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Letterpress Printing And Machines
Old School Letterpress Machine
Letterpress printing was invented by Johannes Gutenberg in the mid-15th century. It was the common form of printing text until the 19th century. Letterpress printing is basically a relief printing of image and text using a press with a “type-high bed” printing press and movable type, in which a reversed, raised surface is inked and then pushed into a sheet of paper in order to obtain a positive reading image. This type of printing was widely used for printing books even in the second half of the 20th century. Photo-etched zinc “cuts” (plates), linoleum blocks, wood engravings are the inked printmaking blocks, which have a direct impressions on the letterpress.
21st century has seen the use of ‘water-wash’ photopolymer plates, which are stuck to a near-type-high base to produce a relief printing surface usually from digital –rendered art and typography.
Card Printed With Letterpress Machine
The original mode of mass communication is letterpress printing, which has given birth to widely produced and distributed newspapers. This type of printing has allowed millions of people to share the information in a single day. Letterpress has seen many advancements as well as innovations, due to industrialization. Today in this day and age, letterpress as a tool enjoys a very unique niche in big-business media houses as well as fine-arts independent organizations.
Tracing The History Of The Machine
Applying Color After Pressing
The roots of the letterpress are as old as the seventh-century China. Wooden blocks were used initially to reproduce the written characters on cloth. Johannes Gutenberg in the 15th century recommended having an updated form of the letterpress having moving type sets. This has been considered one of the most important developments in the modern times. It strengthened the language, allowed mass media communication and gave way to global information network. With the start of mechanization, the letterpress helped in the launch of the newspapers in the most powerful media forms of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Different Styles Of Letterpress Machine
There are basically three kinds of letterpress printing machines: the rotary letterpress, the platen-type letterpress and the flatbed cylinder-printing machine.
1. Rotary Letter Press
DIY Letterpress Machine
Rotary letterpress machines are used for their ability of efficiently and effectively producing high quality material. Letterpress printing is chiefly employed to produce commercial and special printing like newspaper and magazine production. Rotary letterpress has two broad features: sheet-fed rotary letterpress, the use of which is declining and the web-fed rotary letterpress is being used for the production of newspapers. Web-fed rotary is higher in speed and gives more output than the sheet fed rotary press.
2. Flat-bed Cylinder Press
The rudimentary design leads to low output. The flat-bed cylinder press operates slowly with respect to the other models. This type of letterpress utilizes horizontal or vertical bed to which the plate is then locked into. This plate acts as a surface on which the ink passes over and it also contains the documents that are to be copied. Flat-bed has now been replaced with modern technologies of web-fed machines, which enable fast printing.
3. Platen-Type Press
Letterpress Greeting Cards
Platen-type letterpress machines are mostly used for short-run projects like place cards and stationary production. This machine is made up of two parts: the bed and the platen. Paper is placed on platen as well as on the bed with the press closing and opening onto a surface that is flat, where type set and ink is located. These presses are quite old, majority of them being built in the 17th century. This style of letterpress has the “clam-shell” like design that many newspapers and journals will publish.
