Microprinting

Microprinting is the production of recognizable patterns or characters in a printed medium at a scale that requires magnification to read with the naked eye. To the unaided eye, the text may appear as a solid line. Attempts to reproduce by methods of , image scanning, or pantograph typically translate as a dotted or solid line, unless the reproduction method can identify and recreate patterns to such scale. Microprint is predominantly used as an anti-counterfeiting technique, due to its inability to be easily reproduced by digital methods.

While microphotography precedes microprint, microprint was significantly influenced by Albert Boni in 1934 when he was inspired by his friend, writer and editor Manuel Komroff, who was showing his experimentations related to the enlarging of photographs. It occurred to Boni that if he could reduce rather than enlarge photographs, this technology might enable publication companies and libraries to access much greater quantities of data at a minimum cost of material and storage space. Over the following decade, Boni worked to develop microprint, a micro-opaque process in which pages were photographed using 35mm microfilm and printed on cards using offset lithography. (U.S. Patent 2,260,551A, U.S. Patent 2,260,552A) This process proved to produce a 6" by 9" index card that stored 100 pages of text from the normal sized publications he was reproducing. Boni began the Readex Microprint company to produce and license this technology. He also published an article A Guide to the Literature of Photography and Related Subjects (1943), which appeared in a supplemental 18th issue of the Photo-Lab Index.

Currency commonly exhibits the highest quality (smallest size) of microprint because it demands the highest level of counterfeiting deterrence. For example, on the series 2004 United States $20 bill, microprint is hidden within the border in the lower left corner of the obverse (front) side as well as the Twenty USA background.

Bank cheques as well as various other items of value may also commonly leverage microprinting methods, but generally not of such extreme size. For example, personal bank cheques commonly denote the characters MP next to the signature line of the check; these characters represent microprint and are used as an anti-counterfeiting feature due to their difficultly in being reproduced and simple deterrent as a warning that the item employs microprint.

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