ATF Typesetter Question
Comments
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While some sources called the Lumitype, also known as the Photon, the first phototypesetting machine, it dated from 1949, while the Intertype Fotosetter preceded it in 1946.0
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Maxim Zhukov said:What about Uhertype?Experiments with Uhertype ceased, and the two prototypes were sold, the last entry says, so that was not a commercially successful phototypesetter. Phototypesetting patents go back to the 19th century - as that site shows - but it wasn't until photo-offset lithography became popular that it had a chance to take off.As to my own question, the second patent was for an improvement that allowed the use of an 18 unit system, so apparently my speculation that the 7 unit system was the original is confirmed.0
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A person who knows this history well is Frank Romano, president of the Museum of Printing, in Haverhill, Massachusetts. He’s the author of a number of books, including a history of the Linotype Company, and also professor emeritus at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT). I recommend you get in touch with him—he’s a very friendly and helpful guy.
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‘The machine, about the size of a desk, has an ordinary typewriter keyboard. When the operator presses a key the machine photographs a letter either on positive or negative film. The film is transferred directly to engraving plates for printing, thereby eliminating the need for casting each line in metal. An electronic “brain” justifies the lines as they are set. The material also is typed on a sheet of paper, enabling the operator to proofread the work as he proceeds. He can make corrections by pressing a button which “erases” erroneous letters and brings the machine into position to type the correct letter. The machine “sets type” four to five times faster than modern Linotype machines. It was developed by Doctor Bush, his associates at the Carnegie Institution of Washington, and two French telephone engineers who were doing independent work in the same field.’
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That one, however, is built using an Underwood electric typewriter, not a Flexowriter, so it isn't related, despite some resemblance.
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I have learned some more about the early history of the ATF Typesetter.When it first came out in 1958, it actually set type using 5-unit typefaces, just like the ones the Justowriter offered. That made it pretty hard to justify the extra expense of buying one instead of just going for a Justowriter with a carbon ribbon. (No pun intended!)The 7-unit faces came about, apparently, as an effort on the part of ATF to remedy this as quickly as possible. Three slugs on the coding bars indicated the character width, so they could go up to seven units from five without a (major) redesign. Set width was quite flexible on that machine, so other than relabeling the set width gear sets, and rearranging the coding slugs, they may not have had to make substantive changes to the machine at all. In 1960 or 1961, the first 7-unit face for the ATF Typesetter, Baskerville, modified for it by their designer Samuel Winfield Thompson, usually known as Tommy Thompson, was made available.In 1963, the new improved 18-increment ATF Typesetter was announced. They called it an 18-increment version instead of an 18-unit version because of its design, as described in U.S. Patent 3,333,668. The slugs on the coding bars were now arranged as if the underlying Justowriter was handling a 6-unit typeface, and determining if one or two increments of one-third of a unit were to be added to the width of a character was done by putting wires and switches under the keyboard.0
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