2D Digital Printing Technologies

Illustrators use digital printing technology to reproduce their work for a number of purposes. Most of us own and rely on one or more digital printing output devices to help us conduct our business and produce our work. Illustrators who exclusively work digitally are totally reliant on digital printers to help proof work in preparation for offset printing or display it in non-digital settings.

Over the past few decades several different types of printers has been used to reproduce digital work. Some of these device types have become all but obsolete due to technological advancements in digital printers, which have become quite sophisticated in quality and economically efficient.

Impact Printers

The earliest digital were based on impact technology. These printers contain an appliance that comes into physical contact with the paper surface in order to transfer toner to create an image. The two main types of impact printers are character printers and dot matrix printers.

Character Printers

Character printers are basically computerized typewriters that print nothing but fixed characters. They have a ball or series of bars with actual raised letters and numbers on the surface. To print a letter is struck against an ink ribbon, transferring the character's image to the paper. The characters are finite and cannot be altered.

Inpact character printhead.

Impact character print sample.

Dot Matrix Printers

Also referred to as a pin printer, and precursor to inkjet and laser printers, dot matrix printers use print heads to strike an ink ribbon to place hundreds to thousands of little dots directly on the paper to form text or images. The matrix field allowed computer manipulated imagery and type to be combined and customized. Dot matrix printers, because of their low quality prints, have been replaced by inkjet and laser printers.

Dot matrix printhead.

Dot matrix print sample.

Non-Impact Printers

As the name suggests, non-impact printers do not touch the paper when creating an image. Both wet and dry toner technology printers are represented in this category, which includes inkjet, laser, thermal wax, dye sublimation, solid ink, bubble jet, piezoelectric, and thermal autochrome printers.

Inkjet Printers

Inkjet printers produce prints by spraying liquid ink onto paper. Inkjet printers can produce resolutions as fine as 600 dpi or more rather inexpensively. The print head has several tiny nozzles, called jets that spray ink drops onto the paper as it moves past it to produce characters and images. Because the ink is liquid, prints require time to dry for the ink to cure properly. Most inkjet printers contain cyan, magenta, yellow, and black inks, consistent with CMYK 4-color process printing. The more sophisticated units use as many as eight color cartridges with red, green, blue, matt black, and gloss optimizer along with the CMYK inks. These high-level inkjet printers can render gallery quality digital images on special paper stocks,

Inkjet 4-color printhead.

Inkjet dot pattern nagnified.

Bubble Jet Printers

Thermal Bubble Jet

A thermal bubble jet printer differs from a conventional inkjet printer in the way the droplets of ink are formed and distributed on the paper. In a standard bubble jet printer, tiny resistors produce heat, which vaporizes the ink into bubbles. The expansion of the liquid from the heat causes a bubble that pops or collapses causing a vacuum to be created, which forces ink into the print head from the cartridge to be ejected onto the paper surface. Bubble jet print head have 300 ink nozzles. High-end units have 600 nozzles, all which can dispense ink simultaneously.

Bubble jet printhead dispensing ink.

Bubble jet print dot pattern magnified.

Piezoelectric Bubble Jet

Patented by Epson, piezoelectric technology uses piezo crystal dyes. These dyes are located at the back of the ink reservoir of each nozzle. The crystal receives an electric charge that causes them to vibrate. When they vibrate in the nozzle they act like a piston in an engine, alternatively pulling ink into the nozzle from the reservoir and then dispensing it to a receiving surface. Piezoelectric printing is most commonly used for digital printing on fabrics.

Piezoelectric printhead.

Piezoelectric dot pattern magnified.

Laser Printers

Laser printers, also called laserjet printers, were developed as devices that adapted photocopier technology for computer generated digital output. Using static electricity and heat, laser printers differ from inkjet printers in that the toner or ink in a laser printer is dry, whereas in an inkjet printer the ink is wet. More commonly used for high volume output, most laser printers are monochrome, although there are also color laser printers that contain 4-color CMYK insets for the production of full-color prints. To print, a laser printer places an electrical charge on a selenium drum. The charged areas attract ink, which is then transferred to the paper surface. Most laser printers print at a resolution of 600 dpi., however high-end models can produce resolutions as fine as 2400 dpi

Laserjet printhead.

Laserjet dot pattern magnified.

