
Stock
The paper, board, plastic, or other material selected as the surface for printing.
Stock Photography
Pre-existing licensed photography available for use in design and marketing instead of commissioning a custom shoot.
Substrate
Any material that receives printing, coating, or decoration, including paper, board, plastic, fabric, film, and metal.
T
TIFF (Tagged Image File Format)
A high-quality raster image format often used for photographs, scans, and flattened production artwork.
Text Stock
A flexible paper category commonly used for interior pages, brochures, flyers, catalogs, and booklets.
Trapping
A small overlap between neighboring colors that helps prevent unwanted white gaps caused by normal registration variation.
Trim Marks
Fine lines outside the finished area that indicate where a printed sheet should be cut to its final size.
W
With the Grain
Folding or binding parallel to the paper’s fiber direction, which usually produces a smoother fold and a more flexible finished piece.
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