Thumbnail Sketch

A quick and rough sketch of what you are about to work on. Good for getting the ideas out of your head and onto the page while you're still in that creative phase.

More terms you might want to know

Typeface Design

The art and discipline of putting together set of typefaces into a harmonious and readable type system. A typeface designer spends much time considering many things such as clear visual message, readability at different sizes, legibility at small point sizes, ease of use for printing processes on its own or over the top of other fonts.

Letterpress

A printing press that uses movable type and punches to make impressions on paper.

Stem

The part of a letter, usually a vertical line, that rise above the x-height.

Abstract Mark

An abstract mark is a type of logo where instead of being a recognizable object from everyday life, it is an abstract geometric form representing a business or brand. Famous examples include the BP starburst logo, and the Pepsi divided circle.

Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

A term that means the smallest amount of work that can be done to move a project forward.

PDF File

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.

Hierarchy

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.

Card Sorting

A UX design technique in which you divide your users into groups, show them cards with different names for unrelated objects and ask them to categorise them.

Thumbnail

A small, non-preview image that accompanies a larger image. It provides an immediate sense of the content while not necessarily revealing it in its entire scope.

Type Size

The height of a font, measured in points or pixels.

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