A concept used in systems design to describe the negative consequences of making seemingly innocuous design changes. Shorthand for a product's delayed but inevitable need to be reworked due to earlier, seemingly trivial decisions not having been fully thought through in the original release.
Designers incur this "debt" by making quick and easy choices that save time in the present but cause more complex problems later on down the road when it becomes necessary to change or add something.
Also known as visual hierarchy, hierarchy is the ordering of priorities in a design. This may include different visual elements, such as contrast, colour, font size and placement on a page. The graphic designer's job is to create an understandable document using organisational systems that the reader easily understands.
Small uppercase letters, generally about half as tall as regular uppercase letters.
A generic term for adding colour to an image. A tint can be applied by darkening a colour to create different shades or lightening the saturation, creating a washed-out look.
A discipline that analyses the usability of an application by assessing its interaction design and user experience.
An element that prompts viewers to take a desired course of action. This type of marketing technique is used by businesses and marketers to increase page visits or sales in a certain period.
The end (straight or curved) of any stroke that doesn’t include a serif. Some typefaces feature ball terminals on letters such as the ‘f’, ‘a’, and ‘c’.
A Tagged Image File Format is a file format for storing images losslessly.
The surface quality of an element.
A type of font that comes pre-installed in an operating system.
Also known as text colour, is a visible attribute of text determined by the combination of text and background colour.