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| Hairline Register | Printing registration that lies within the range of plus or minus one half row of dots. It is the thinnest of the standard printers' rules |
| Hairline Rule | The finest weight of rule used in page layout. The use of Hairline is not recommended. A hairline will reproduce at the finest possible resolution of which the output device is capable. In the case of a desktop 600 dpi printer the rule will print as a fine rule |
| Half-Scale Black | Black separation made to have dots only in the shadows and midtones, as compared to full-scale black and skeleton black |
| Halftone | 1. The reproduction of continuous-tone-images, through
a screening process, which converts the image into dots
of various sizes and equal spacing between centers or
dots of equal size with variable spacing between them. 2. A photograph or continuous-tone illustration that has been halftoned and appears on film, paper, printing plate or the final printed product |
| Halftone Paper | A high finish paper that is ideal for halftone printing |
| Halftone Screen | A sheet of film or glass containing ruled right-angled lines, used to translate the full tone of a photo to the halftone dot image required for printing |
| Halo Effect | Faint shadow sometimes surrounding halftone dots printed. Also called halation. The halo itself is also called a fringe |
| Hand Scanner | A hand held, generally low quality, device for digitising images |
| Hard Dot | The effect in a photograph where a dot has such a small degree of halation that the dot shows quite sharp |
| Hard-Sized | Relative term used to indicate the maximum size of paper |
| HCI | Human Computer Interface |
| Head Margin | That space which lies between the top of the printed copy and the trimmed edge |
| Head(er) | 1. The margin at the top of the page. 2. The main text title of a publication, usually on the title page |
| Head-to-Head | Imposition with heads (tops) of pages facing heads (tops) of other pages |
| Head-to-Tail | Imposition with heads (tops) of pages facing tails (bottoms) of other pages |
| Heat-Set Web | Web press equipped with an oven to dry ink, thus able to print coated paper. Hexachrome A six-colour printing process. The colours used are Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black, Orange and Green. Digital Presses may use Purple instead of Green |
| Hickey | A term used to describe the effect that occurs when a spec of dust or debris (dried ink) adheres to the printing plate and creates a spot or imperfection in the printing. Also called bulls eye and fish eye |
| High Bulk Paper | Paper stock that is comparatively thick in relation to its basis weight |
| High Key Halftone | A halftone that is made utilizing only the highlight tones down through the middle tones |
| High-Fidelity Colour | Colour reproduced using six, eight or twelve separations, as compared to four-colour process |
| High-Key Image (Photograph) | Photo whose most important details appear in the highlights |
| Highlights | The lightest tones of a photo, printed halftone or illustration. In the finished halftone, these highlights are represented by the finest dots |
| Hinged Cover | Perfect bound cover scored 1/8 inch (3mm) from the spine so it folds at the hinge instead of along the edge of the spine |
| HLS | Abbreviation for hue, lightness, saturation, one of the control-control options often found in software, for design and page assembly. Also called HVS |
| Hollow | That space on the spine of a case-bound book between the block of the book and the case binding |
| Hopper | Alternate name for the box on a finishing machine where folded sections are loaded in order they can be bound into a publication |
| Hot Melt | An adhesive used in the binding process, which requires heat for application |
| Hot Spot | Printing defect caused when a piece of dirt or an air bubble caused incomplete draw-down during contact platemaking, leaving an area of weak ink coverage or visible dot gain |
| House Sheet | This is a term that refers to a paper that a printer keeps on hand in his shop |
| HTML (HyperText Mark-up Language) | A method of tagging text in order it can be presented on the internet |
| Hue | Hue is the wavelength of light reflected or transmitted from an object. However, hue is more commonly known as the actual colour, such as red, yellow, or blue |