From decoration to illustration

Images and decoration applied by hand were common in manuscripts, therefore solutions were immediately sought to insert them in printed books.
Printed copies were finished with hand decoration. In the 1470s some printers used decorative wooden blocks to impress, on individual copies, decorations which were often coloured in by hand. From the 1480s onwards, illustrations – woodcuts or metalcuts – were set with the text, to save time. Then they might be coloured in by hand.

Credits: Cristina Dondi - Printing R-Evolution Exhibition, https://www.printingrevolution.eu/virtual-exhibition-printing-revolution/
Sebastiano Girardi Studio, Venice