Solid Ink Printers

The toner used for solid ink printers is in the form of sticks of wax-like ink similar to hard crayons. This heat based process melts the ink as it is applied to the paper. As the ink cools it then hardens in place. Unfortunately prints produced using solid ink are susceptible to damage by heat such as would occur in lamination. Solid ink printing can be applied to many different types of media and substrates.  

Solid ink printhead and ink bar.

Solid ink dot pattern magnified. The American Institute for Conservation.

Dye Sublimation Printers

The toner colors in dye sublimation printers is supplied by rolls of red, blue, yellow and gray colored cellophane film panels that are alternatively sectioned together end to end. The 4-color CMYK version contains cellophane film coated with solid cyan, magenta, yellow and black dyes corresponding to four basic color printing. The film is heated at various temperatures, according to the amount needed to reproduce a particular image. The heated dyes melt and permeate the surface of the paper, then they solidify to form a print. Dye sublimation printers apply each color individually as its own layer until the image is completed. The dyes actually permeate and stain the paper to generate an image.

Dye sublimation printhead with color ink ribbon.

Dye sublimation ink pattern magnified. The American Institute for Conservation.

Thermal Wax Transfer Printers

A hybrid of dye sublimation and solid ink technologies, thermal wax printers use a solid form of ink applied to a ribbon with alternating 4 color CMYK process color bands. Tiny heated pins contact the toner ribbon as it passes to produce an impression on the paper surface. The heat causes the wax to melt and adhere to the paper, where it hardens in place.

Thermal wax transfer print head.

Thermal wax transfer ink pattern magnified. The American Institute for
Conservation.

Thermal Autochrome Printers

Thermal autochrome printers operate in a parallel way to photographic printers. The color is contained within the autochrome paper and acts as a receptor for a heat source, instead of a light source, that brings forth the color. The paper contains three color layers--cyan, magenta and yellow. Color density within the print is controlled by a varying amount of heat that is applied. in the paper, and each layer is activated by the application of a specific amount of heat. The print head applies each color individually by passing over the paper for each separate color until the image is complete.

Thermal autochrome print head.

Thermal autochrome dot pattern magnified. Image Permanence Institute.

Stylistic Illustration: 1. Origins

It would have been just as easy and perhaps clearer to title this article Non-Realistic Illustration. After all, realism is also a style. So to clarify, the article will be concerned with the origins of the transition from realism to other styles of illustration.

Realism

During the golden age of illustration from the last quarter of the 19th century through the first half of the 20th century, a realistic approach to figure, still life object, and setting was the norm for illustration, with an occasional artistic foray into non-representational fantasy, such as in works by Maxfield Parish and other magic realists. Caricature illustration and political cartooning took some liberties by distorting and exaggerating figures for editorial and narrative purposes, as can be seen in the works of Thomas Nast. But for the most part, illustrated figures related comfortably and proportionately to their settings. If action was depicted, it was done so accurately and believably. Classical perspective was applied to compositions to add a pictorial reality to illustrations. This was at a time when photography and the camera were thought of as a novelties and not serious media for communication.

Stonewall Jackson. Artist, N.C. Wyeth, 1910.

Pictures from Thakery. Artist, Howard Pyle, 1906.

The Geste of Duke Jocelyn. Artist, Eric Pape, 1919.

The Childrens Longfellow. Artist, Frank E. 

Schoonover, 1908.

Wild Geese. Artist, Maxfield Parrish, 1924.

They Scrambled Up The Parapet. Artist, Howard 

Pyle, 1899.

Idealization

Some of the earliest examples of stylized illustration occurred between 1890 and 1920. Art Nouveau was firmly founded as the new art movement of the time. Artists such as Alphonse Mucha, Eugene Grasset, and William H. Bradley began to explore the use of shape and pattern as a way of presenting figures and objects. Compositional arrangements became more complex and the rendering of the elements themselves was flattened and simplified. Dimensionality was implied though the design of form and limited values rather than by realistic rendering techniques. Illustrations presented idealized figures in unreal stylized settings.

Reverie Paris. Artist, Alphonse Mucha, 1897.

Grafton Galleries. Artist, Eugene Grasset, 1893.

La Libre Esthétique. Atist, Gisbert Combaz,1898.

Bec Auer Incandescent Candles. Artist, Henri
Privat-Livemont, 1898.

