The principle of Chinese character printing is actually a text printing method invented after continuous practice and research by the working people of ancient China over a long period of time. First, use clay to make multiple blanks of the same specifications. The protruding height of the character strokes should be close to the thickness of the edge of the copper coin. After hardening with fire, it becomes a single clay movable type, that is, a single-character inverse character mold is created. Then select the single words according to the required layout, and arrange them in the word plate according to the paragraph logic. After the ink printing is completed, the typeface is removed and can be used again for the next printing.
In order to meet the needs of typesetting, multiple commonly used words are prepared to prepare for possible duplication in the same version. The great thing about this kind of operation is that it can be made and used at any time, and it is particularly flexible. When encountering uncommon characters that are not commonly used, even if there is no preparation in advance, the typesetting task can be completed as quickly as possible. Every step of movable type printing shows the soul of Chinese characters. The emergence of movable type printing in Chinese character printing marked the birth of movable type printing and was a great technological revolution in the history of printing.
China is the first country in the world to invent printing. It was invented by Bi Sheng, about 400 years earlier than German movable type printing. The unexpected encounter between words and printing gave people the opportunity to understand a richer spiritual world. At present, many fonts have been combined with modern digital information technology and have become the original matrix of Chinese character information processing laser phototypesetting technology.
There are four main types of Chinese movable type fonts: Song style, block letters, imitation Song style, and bold style. The block letter font presents a dignified and square posture, and is particularly applicable to a wide range of applications. In the long history of cultural development, China has successively invented engraving printing and movable type printing, which are inseparable from the shaping, inheritance and innovation of Chinese character fonts. Especially in the Song Dynasty, when printing developed rapidly, woodblock printing was widely used, resulting in Song-style printing fonts, a new type of writing style, which gradually formed a special field that was both between the aesthetics of calligraphy and closely related to it.