2.7: Visual Communication Design
1. The essence of visual communication design is the use of ________ to communicate information
and ideas.
a. Internet d. words
b. prints e. pictures
c. symbols
2. The first people (c. 3400 BCE) to employ picture symbols in a consistent language system were
the ________.
a. Indians d. Greeks
b. Mesoamericans e. Mesopotamians
c. Romans
3. Egyptian picture symbols are called ________.
a. hieroglyphs d. calligraphy
b. cuneiform e. letterforms
c. script
4. Wherever literacy takes hold, ________ usually develops as a form of art that expresses layers of
meaning and feelings by means of the shape of the written letterforms.
a. cuneiform d. typeface
b. hieroglyphics e. media
c. calligraphy
5. Wang Xizhi was one of the great calligraphers of the Jin Dynasty from this ancient culture.
a. China d. Persia
b. Japan e. Siam
c. India
6. These handwritten, illustrated books were created during the Middle Ages.
a. papyrus scrolls d. Books of the Dead
b. Gutenberg’s Bibles e. I Ching
c. illuminated manuscripts
7. How has the inclusion of headings, page numbers, illustrations, and boldface and italic type
changed the way that we communicate compared to that of handwritten manuscripts? Describe
how each of these innovations may have changed the way the written word is perceived.
8. The visual form of printed letters, words, and text is called ________.
a. media d. layout
b. calligraphy e. hieroglyphics
c. typography
9. The art of typography came into existence with the introduction of this invention.
a. cotton gin d. movable type
b. the automobile e. the wheel
c. moving pictures
10. Who was the German inventor of the printing press and movable type?
a. Johannes Gutenberg d. Charlemagne
b. Albrecht Dürer e. John Baskerville
c. Hieronymus Bosch
11. In 1525, this German master printmaker wrote a manual establishing the first set of rules for the
construction of letterforms.
a. Nolde d. Beckmann
b. Dürer e. Gutenberg
c. Rembrandt
12. Albrecht Dürer’s standard of letterforms was based on the alphabetic characters of this culture.
a. China d. Greece
b. Germany e. Rome
c. France
13. This is a group of letterforms designed to have a uniform appearance.
a. codex d. carriage
b. layout e. serif
c. font
14. The marks that are added to a letterform that were derived from the chisel marks created for words
incised on Roman buildings are called ________.
a. serifs d. accents
b. codex e. carriages
c. italics
15. If you were to design a party invitation, you might put important information, such as the date,
time, and place in ________.
a. bold type d. a different font
b. a larger font e. any of the other answers
c. a different color
16. Find two examples each of serif and sans-serif fonts. Where would each of these fonts be most
appropriate? Why do we need so many different kinds of font? How does changing the font affect
what is being communicated?
17. The ________ was a German school of art and design that operated in the early twentieth century.
The students at the school were immersed in the idea that “form follows function.”
a. Bauhaus d. Hudson River School
b. Royal Academy e. Academy of Fine Arts, Munich
c. Kunstakademie Düsseldorf
18. The German designer Herbert Bayer created a sans-serif typeface called ________ that could not
be immediately associated with any one culture.
a. Universal d. Arial
b. Helvetica e. Baskerville
c. Garamond
19. Mies Van der Rohe, who was Head of the Bauhaus, is often remembered for saying:
a. “less is more” d. “the future is now”
b. “form follows function” e. “straight and narrow”
c. “machine for living”
20. This is most often a carefully designed piece of type that is unique and easily identified.
a. logo d. serif
b. codex e. carriage
c. font
21. The Ford Motor Company created a logo from this handwriting style, which was practiced in
nineteenth-century America.
a. Blackletter script d. D’Nealian script
b. Edwardian script e. Zaner-Bloser script
c. Spencerian script
22. This pictorial logo, used to identify Chevrolet products, has come to replace words when
identifying the company.
a. ram’s head d. lightning bolt
b. apple e. jaguar
c. bowtie
23. When you think about famous logos, which three are the first to spring to mind? Do these three
logos all share similar characteristics? Are they an image, a text, or a mixture of both? What is it
about these particular logos that make them stand out to you?
