Encyclopedia of Graphic Communications

This weighty reference book from GATF (the Graphic Arts Technical Foundation) has more than 10,000 entries explaining the various aspects of traditional and digital graphic arts. It defines terms from the fields of printing, typography, color, paper, ink, binding, imaging, software, and more. Besides the many essays, descriptions, illustrations, and cross-references, there's a 16-page color section explaining everything from color theory to the prehistory of communications. The Encyclopedia of Graphics Communications includes a more detailed, 2,000-year timeline of graphic communications history. This section breaks events up into the areas of advertising, broadcasting, computer, information, media, photo imaging, printing and paper, telecommunication, typesetting, and word processing.

There's not only history, but also many terms relating to technology and art. The entries are so various as to include everything from Aldus Manutius to electroplating, fountain solution, gamma correction, intellectual property, lithography, Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG), packing, scanning, screen angles, trapping, twin-wire forming, Web offset lithography, and zero-speed splicers. If your library, school, or organization needs a thorough one-volume reference to graphic communications, this is a great choice. Die-hard professionals and scholars will want to add it to their book collection as well. --Kathleen Caster