About the Lithographic Printing Process

A lithograph is created using a printing technique based on the principle that oil and water do not mix. Using oil-based ink or a grease crayon, an image is drawn on a flat stone or metal plate. Water is applied to the surface and is repelled by the areas where oil-based images have been drawn. The entire surface is then coated with an oil-based ink that adheres only to the areas drawn in oil, ink or crayon. The image is then printed on paper.

Lithography became a popular printing technique because thousands of exact replicas could be made that were like drawings on paper, without degradation of the image.

Offset lithography is an industrialized version of the same printing technique as lithography. By using modern printing presses, high-quality reproductions are produced faster and in higher volumes than with manually-produced lithographs.

Color lithography is essentially the same process as basic lithography. In this process, however, the application of each color is printed separately through careful alignment or registration. This process is typically done by computer analysis, and is most frequently used in the production of posters and open edition prints.