this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2026
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This made me realize, I often see things about the invention of the printing press, but I know almost nothing about how color printing was developed. I’m sure it was obvious that early on that different colors could be used, I believe basically what is called spot color today, but I’d be far more curious about the development of process color to reproduce a full color spectrum.
My university advisor pranked me into taking a senior-level class on color theory from the college of art & design, which was interesting and an insane amount of work. The professor might have gone into it some but the main thing I remember was the way they used to use grid screens at different angles to make sure the different colors landed next to each other on the page and not on top of each other.
If you look at advertising posters up close they still put dots next to each other. Actually your phone screen works like that too
Yes, but with modern desktop publishing the computer software can decide where to put each pigment for best effect. A century earlier it was a completely mechanical/optical process that still produced decent results. It looks like halftone is the process name, but this was a class I took 20 years ago and I’m just skimming Wikipedia.