Chemin de fer

[Alan Marshall <AlanMarshall1@xxxxxxx>]

    Chemin de fer (no hyphens) is translated by Jean-Paul Roth in his
"Dictionnaire des termes typographiques et de design" (the French
version of
Michael Barnard's "Pocket glossary of design and typographic terms") as
"flat plan".
    There may possibly be a slight confusion here with what is sometimes
known as a "press form plan" ("plan d'imposition" in French). A "flat",
in
"traditional" (post hot-metal) usage, is what the French call a
"montage",
i.e. a fully assembled film
imposition ready for exposure onto the plate. The press form plan (flat
plan?) thus indicates the number of plates/printings/signatures required
for
a given book. It is an essential stage in the planning, costing, design
and
production of a book but is rather less detailed than a "chemin de fer".
    The always reliable Ken Garland in "Graphic, design and printing
terms"
indicates that the term "thumbnail layout it is widely used in the US as
a
substitute for 'flat plan". This seems to me the most appropriate
translation of chemin de fer because it corresponds to current usage in
a
wide variety of software applications.
    The English and French terms are probably of recent origin (though
they
may conceivably have been very specific design terms in the days before
design
and printing became the graphic arts) as they do not figure in any of
the
older dictionaries of graphic arts terms such as the ubiquitous "Pocket
pal"
(regularly updated and reprinted since the 1930s), Schuwer's
"Dictionnaire
de l'édition" (1977 edition), Nitsche's "Polygraph dictionary" (1990),
Faudouas' "Dictionaiore des industries graphiques" (1989), Rambousek's
multilingual "Polygraficky slovnik" (1967). Likewise neither the English
nor
the French terms appear in any of the authoritative printing manuals
before
the 1980s (or later). Or in classics like the "Bookman's glossary".
    In "Systematic aspects of book design" (1978), Stanley Rice talks
about
a "predummy" (the next step being the "dummy" which consists of roughly
pasted-up galley proofs).
    Collins defines "mock-up" as (among other things) "a layout of
printed
matter", though the term can also be applied to a dummy.
    The term "layout" is too general to translate "chemin de fer". A
thumbnail layout is a layout but a layout is not necessarily a chemin de
fer
(if you see what I mean).

Alan Marshall