Label Printing and Printers Glossary
The wholesale label printing glossary resource for all of your questions.
A - D E - H I - L M - P Q - T U - Z All
Abrasiveness: The tendency of a paper, coating or ink to abrade or wear away die edges, slitting blades, printing type, etc., by friction.
Abrasion Resistance: The degree to which a label surface - including printing and protective coatings - is able to resist rubbing or wearing away by friction.
Accelerated Aging: Test procedures for subjecting P.S. label stock to special environmental conditions in order to predict the course of natural aging in a far shorter period of time.
Accordion Fold: Bindery term, two or more parallel folds which open like an accordion.
Acetate: A plastic synthesized from cellulose dissolved in acetic acid which exhibits rigidity, dimensional stability and ink receptivity. Transparent or matte films, sometimes used for label stocks.
Acrylic: A general chemical term of a particular family of thermoplastic resins based on acrylic acid and its derivatives.
Acrylic Adhesive: Pressure-sensitive adhesive based on high-strength, acrylic polymers. Can be coated as a solvent or emulsion system.
Acrylic Emulsion: A water-based latex make with acrylic polymers, used in coatings and adhesives.
Adhesion: A measurement of the force required to remove a label from a substance.
Adhesive: A substance capable of holding materials together by surface attachment.
Adhesive Cold Temperature: An adhesive that will enable a P.S. label to adhere when applied to refrigerated or frozen substrates...generally +35 F or colder.
Adhesive High Temperature: An adhesive that will enable a P.S. label to withstand sustained elevated temperature (+200 F or higher).
Adhesive Pressure Sensitive: A type of adhesive which in a dry form is aggressively tacky at room temperature. It has the capability of promoting a bond to dissimilar surfaces on contact, with pressure.
Adhesive Removable: An adhesive characterized by relatively high cohesive strength and low ultimate adhesion. It can be removed easily from most surfaces. Some adhesive transfer could take place depending on the affinity of the adhesive to the surface.
Adhesive Strike-Through: When adhesive penetrates through the face material of a pressure-sensitive lamination.
Adhesive Residue: The adhesive remaining behind on a substrate when a P.S. label is removed.
Adhesive Splitting: Condition where part of the adhesive remains on the face stock and part on the substrate when the label is put under stress or removed.
AGA: American Gas Association
Against The Grain: At right angles to direction of paper grain.
Alteration: Change in copy of specifications after production has begun.
Ambient Temperature: A term used to denote the temperature of the surrounding air.
Anchor Coat: A coating applied to the face material on the side opposite the printed surface to provide increased opacity to the face material and/or to prevent migration between adhesive and the face material and/or to improve anchorage of adhesive to a face material.
ANSI: The American National Standards Institute. A non-governmental organization responsible for the development of voluntary industry standards.
Anvil: A hardened steel roll upon which the bearers of a rotary die cutter ride which also provides the hardened surface to support the die cutting.
Application Temperature: Temperature of a substrate or label material at the time the label will be applied. All adhesives have a minimum application temperature rating.
Applicator: A device that automatically feeds and applies pressure sensitive labels to a product.
Artboard: Alternate term for mechanical art.
ASCII: The character set and code described in the American National Standard Code for Information Interchange, ANSI X3.4-19777. Each ASCII character is encoded with 7 bits (8 bits including parity check). The ASCII character set is used for information interchange between data processing systems, communications systems, and associated equipment. The ASCII set consists of both control and printing characters.
Aspect Ratio: The ratio of height to width of a bar code symbol. A code twice as high as wide would have an aspect ratio of 2; a code twice as wide as high would have an aspect ratio of 1/2 or 0.5.
Author's Corrections: Also know as "AC's". Changed and additions in copy after it has been typeset.
Autoclave: Container for sterilizing, i.e. in label application, label must endure a cooking process by superheated steam under pressure.
Back Up: Printing the second side of a sheet already printed on one side.
Backing: Refers to the carrier sheet of material in a pressure sensitive lamination as opposed to the face material. Usually has a release coating applied so that the adhesive will not stick too tightly to it. Release liner, backing paper, carrier, etc.
Bagginess: A slack, floppy area usually caused by gauge variation. The material has been stretched and is actually longer in that area.
