drawings which has taken place within the past few years has led to a
remarkable increase in the publication of architects' designs, both in
the technical journals and in the popular magazines and daily press.
Undoubtedly the recent progress of architectural design in America is
largely due to the opportunity for comparison thus placed within the
reach of architects and draughtsmen who could not otherwise place their
productions beside those of their fellows. So important has this become
that an architectural paper is now usually judged almost entirely upon
the quality of its illustrations, the text matter being not only
secondary, but in some cases serving only as a vehicle for the plates.
In fact, some of the most valuable and most highly esteemed
architectural publications are entirely devoid of text.

It naturally happens that many of the drawings made in the ordinary
course of an architect's work sooner or later fall into the hands of the
publishers of some of the architectural papers or are required for
publication in other directions. When such drawings have been made
without a proper knowledge of the requirements of the reproductive
processes the result is frequently very unsatisfactory, and in many
cases gives an entirely unfair impression of the design, while this
difficulty might have been easily avoided by a little forethought, and
without any additional labor.

A few fundamental points which can always be kept in mind will enable
draughtsmen to make sure that their work will reproduce well, that is to
say, will give a fairly truthful reproduction of the original drawing.

There are at present in use a large number of printing processes
depending upon photography as a basis, by which drawings may be
duplicated, but they can be roughly divided into two main classes