Abstract: In an electronic pattern generator characters to be recorded are displayed on the screen of a cathode ray tube and then exposed on a recording medium mounted on a carrier, which is displacable in a plane parallel to the plane of the screen.The characters are displayed from video-data recallable from a store. The recalled video-data are transformed into a first video signal for the brightness control of the electron beam of the cathode ray tube into first deflection signals for the beam and into displacement signals for the carrier.For controlling the make-up and composing process the characters are displayed identically on a further screen of a soft copy terminal independently of the display on the screen of the cathode ray tube.By identical display it is understood, that the various type fonts and sizes of characters are not displayed in an unitary fashion, but in the original font of writing, as they will appear later in the typographical composition on the recording medium.