Banding: Method of packaging printed pieces of paper using rubber or paper bands.
Bar: The dark element of a printed symbol.
Bar Code: An array of rectangular bars and spaces which are arranged in a predetermined pattern following unambiguous rules in a specific way to represent elements of data which are referred to as characters.
Bar Code Density: The number of data characters which can be represented in a linear unit of measure. Bar code density is often expressed in characters per inch.
Bar Code Reader: A device used to identify and read bar code symbols.
Bar Length: The bar dimension perpendicular to bar width.
Bar Width: The thickness of a bar measured from the edge closest to the symbol start character to the trailing edge of the same bar.
Bar Width Reduction: Reduction of the nominal bar width dimension on film masters or printing plates to compensate for printing gain.
Barrier Coat: A coating applied to the face material on the side opposite the printed surface to provide increased opacity to the face material and/or to prevent migration between adhesive and the face material and/or to improve anchorage of adhesive to face material.
Base: The major constituent, other than pigments and filler, comprising the non-volatile portion of an adhesive coating or sealer compound.
Basic Sheet Size: The size of a sheet of paper which is used to determine paper weight. Sizes vary depending on the type of stock
Basis Weight: Weight in pounds of a ream of paper cut to the basic size for its grade.
Bearer: Type-high supports mounted or molded around each end of printing plate to help carry part of the impression load and to help prevent bounce. Also the load bearing surface(s) of a rotary die, usually positioned at each end of the die.
Bearing Block: A device that holds the die in place in the die station.
Biax: Biaxially oriented material, that is, oriented in the machine and transverse directions.
Bidirectional Read: The ability to read data successfully
whether scanning is done left to right or right to left.BARRIER COAT
A coating applied to the face material on the side opposite the printed surface
to provide increased opacity to the face material and/or to prevent migration
between adhesive and the face material and/or to improve anchorage of adhesive
to face material.
Bind: To fasten sheets or signatures with wire, thread, glue. or by other means.
Bindery: The finishing department of a print shop or firm specializing in finishing printed products.
Blanket: The thick rubber mat on a printing press that transfers ink from the plate to paper.
Bleed: Printing that goes to the edge of the sheet after trimming.
Bleedthrough: Migration of materials from an adhesive or substrate into a face material, resulting in a mottled appearance of the face stock and possible detrimental effects to the adhesive.
Blind Embossing: An image pressed into a sheet without ink or foil.
Blocking: Condition where the labels in a roll of material stick to the backside of the liner above them. Usually due to adhesive cold flow, incomplete die cutting of the adhesive, improper drying of inks or improper drying of coatings.
Blueline: A blue photographic proof used to check position of all image elements.
Board: Alternate term for mechanical.
Bond & Carbon: Business form with paper and carbon paper.
Bond Paper: Strong durable paper grade used for letterheads and business forms.
Break For Color: Also known as a color break. To separate mechanically or by software the parts to be printed in different colors.
Brightness: The brilliance or reflectance of paper.
Bulk: Thickness of paper stock in thousandths of an inch or number of pages per inch.
Bulk Pack: Boxing printed product without wrapping or banding.
Burn: Exposing a printing plate to high intensity light or placing an image on a printing plate by light.
Bursting Perf: A fold perforation that permits mechanical bursting.
Bursting Strength: The pressure required to rupture a material specimen when it is tested in a specified instrument under specified conditions. It is largely determined by the tensile strength and extensibility of the material.
Butt: Joining images without overlapping.
Butt Cut Labels: Rectangular labels in continuous form separated by a single knife cut to the liner across the web. Also face cut, knife cut.
Butt Fit: Printed colors that overlap one row of dots so they appear to butt.
Butted Rectangles: Die cut rectangles butted to each other with no around and/or across matrix to remove.
Carbonless: Pressure sensitive writing paper that does not use carbon.
Calender Finished: A term applied to any paper with a surface glazed by means of a calendar stack.
Caliper: Thickness, usually measured in mils or thousandths of an inch. A mil is sometimes called a "point." A 10 mil tag might also be called a 10 point tag stock.
Camera-Ready Copy: Print ready mechanical art.
Carload: A truck load of paper weighing 40000 pounds.
