Ed #12 Standards

Sheet size, basis weight, caliper and brightness are just a few of the numbers encountered in printing. Others include the points and picas used in typesetting.

In typesetting, points (pts.) are used to measure the height of type and the vertical distance, or leading, between lines of type. There are 72 pts. to the inch, which means that standard 8 pt. type is 1/9th of an inch tall.

Although they are sometimes measured in inches or millimeters, the length of lines of type, column widths and margins are traditionally measured in picas. There are 12 pts. in a pica (and approximately six picas to the inch). So if you want to know how much vertical space a 48 pt. headline occupies, all you need to do is divide 48 by 12 to arrive at four picas of vertical space.

Just as designers and printers need standard references for type, they also need standard references for color. That’s where the Pantone Matching System®, the Toyo Ink System and other color matching systems come in.

In the same way that preschoolers mix yellow and blue finger paint to create green, color matching systems typically use a limited number of basic colors to create hundreds of solid, or spot colors, each identified by a number. Swatchbooks show small samples of each color on coated and uncoated papers, typically in both matte or gloss finishes, along with the formula used to create the color. Printers typically order the color by its number or mix it themselves according to the formula found in a guide. By using these standards, designers, printers and others can specify, match and reproduce colors, regardless of the specific equipment used to reproduce them. You could call printers around the world and ask for Pantone 200, for example and in theory at least, the reds they produce would all be identical.