They provide a visual shorthand that condenses action and eliminates the unimportant.

A visual shorthand has developed, a nod, a look, that signals their common anticipation.

Even today, the Art Deco style is visual shorthand for "Hollywood."

This visual shorthand had parallels with some of the most advanced techniques of his day.

In some scenes, that requires an extraordinary visual shorthand.

It is visual shorthand that compels her instead.

For many young Hispanics, he said, they are a visual shorthand that signals their identity.

Forms are simplified, reduced to visual shorthand, yet the familiar feeling of the locales remains strong.

They were visual shorthand for being technologically progressive, in Coolidge's case.

But the visual shorthand is entirely legible, as the viewer completes the picture with firsthand experience of such objects and places.