Carrier: Sometimes used to refer to the liner materials of pressure sensitive labels.
Case Bind: A type of binding used in making hard cover books using glue.
Cast Coated: Coated paper with a high gloss reflective finish.
Cast Coated Paper: A paper, the coating of which is allowed to harden or set while in contact with a finished casting surface.
Cast Film: Plastic sheeting manufactured by the casting process, as opposed to the extruding process.
Cast Vinyl: Vinyl sheeting manufactured by coating a liquid vinyl acetate or similar ester onto a casting paper and curing in a heated oven.
Cavity: Usually refers to the engraving on a rotary die cutter that die cuts a single shape.
Central Impression: A press with a number of printing units around a large cylinder that serves as the impression cylinder against which the substrate rides.
Character: A single group of bars with spaces which represents an individual number, letter or punctuation mark.
Check Digit: A digit included with-in a symbol whose value is based mathematically on other characters included in the symbol. It is used to perform a check to ensure the accuracy of the read.
Chemical Resistance: The resistance of a P.S. label to the deteriorating effects of exposure to various chemicals under specified conditions.
Chill Roll: Metal roll or drum cooled internally with water, etc. Often used after the press dryer to cool the printed web prior to die cutting, rewinding, etc.
Chrome: A term for a transparency.
Clay Coated: A term used to describe a paper with a clay coating on either one or both sides.
Clear Area: A required clear space, containing no data marks, which precedes the start character of a symbol and follows the stop character. Also known as the "quiet area."
Coated Paper: A clay coated printing paper with a smooth finish.
Coating: In printing, an emulsion, varnish or lacquer applied in-line or off-line, often over a printed surface to give it added protection.
Coating Weight: The amount of weight of coating per unit area. This is expressed in various units including grams per square meter or pounds per ream.
Code 128: A full alphanumeric bar code capable of encoding all 128 ASCII characters.
Code 39: A full alphanumeric bar code consisting of nine black and white bars for each character symbol.
Co-Extrusions: Film produced by more than one extruder through a common die. Films have been made with as many as 13 layers.
Cohesion: The internal strength of an adhesive, its resistance to flow, and the resistance to failure or splitting when labels are removed or under stress.
Cold Flow: The flow of a Pressure Sensitive adhesive under pressure or stress.
Collate: A finishing term for gathering paper in a precise order.
Color Bar: A quality control term regarding the spots of ink color on the tail of a sheet.
Color Correction: Methods of improving color separations.
Color Filter: Filters uses in making color separations, red, blue, green.
Color Key: Color proofs in layers of acetate:
Color Matching System: A system of formulated ink colors used for communicating color.
Color Separations: The process of preparing artwork, photographs, transparencies, or computer generated art for printing by separating into the four primary printing colors.
Comb Bind: To plastic comb bind by inserting the comb into punched holes.
Composite Film: Combining two or more images on one or more pieces of film.
Conditioning: Process of subjecting material to specific temperature and humidity conditions for stipulated time.
Conformability: The ability of a P.S. material to yield to the contours of a curved or rough surface.
Continuous-Tone Copy: Illustrations, photographs or computer files that contain gradient tones from black to white or light to dark.
Continuous Code: A bar code or symbol where the space between characters (intercharacter group) is part of the code.
Continuous Label: Fan-folded labels manufactured from a continuous web of label stock which is not cut into units prior to execution. Continuous labels are mostly used for data processing applications.
Contrast: The tonal change in color from light to dark.
Converter: Refers to that type of manufacturer who produces plain or printed rolls, sheets, bags or pouches, etc., from rolls of film, foil or paper, including pressure sensitive labels and tags.
Copier Label: A label designed for overprinting by a plain paper photo-copier.
Copy: All furnished material or disc used in the production of a printed product.
Corner Radius: Describes the arc or curvature of the die blades where they meet so that they can impart a rounded corner to a die cut label.
Corona Treatment: Altering the surface characteristics by exposing the surface to a high voltage discharge (corona) resulting in an increase in surface energy (dyne level).
Coupon: Removable label either supplying information or having redeemable value. They may be either pressure sensitive on non-pressure sensitive.
Cover Paper: A heavy printing paper used to cover books, make presentation folders, etc.
