REPRODUCTION OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



snappy blacks and clear intermediate grays. To do 

 this a fourth printing with black ink is sometimes used, 

 the "three-color" work then becoming really four-color 

 printing. The principle involved, however, is the same 

 as in three-color printing, the extra black being applied 

 to improve the blacks in the picture which have a ten- 

 dency to become muddy, and not clear and sharp. 



The comparative merit of pictures reproduced in color 

 by lithographic processes and those reproduced by the 

 three-color process is determined, commercially at least, 

 by the fact that only three printings are necessary for 

 the reproduction of any picture by the photographic proc- 

 ess, whereas to get the same effect by lithography it is 

 always necessary to make several more separate print- 

 ings than these, sometimes as much as forty separate 

 impressions for very fine facsimile work, although 

 of course such a number is unusual. 



Waiving the question of mechanical advantages or dis- 

 advantages, however, it may be said in a general way that 

 artistic effects are better represented in the three-color 

 process, a certain hardness in the colored lithography 

 being practically unavoidable. For the reproduction 

 of purely artistic designs such as paintings, therefore, 

 artists very generally prefer the three-color process to 

 the lithographic. 



On the other hand, when exact facsimiles in color are 

 to be made, where scientific accuracy rather than ar- 

 tistic effect is desired, lithography is still superior to 

 three-color process work. The remarkable results 

 that may be obtained by this lithographic process of 

 many printings are such that in cases where an absolute 



