Tech Biz Writing

“Copy” is a term used by writers, editors and printers to indicate the draft of any text which is to be printed. Much of the printing of technical literature is still done by offset lithography using a photographic method of plate-making. The final copy to be submitted to the printer for the photographic process, is consequently known as camera, or camera-ready copy.

Camera copy is produced by various means depending on the desired quality of the finished product. Nowadays, of course, documents can be scanned or saved into computer files and simply adjusted by a compositor, or other operative, and output directly to the printing process.

Camera copy may also be prepared in the now old-fashioned way as a “paste-up” in which typescript or printed material is pasted onto a special sheet ready for the photographic process. Or it may take the form of directly typed text on “laymark” sheets. Laymarks are guidelines, usually in non-reproducible blue, printed on a quality paper which indicate the margins — sometimes different for verso and recto pages — on the sheet, together with any specified datum lines, such as heading positions or classification notices.

Next: 34. Proofreading.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 27th, 2006 at 12:57 pm and is filed under Technical Writing, Publishing, Documentation, Photography, Technical Vetting, Editing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.