Lesson - 6 : P20446

Machine Section

    This lesson gives information about the machine section of news publications which has to function very fast. There are five parts in this section.

    There are Two central units in this lesson. One is the machine section and the other is the complementary section.

    There are five sub-sections within the machine section. They are composing, typing or casting, engraving, printing and proof-reading sections. Composing section follows the editor’s instructions regarding the fonts, the organisation and the get-up of each news story. Big newspapers have autocomposing facility. Manual composers take the prints from their ‘case’ to fit it into the printing frame called mono-type and lino-type referring to the arrangement of individual letters and the setting of each line in print. Phototype setting is now adopted with the help of computers. Rotary machines print-fast the composed paginated prints.

    The other divisions in the machine section include block-making, printing and proof-reading. Pictures and drawings are printed in various sizes in different newspapers.

    Rotary machines not only print but even fold, count and bundle the newspapers. Photo offset methods are more beneficial than these rotaries and are followed by several newspapers like The Hindu, The Times of India, Dinamalar and Dinaboomi.

    Proof-readers belong to the editorial team and correct the composed forms by reading the preliminary print-out. Their job adds to the quality and accuracy of the news published.

    Thus this lesson is about the functions performed by the machine section.