Word.ws English Dictionary

surprint

surprint noun: the printing of text or graphics elements on top of a background that is a different tint of the same color.

Noun

surprint (countable and uncountable, plural surprints)

  1. The printing of text or graphics elements on top of a background that is a different tint of the same color.
    • "Dropout" is obviously the opposite of surprint in that during the process of preparing the plate the "line" shape (type or drawing) is deleted from the halftone or screen film negative of any one color or combination of colors.1980, Tom Cardamone, Mechanical color separation skills for the commercial artist, page 41
    • To use this chart to decide if type should be surprinted or reversed over a portion of a photograph or in a screened area, find the shade of gray that most closely matches the area and see if the surprint or reverse is more readable.1985, Judy E. Pickens, The copy-to-press handbook: preparing words and art for print

Verb

surprint (third-person singular simple present surprints, present participle surprinting, simple past and past participle surprinted)

  1. To print text or graphics elements on top of a background that is a different tint of the same color.
    • Only lines and areas which are to print as blacks or solids can be surprinted.1924, Harry Appleton Groesbeck, The Process and Practice of Photo-engraving, page 96
    • Don't decide to "strip this" or "surprint that" unless you are sure of your ground, and even then you may well leave the decision to the engraver.1930, Harry Appleton Groesbeck, Practical photo-engraving, page 101

Forms of surprint

Noun
pluralsurprints
Verb
third-person singular presentsurprints
present participlesurprinting
past participlesurprinted
pastsurprinted

Origin of surprint

From sur- + print.

Questions about surprint

What does surprint mean?
Surprint means the printing of text or graphics elements on top of a background that is a different tint of the same color.
What part of speech is surprint?
Surprint can be a noun or a verb.
What is the plural of surprint?
The plural of surprint is surprints.

Words near surprint in the dictionary

  1. surplussing
  2. surpoose
  3. surpooses
  4. Surprenant
  5. Surprenants
  6. surprint
  7. surprinted
  8. surprinting
  9. surprints
  10. surpris'd
  11. surprisable

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: surprint (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “surprint.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/surprint. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.