PRINTING WITHOUT TYPE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXXXIII, Issue 40, 23 February 1901, Page 4

PRINTING WITHOUT TYPE.

Pbogriss in the printing trade io the la9t few yenrs of tho nin'tsenth century was marvellous The procaa of the production of a newspaper was revolutionised. The linebypf, which ia still comparatively new in thiß colony—so ran oh so that there are bearly a dozsn offieta where the machine is to be found—ii on'v one of severil type sitting machines fiat have bem instrumental in dl pacing hand composition. It ia, however, that which i 3 most f.ivoarcd, the monotype, Bat'prslpy, Enpirel etc.. being ptnployei to a much smaller sxtont. Two now machines, the typogrsph and the monolinp, which aro barred oot of the United States by r ason of the infringempnt of the Merganthaler p*teit3 issued to the inventor of the linotype, are largely used in Canada, and in is worthy of mention that the jury of the Paris Exhibition. in making it-i decision on the merits of all i-bnnx-hibit-d machines, declared in fivour of the monolinp, the points taken into consideration being design, material, construction method of operation, and range of aduptab'lity. Bnt now the di>p'ac o mPn' of all theie "mechanical compositors" ig threatened The books of the near fnturp, it is predicted, will b> made by photography, and t is net improbable that even newspaper! wiil be issued by methods in which the camer.i and d r y plate will take the place of the font of metal letters and the stereotype from a newspaper matrix The.originator of the idea, it is explained in an article in an Ameri- ( on trade journal, proposes to apply to the reproduction of letterpress a process noi very different from that already used in the multiplication of pictures. "The publisher of the fntur?. instead of having many fonts of hesvy and costly type, will be proviipd simply with a set of square white cirds, on each cf which is a large block letter, au inch or more in height. ') hese cards will be placed is a series ■nf horizontal lines on a raek made for .tho purpogp, following copy, so that the !ptt?rs will read jost like those of the that Is to be reproduced. A c»m a r« phced front will photopraph tlte letters, its di-tince from them dele'raiaing tike size of the text as i 4 is cvtntaally tj appear. The negative thus made will be developed in the usoal inmner. It only remains to etch th? plate and print from it, just i"9 a pic u-e simiiariy prepared is friuied nowadays." A machine has, io is said, al;eidy been'construct*d which, fa king the place of the linotype of ta-clny, sets up the cards in t ie rack according to copy, and photographs 'hem o*;o line at a time, tbi g!*gi 8?n-it vo p'ate moving automatically at such « rate as to take the matter lire by ">iip. until ii ii fiiled. Then, of it 13 removed and developid in a dn.rk rrom, whenupjn it ii ready to transfer iis iaiprint to the metal p!aw>, wbioh is du ! y < The process is so expeditiously performed that within 30 mioutes from t : n; fl's* exposure of the negative th" zit:c pktfl is rotdy to go to press. A fresh revolution in the printing trale may thus bn one of the marvels whi h the twentifth century has in store for au. "We stard betweeu two centuries. and tl);r9 are wonders to'h w/iye-"-Otago Daily Times. \