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Designers Glossary

  • Posted by nick on 17/05/2007 at 03:03 AM

A crash course in designer’s jargon.

As we like to make clear we try our hardest not to talk Designer Jargon. Sometimes there is just no other way, so this short crash course of definitions should be useful. The below definitions will most likely be used on your projects.

Low Resolution

Commonly used within web based materials of computer output devices; producing images that is not sharply defined.

High Resolution

Printing high quality images requires 300 DPI (dots per inch). This produces images that are sharp and finely detailed;

CMYK

(Cyan Magenta Yellow blacK) The colour space used for commercial printing and most colour computer printers. In theory, cyan, magenta and yellow (CMY) can print all colours, but inks are not pure and black comes out muddy. The black ink (K) is required for quality printing.

RGB

(Red Green Blue) The computers native colour space. It is also the colour system for capturing images and displaying them. Human eyes are sensitive to red, green and blue, and all colours are perceived as a combination of the R, G and B.

Spot Colours

A colour that is printed from one printing plate which contains one matched colour of ink. Spot colours are used when only one or two solid colours are needed on a page or when a colour has to match perfectly and be consistent such as with a company logo or when colours are the trademark of the organisation or message. For example, you can be sure that IBM’s “Big Blue” colour is a carefully chosen spot colour mix that the company is quite particular about! If a spot colour is used along with process colour, then a four-color print job becomes a five or six-colour job.

Serif Fonts

Short horizontal lines added to the tops and bottoms of traditional typefaces, such as Times Roman.

San Serif Fonts

A typeface style without serifs, which are the short horizontal lines added at the tops and bottoms of the vertical member of the letter. Helvetica is a common sans-serif font.

Logo

A name, symbol, or trademark designed for easy and definite recognition.

Corporate Branding

Corporate branding refers to the practice of using a company’s name as a product brand name. It is an attempt to leverage corporate brand equity to create product brand recognition. Corporate branding can result in significant economies of scope since one advertising campaign can be used for several products. It also facilitates new product acceptance because potential buyers are already familiar with the name.

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