Photo Type
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- Title
- The Eighth Wonder
- Date
- 1961
- Length
- 25:00
- Topics
- Description
Made for the 75th anniversary of the Linotype in 1961, this film shows the impact that the invention of the Linotype had on the printing industry and the world. There are excellent sections on typeface design, cutting steel punches, using the Benton engraving machine, and the manufacture of Linotype matrices.
The film showcases various models of Linotypes, machines running via tape and Teletypesetting, as well as Linofilm machines and the process of producing film type matrices.
(note: audio is missing for the first 10 seconds)
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- Title
- Modules Make Sense
- Date
- Circa 1968
- Length
- 25:40
- Topics
- Description
Monotype made this film to showcase their newer, computer technologies that were finally coming to the market in the late 1960s. Based on the idea of modules which could be interchanged as needed for printers’ and typesetters’ specific needs, Monotype is desperate to show they are using modern circuit boards and tape-reading “computers” and are not behind the times.
Even though they are doing their best to talk about computers and modern technology, this film still has a great deal about their mechanical keyboards, composition casters, and non-digital machinery. At the very end of the film, they literally walk over to their R&D department to show a preview of their Monophoto 600 Film Setter, which is their first truly-electronic typesetting machine.
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- Date
- 1955
- Length
- 21:33
- Topics
- Description
The ‘Rotadon’ darkroom camera from Monotype’s subsidiary, Pictorial Machinery Limited, is a revolutionary, new camera made for photographing, enlarging and reducing, and creating photo positive and negatives for photographic reproduction and printing.
It is so revolutionary that it allows the operator to STAY PUT and not have to move anywhere compared to old and outdated copy cameras (which is hilariously acted out by a chain-smoking, bumbling operator).
The camera has a vacuum back for creating exposures on plates, films, and papers with a mirror setup and easy adjustment for enlarging and reducing images and illustrations to any size needed for film output. Lots of obscure buttons, switches, and gauges are on display along with diagrams and darkroom shots to show how the system works.
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- Date
- Circa 1958
- Length
- 22:54
- Topics
- Description
This film showcases Monotype’s answer to the upcoming phototypesetting revolution. They take great pains to show how little has changed from the old, hot-metal Monotype machines by replacing the hot-metal pot with a light source and the brass matrices with individual, photo negative matrices for exposure on paper or film. This cautious approach was in order to assuage the fears of printers who did not want to change.
Throughout this film, you see what is new (including a session in the red-light darkroom) along with everything that has stayed the same (same keyboard and punched paper tape). Watch a woman “stripping” in new lines of text using techniques that would have seemed futuristic and fanciful in the late 1950s.
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- Date
- 1963
- Length
- 38:00
- Topics
- Description
Learn all about the ‘Monophoto’ Filmsetter from Monotype. This machine attempts to bridge the gap in typesetting from the hot metal machines to the “new and exciting” world of photo typesetting.
Using light-sensitive paper, a photographic lens, and photo type matrices, the Monotype casts type that can be used for offset printing instead of the old, hot-metal process.
See diagrams of the machine, dark room processing, and in-depth explanation of paste-up techniques.
(note: audio is missing for the first 35 seconds)
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- Date
- 1965?
- Length
- 24:20
- Topics
- Description
This film was created by the International Typographic Union to encourage their members to become more comfortable with the new “Cold Type” technology revolutionizing the typesetting industry.
Starting with an explanation of the hot-metal process, they feature the Intertype Fotosetter and then go through the entire photo-composition process. The film shows camera work, stripping, chemical development, and paste-up. It ends with an aerial view of the ITU building in Colorado Springs, CO.
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- Date
- 1966
- Length
- 16:34
- Topics
- Description
A film created by the International Typographic Union to display the advancing electronic technology being introduced to typesetting and printing. It specifically demonstrates “A System to Computerize Advertising Composition at the Washington Evening Star” in Washington D.C.
This film shows an IBM 1620 computer and additional storage disks working with Linofilm typesetters that were installed in July of 1963. There is a very in-depth explanation of the process of early computer and film typesetting. Additionally, new forms of plate making with cameras and photo composition are shown.
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- Title
- Linotron 1010
- Date
- 1966
- Length
- 10:27
- Topics
- Description
The Linotron is a very early CRT exposure machine. It creates a page (not just a line) of text at one time. Using a film grid of characters, it can create up to 1,000 characters per second.
The film starts with a great animated sequence showing the speed of change and the overwhelming mass of communication. The Linotron 1010 is a CRT machine in three parts; the control unit, the character generator, and the output/display unit. It no longer uses tape input, but now uses magnetic tape from computers.
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- Title
- Linotron 505
- Date
- 1969
- Length
- 13:54
- Topics
- Description
Featuring the cathode-ray tube Linotron 505 for high-speed film typesetting. Although this is a film machine, the input is still controlled by perforated tape.
The film features many line diagrams on how the CRT machine works and exposes the characters onto paper or film. It goes into depth about the optical grid system of characters on glass plates.
The ability to photographically create “fake” italics is possible for the first time and the facilities that create the grids are shown in detail. The film ends with an aerial view of the Mergenthaler (a division of Eltra) production plant in Long Island, New York.
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- Date
- 1967
- Length
- 10:28
- Description
Created by Mergenthaler to show off the newest typesetting, film and computer machines to the American Newspaper Publishers Association.
This film was created at a time when all newspapers knew film and computer technology were the future, but they were not yet convinced in which technology to invest. It features the Elektron, tape-perforating keyboard center, Linofilm Quick, and other early-computer machines.
Many newspaper men in suits, thick glasses, and skinny black ties.