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 well-known cognitive psychologist's principle that says that the time it takes to make a decision varies logarithmically according to the number of choices. As more options are presented, more decision time is required due to the mental work of comparing and contrasting each potential option.
A printing term that describes how close an object is to the edge of a printed page. Bleeds are often used in graphic design for books, magazines, posters and other printed materials with photographs or illustrations.
A decoration technique used primarily on paper, metal, and some plastics in which ink or another printing medium is pressed into the material's surface to create a three-dimensional effect.
Colours that have a relation in their hue. A colour wheel can be used to help identify analogous colours. Analogous colours are typically found next to each other on the colour wheel.
Small uppercase letters, generally about half as tall as regular uppercase letters.
The feeling or mood created by a design.
A type of user interface design carefully crafted to trick people into doing things they might not want to do.
Also known as the divine proportion, is a number, or a ratio, sometimes approximated by phi and widely considered aesthetically pleasing. The golden ratio has been featured in nature and art in many ways, including hexagonal honeycombs, the human body, and mathematics. More frequently, it is used in design and digital art to represent a path (or steps) one can take to achieve a particular look or result. In art, an artist may produce something (a painting or drawing, for example) using the golden ratio as a basis for its composition.
The principle of both sides of an object having a sense of symmetry. It ensures that the weight and visual mass are distributed evenly on both sides of a surface. Balance is more important than symmetry because people don't often notice when something is asymmetrical, but they will always see if something is unbalanced.
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.