24. These simple, symbolic graphics are often used for products that people of many different cultures
use, so that there is no need for language translation:
a. icons d. trademarks
b. citations e. patents
c. hieroglyphics
25. Images that are created to inform as well as to embellish a written or printed text are called:
a. cuneiform d. charms
b. hieroglyphics e. dingbats
c. illustrations
26. If you were to design an instruction manual for building a car, good illustration as well as text
would be vital.
27. The nineteenth-century artists Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris created a handcrafted
version of this writer’s works as a rejection of rampant industrialization.
a. Chaucer d. Brothers Grimm
b. Plato e. Homer
c. Shakespeare
28. James Montgomery Flagg created an illustration of this character, who the artist used for
recruitment posters during World Wars I and II.
a. Doonesbury d. Uncle Sam
b. Garfield e. Rosie the Riveter
c. Beetle Bailey
29. This type of image is generated by math-based computer applications often used by designers who
create illustrations in digital media.
a. vector d. hologram
b. raster e. pointillist
c. carriage
30. The Portuguese-born illustrator Jorge Colombo uses this personal device to draw his illustrations,
including covers for The New Yorker magazine .
a. stylus d. iPhone
b. photocopy machine e. personal computer
c. mimeograph machine
31. This is the art of organizing type, logos, and illustrations in traditional print media:
a. typography d. vectoring
b. layout design e. rasterizing
c. marginalia
32. This is the name that refers to the empty space around type or other features in a layout.
a. white space d. flat
b. measure e. mean line
c. carriage
33. White space is always a bad thing in layout design.
34. This nineteenth-century French artist is highly regarded for the outstanding layout design of his
posters for a Parisian nightclub called the Moulin Rouge.
a. Toulouse-Lautrec d. Cézanne
b. van Gogh e. Matisse
c. Degas
35. Designers created advertising materials for Tyco by manipulating fonts into the image of a young
woman to support the tagline “A Vital Part of Your World.” Do you think the result is visually
effective? What does it make you feel about what Tyco is selling? Do you think there are any
ethical issues involved with using visual communication design in this way?
36. The primary colors that make up the basis for commercial printing are ________.
a. cyan, magenta, yellow
b. red, green, blue
c. red, yellow, blue
d. orange, green, purple
e. ultraviolet, infrared, spectral yellow
37. Commercial printing uses an area of patterned dots called a ________. The dots vary in size
depending on the level of color needed.
a. screen d. duotone
b. offset e. matrix
c. span
38. The primary colors used to create color in an electronic display are ________.
a. red, green, blue
b. cyan, magenta, yellow
c. red, yellow, blue
d. orange, yellow, purple
e. ultraviolet, infrared, spectral yellow
39. Video-gaming tournaments create competitive sporting events for large groups of spectators to
experience at the same time. The use of video monitors and digital projection devices make it
possible to view competitions between players in such games as ________.
a. Starcraft d. competitive rowing
b. dressage e. cornhole
c. backgammon
40. This medium has made it possible for designers to make their page design “come alive” by
allowing interactivity through hyperlinks.
a. cell phones d. World Wide Web
b. television e. fax machines
c. radio
41. This type of design can incorporate text, image, recorded sound, and moving images.
a. layout design d. typography
b. web design e. none of the other answers
c. calligraphy
42. This American web designer created a website at the Carolina Photojournalism Workshop that
cleverly integrates image and text.
a. Moser-Katz d. Flintstone
b. Stella e. Rubble
c. Winfrey
43. Interactive web designs engage a viewer using changing visual, sound, and interactive features. A
great example of this was the website created for an exhibition at the __________ of the work of
the Belgian artist René Magritte.
a. Museum of Modern Art d. Corcoran Gallery
b. Metropolitan Museum of Art e. Getty Museum
c. Whitney Museum
44. Visual communication design supports better communication. Find information related to the
butterfly ballot used in Florida during the 2000 Presidential election. Did bad design affect the
outcome of a major political event in American history during this election, or would the outcome
have been the same regardless of the quality of the visual communication design? Give your
reasons why, or why not.