In
printing
Printing is a process for mass reproducing text and images using a master form or template. The earliest non-paper products involving printing include cylinder seals and objects such as the Cyrus Cylinder and the Cylinders of Nabonidus. The ...
, a key plate is the plate which prints the detail in an image.
When printing
color image
A digital image is an image composed of picture elements, also known as ''pixels'', each with ''finite'', '' discrete quantities'' of numeric representation for its intensity or gray level that is an output from its two-dimensional functions f ...
s by combining multiple colors of
inks, the colored inks usually do not contain much image detail. The key plate, which is usually impressed using black ink, provides the lines, contrast, or both, of the image. However, in two-color images where neither color was black, the key plate might have been printed in the darker of the two colors. Key plate is synonymous with ''keystone'' in the same context.
See also
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CMYK color model
The CMYK color model (also known as process color, or four color) is a subtractive color model, based on the CMY color model, used in color printing, and is also used to describe the printing process itself. The abbreviation ''CMYK'' refers ...
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Key type stamp
Key type stamps are stamps of a uniform design that were widely used by colonial territories in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Origins
The idea was invented by Perkins Bacon who used it to print stamps for Trinidad (1851), Barbados (1852) and M ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Key Plate
Printing terminology