Crash Number: Numbering paper by pressing an image on the first sheet which is transferred to all parts of the printed set.
Crimping: Puncture marks holding business forms together.
Cromalin: Trade name for DuPont color proofs.
Crop: To cut off parts of a picture or image.
Crop Marks: Printed lines showing where to trim a printed sheet.
Cross Direction: The direction across the web. Papers are weaker and are affected more by changes in relative humidity in the cross direction than the grain direction.
Crossover: Printing across the gutter or from one page to the facing page of a publication.
Crush Cut: A cut made by a rotary blade in contact with an anvil or base roll.
Curl: The tendency of material by itself or in a laminate to bend or partly wrap around the axis of its directions. Curl is often caused by humidity or improper tension.
Cut-Off: In web printing, the cut or print length corresponding to the circumference of the plate cylinder and/or die cutter; equipment.
Cut Rule: Steel rule blades designed to cut material being produced on flat-bed die cutting equipment.
Cyan: One of four standard process colors. The blue color.
Cylinder: In flexography, most rollers in the printing press are called rolls with the exception of ones on which the rubber plates are mounted, and the one which receives the impression. These are usually referred to as cylinders, i.e., plate cylinder, impression cylinder.
Debossed: An indent or cut in design or lettering of a surface.
Delamination: The separation of a material into layers in a direction approximately parallel to the surface. The partial or complete separation of the layers of a laminate.
Densitometer: A quality control devise to measure the density of printing ink.
Density: The degree of color or darkness of an image or photograph.
Destaticization: Treating plastic materials to minimize their accumulation of static electricity.
Diazo: A light sensitive coating used on printing plates.
Die: Metal rule or imaged block used to cut or place an image on paper in the finishing process.
Die Adapter: A device used to modify a die station of one type of press so that it will accommodate dies originally designed to be used on different presses.
Die Blades: Sharpened, thin steel blades used in flat or rotary dies. Also refers to blades on machine engraved or EDM manufactured rotary dies.
Die Cut: To cut labels with a die. A term used to describe a label formed by die-cutting
Die Cut Label: Pressure sensitive labels mounted on a release liner from which the matrix has been die cut and usually removed.
Die Cutting: Curing images in or out of paper.
Die Hold-Down Assembly: A steel block incorporating bearing which apply pressure to the bearer surface of a rotary die cutter through pressure screws.
Die Life: Mileage expected from a new die and that expected following a resharpening of a die.
Die Lines: A hand drawn or computer generated layout of the die cut shape or shapes on a clear or matte finish acetate or mylar.
Die Stain: Used to check die cutting accuracy. Usually done with diluted ink applied to the die cut surface of the backing or liner material. The ink wicks into any fractures of the silicone coated surface, thereby exhibiting the problem areas.
Dimensional Stability: The property of a material which relates to the degree of its growth or shrinkage from temperature or tension.
Discrete Code: A bar code or symbol in which the spaces between characters (intercharacter gap) are not part of the code.
Dispenser: A device that deeds pressure sensitive labels, either manually or automatically, making them ready for application. It can serve as a package for the labels as well (dispenser boxes).
Dispensing Edge: A relatively sharp edge around which a backing material is pulled in order to dispense a pressure sensitive label from that backing. Sometimes referred to as a peeler plate.
Dot: An element of halftones. Using a loupe you will see that printed pictures are made many dots.
Dot Gain or Spread: A term used to explain the difference in size between the dot on film v paper.
Double Burn: Exposing a plate to multiple images.
Double Coated: A pressure sensitive product consisting of a carrier material with similar or dissimilar adhesives applied to the two surfaces and wound with a silicone release paper.
Draw-Down: A sample of ink and paper used to evaluate ink colors.
Driving Side: That side of a flexographic press on which the main gear train(s) are located. Also gear side; opposite of the operator side.
Drop-Out: Portions of artwork that do not print.
Dummy: A rough layout of a printed piece showing position and finished size.
Duotone: A halftone picture made up of two printed colors.
Dwell: 1)The time during which P.S. material remains on a surface before testing for permanence or removability. 2)The time during which a hot-stamp, embossing, head, or thermal die remains in contact with the surface of a P.S. material.
Dylux: Photographic paper made by DuPont and used for bluelines.