Editing Phototypesetting (section)

{{Short description|Photographical analog method for text composition}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2015}}
{{History of printing}}

'''Phototypesetting''' is a method of [[Typesetting|setting type]] which uses [[photograph]]y to make columns of [[Sort (typesetting)|type]] on a scroll of [[photographic paper]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/phototypesetting|title = Definition of PHOTOTYPESETTING}}</ref><ref name="Monotype and Phototypesetting">{{cite journal|last1=Boag|first1=Andrew|title=Monotype and Phototypesetting|journal=Journal of the Printing History Society|date=2000|pages=57–77|url=http://www.letterpress.ch/APINET/IMMPDF/MONOPHOTO/PHS_journal.pdf|access-date=22 July 2016|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160328052034/http://www.letterpress.ch/APINET/IMMPDF/MONOPHOTO/PHS_journal.pdf|archive-date=28 March 2016|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
It has been made obsolete by the popularity of the [[personal computer]] and [[desktop publishing]] which gave rise to [[digital typesetting]].

The first phototypesetters quickly project [[light]] through a [[film negative]] of an individual character in a [[font]], then through a lens that magnifies or reduces the size of the character onto [[photographic paper]] or film, which is collected on a spool in a light-proof canister. The paper or film is then fed into a processor, a machine that pulls the paper or film strip through two or three baths of chemicals, from which it emerges ready for [[paste-up]] or film make-up. Later phototypesetting machines used other methods, such as displaying a digitised character on a CRT screen. The results of this process are then transferred onto printing plates which are used in [[offset printing]].

Phototypesetting offered numerous advantages over the metal type used in [[letterpress printing]], including the lack of need to keep heavy metal type and matrices in stock, the ability to use a much wider range of fonts and graphics and to print them at any desired size, and faster page layout setting.