Exaggeration

Caricature

The use of exaggerated, but realistically based illustrations, was popularized by 19th and early 20th century cartoonists of political and narrative subject manner. The exaggeration of facial expressions, body proportioning, and other compositional elements was a way of communicating satire to a viewership. This distortion of the physical attributes contained in an illustration became an understood style for the editorializing of a person, place, or event. And this editorializing of content was but one more stylistic form that played a role in the diminishment of realism as the predominant form of illustration. Born out of realism, the use of exaggerated interpretations of subjects was part of the repertoire of many illustrators who also worked in a true realistic style.

Tammany Ring. Artist, Thomas Nast. 1873.

Victor Hugo. Artist, Benjamin Roubard, 1878.

Russian Patriotism and Hatred. Artist unknown, 1914

Willie McKinley as the Trusts Little Boy With His New Playmate 

Teddy Roosevelt. Artist, Fredrick Opper, 1900.

Expressionism

When it first appeared in illustrations, expressionism presented itself as another form of exaggerated realism. Most popular in Germany and Russia, it emphasized a more spontaneous way of working. Many expressionists worked without reference material, preferring to illustrate completely from their imagination.

Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Artist unknown, 1920.

Cabinet of Dr. Calagari. Artist unknown, 1920.

Drama Comedy. Artist, Oskar Kokoschka, 1907.

Der Sturm. Artist, Oscar Kokoschka, 1910.

Simplicissimus. Artist,  Thomas Theodor Heine, 1896.

Simplification

The visual appearance of concurrent art and design movements influenced illustration to move away from representational realism. Artists such as Leonetto Cappiello, A.M. Cassadre, Jean Carlu, etc introduced the efficient use of form through simplification of visual elements to illustration. Not only were figures, objects and settings rendered more simply, compositional arrangements also became simpler through the elimination of extraneous elements. Simplification served the purpose of suggesting realistic form without fully rendering it, while exercising an efficient method of depiction that was also more practical to mass produce in certain media such as screen printing and lithography.

Brighton. Artist, Perre Commarand, 1920.

Vins Camp Romaign. Artist, L. Dadoud, circa 1930.

Ca-bloc. Artist, Leonetto Capiello, 1934.

Motobloc. Artist, Rene Vincent, 1928.

Nord Wagons. Artist, Jean Raoul Naurac, 1927.

Grado. Artist, Macello Dudovich, 1933.

Modiano Cigarettes. Artist, Franz Lenhart, 1930.

Stylization

As the Art Nouveau movement began to wane, so did the amount of detail and use of pattern in illustrations. Illustrators began to place more emphasis on shape, color, and compositional dynamics, such as shifted orientations and dramatic perspective. At this time, illustrative design, i.e., the fusion of illustration and graphic design began to emerge to produce highly stylized illustration. The Constructivist, Suprematist, De Stijl, Plakatstil, and Art Deco art movements provided inspiration for an approach to illustration that was based on challenging a viewer to interpret the formal aspects of an illustration to understand it's meaning though a visual or experiential association rather than by pictorial realism. These movements began in 1900 across Europe and were differentiated by their highly stylized graphics, flat colors, and simple compositions.

Vogue. Artist, Eduardo Benito, 1909.

Chapbook. Artist, William H. Bradley, 1895.

The Last Flight. Artists, Vladimir and Georgil
Stenberg, 1929.

May Day. Artists, Vladimir and Georgil Stenberg,
1918.

Tournee Du Chat Noir. Théophile Alexandre
Steinlen, 1896

Abstractionism

The simplification of illustrations led to the use of abstract elements and the ultimate acceptance of abstractionism as a non-realistic genre of illustration. This required a viewer to make a mental association with the subject of the illustration to fill in the blanks so to speak. Reliance on basic shapes, color and a geometric approach to forms and composition reinforced the abstract appearance of an illustration. The boldness of abstractionism along with simplification was particularly effective in advertising media and public display posters.

Head of a Peasant. Artist, Kasimir Malevich, 1930.

Wimereux. Artist, Leon Dupin, 1930.

Keeping Up With Science. Artist, Shari Weisberg,
1936.

Foriegn Trade Zone. Artist, Martin Weitzman, 1937.

Chemins De Fer. Artist, Theo Doro, 1930.