A PNG (Portable Network Graphics) file is a bitmap image format that has been designed to store images with an alpha channel. This format is primarily used for transparency so that it can be placed over other graphics in many design applications.
An abbreviation for Portable Document Format. The PDF format was originally developed to share documents between different operating systems in the late 1980s. Any text document, image or page layout can be saved as a PDF file that includes all of the font information needed to display it without losing quality.
A way of developing new products or services using a process of repeated and regular refinement, in which prototypes are made, evaluated, revised, and re-evaluated until the desired result is achieved. High profile companies have successfully implemented iterative design to create effective and innovative products.
A type of font that comes pre-installed in an operating system.
The process of arranging type to make written material readable. The arrangement of type involves decisions about individual letters and words (e.g. line spacing, letter spacing, and word spacing) and more significant page layout decisions (e.g., margins, headline position on the page).
A data visualisation tool that can be used to explore and group people's thoughts or reactions to a set of concepts. Affinity diagrams are often used in user research and design thinking as an experimental technique for generating new ideas or solutions.
The emergent patterns in these visual representations can help identify which aspects your audience will respond well to, thus enabling decisions on the information architecture and next steps in the process.
It is important to note that affinity diagrams were initially developed for qualitative research but have since been adapted for quantitative research (though they are not typically used with statistical data).
The distance between two points of extrusion or an object. It can also be defined as the measurement of size.
The art and science of arranging information so that it's intuitive to find, easy to navigate, presents a cohesive design, meets accessibility guidelines, looks attractive on any device or screen size and ultimately drives behaviour change.
Scope creep is when the scope of a project starts to grow without any agreement on how it's going to be paid for. Creep happens because items and features are tacked on top of the original scope of work agreed upon in the original contract.
Vector graphics are made up of two sets of points: control points (which determine shape) and anchor points (determining length). Anchor points attach geometry to form a shape like a ball or a heart.
An imaginary line on which most letters "sit". As such, it equals the height of an em square. The expected result of a baseline is to reference the height with which text is aligned. The alignment ranges from ascenders, which are the upper strokes in b, d, and h, down to descenders like j or y.