REAM.
480 sheets of paper.

RECEPTIVITY.
In printing terminology, a surface is said to be receptive if it retains the ink well. The word is applied to the rollers, the paper, or the plates to be inked. Too much ink makes the impression heavy and thick, too little will render it pale and irregular. Receptivity is also applicable to the rubber rollers used in offset lithography, as well as to a freshly glued surface in its "receptivity" of the other surface which is to adhere to it.

RECTO.
(1) The front of an object. (2) The right hand page of an open book or manuscript.

REGISTRATION.
Owing to the number of plates or blocks, etc., used in color printing, a careful registration is required to ensure that each element prints in the correct position. The method of doing it varies according to the technique. In intaglio printing and lithography, needles are pierced through the paper into holes, specially placed for this purpose in the plate or stone.

RELIEF.
As opposed to intaglio and planographic printing, the black areas of an impression taken from a block cut in relief are made by inking the raised parts, thereby leaving the furrows to print white.

REPRODUCTION.
Before the introduction of photography, a work was reproduced by either copying it identically, or interpreting it as closely as possible if a different technique to that of the original was used. Engraving, wood engraving and lithography were the most common methods of reproduction. A print is therefore termed reproductive if it is made by someone other than the artist of the original design, as opposed to an original print which is made by the artist himself. These distinctions are many times blurred in contemporary print-making where it seems that these days anything goes.

RESTORATION.
Usually refers to corrective and restorative measures to compensate for damages, deterioration and other defects. An attempt is made to return the work, if not to its original condition, to a satisfactory aesthetic state. Restoration is now considered an aspect of conservation.

REVERSE, IN.
1. The design of a print is always drawn in the reverse sense on the block, plate or stone, so that it will print the correct way round. 2. An image is reversed in all printing procedures except screenprinting. The engraver, lithographer or woodcutter must, accordingly, always work in reverse to his original design; a mirror is sometimes employed as an aid.

REWORK.
When part of the printing element has been corrected or touched up.

ROULETTE.
An engraver's tool, having a revolving circular head, with either a single serrated edge (the simple roulette), or a wider surface dotted or lined in a variety of forms. It is used in some of the dot processes (also known as crayon manner) with the aim of creating areas of tone on an impression; may be used either directly on the metal plate or through the intervention of an etching ground. A tool similar to the simple roulette was used, particularly in the nineteenth century, to perforate drawings (See pricking); and, in letterpress, to make dotted lines on sheets destined to be detached.

ROYAL.
A format of paper (620 X 500 mm.).

RUBBING.
A method of taking an impression from a relief block with a leather rubber or a burnisher used manually on the verso-of the paper. Rubbing in lithography. 1. Rubbing ink is a soft ink applied directly to the stone with the fingertip when drawing the design. 2. A crayon or ink drawing may be rubbed with a stump or a brush to create a soft effect.