• 50 questions

NOCTI Advertising and Design Practice Test

Unofficial practice for NOCTI Advertising and Design: typography, color, layout, drawing, printing, photography, image editing and copyright.

A new large-format printer is plugged in, but the computer cannot operate it. Which software is missing?

Pick an answer, then press Check answer. Then you see Correct or Not quite, with the reason. Keys: A to D pick, Enter checks.

Print covers the next 50 questions. Share this set copies a link to the same questions in the same order.

Exam mode: 50 questions, 45 minutes.

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Unofficial practice questions, not affiliated with NOCTI. Bank checked October 16, 2026.

Next step Another NOCTI test: Computer TechnologyMore art and design: FTCE Art K-12

All 50 questions

Computer Literacy 7

  • A designer has a large layout open when the power fails. Why is the unsaved work in RAM gone? Wikipedia, Random-access memory. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Computer Literacy
  • A new large-format printer is plugged in, but the computer cannot operate it. Which software is missing? Wikipedia, Device driver. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Computer Literacy
  • Colors on a studio monitor do not match the printed proofs. What is the aim of color calibration of the monitor? Wikipedia, Color calibration. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Computer Literacy
  • In the file name "poster_final_v3.pdf", what does the suffix ".pdf" tell the computer and the user? Wikipedia, Filename extension. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Computer Literacy
  • Project files are moved from a hard disk drive to a solid-state drive (SSD). What sets the SSD apart? Wikipedia, Solid-state drive. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Computer Literacy
  • What is a backup of project files? Wikipedia, Backup. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Computer Literacy
  • Which peripheral optically scans a printed photo or a pencil sketch and converts it to a digital image? Wikipedia, Image scanner. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Computer Literacy
Show all 50 questions (43 more)

Typography 6

  • A proofreader writes "stet" in the margin beside a correction. What does the mark tell the typesetter? Wikipedia, List of proofreader's marks, Abbreviations. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Typography
  • A text column is 18 picas wide. How wide is that in inches? Wikipedia, Pica (typography). Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Typography; the arithmetic was worked twice
  • In typography, what is leading? Wikipedia, Leading. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Typography
  • What does the x-height of a typeface measure? Wikipedia, X-height. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Typography
  • What does tracking (letter spacing) change in a line or block of text? Wikipedia, Letter spacing. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Typography
  • What is a serif? Wikipedia, Serif. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Typography

Digital Literacy and Application 10

  • A flyer has a photo that runs to the very edge of the sheet. What is the bleed? Wikipedia, Bleed (printing). Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application
  • A logo that is 4 inches wide must be enlarged to 10 inches wide. At what percentage is it scaled? Written to the NOCTI Job Ready Credential Blueprint for Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application; the answer is arithmetic on the numbers in the question, worked twice
  • A magazine designer sets up a grid before placing any content. What is the grid for? Wikipedia, Grid (graphic design). Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application
  • A print shop mails 5,000 postcards, each with a different name and offer pulled from a database, in one press run. What is this kind of printing called? Wikipedia, Variable data printing. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application
  • A web banner must keep an aspect ratio of 16:9. If it is 1,920 pixels wide, how tall is it? Wikipedia, Aspect ratio (image). Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application; the arithmetic was worked twice
  • At the start of a logo project a designer fills a page with thumbnail sketches. What are they for? Wikipedia, Thumbnail, Thumbnail sketch. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application
  • In 3-D design, what is a wire-frame model? Wikipedia, Wire-frame model. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application
  • In page design, what is white space? Wikipedia, White space (visual arts). Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application
  • Three icons sit close together on a poster and a fourth sits far away. By the law of proximity, how do viewers read the three? Wikipedia, Gestalt psychology, Law of proximity. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application
  • What is a comprehensive layout, or comp? Wikipedia, Comprehensive layout. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Literacy and Application

Color Theory and Application 5

  • A brochure uses red, red-orange and orange. What kind of color scheme is that? Wikipedia, Analogous colors. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Color Theory and Application
  • A client asks that the logo color be given as a PMS number. What is the Pantone Matching System (PMS)? Wikipedia, Pantone. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Color Theory and Application
  • A designer needs a tint of a brand blue. How is a tint made? Wikipedia, Tint, shade and tone. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Color Theory and Application
  • In four-color printing, what is the K in CMYK? Wikipedia, CMYK color model. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Color Theory and Application
  • Two strongly colored complementary colors are placed side by side in an ad. What is the effect? Wikipedia, Complementary colors. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Color Theory and Application

Digital Illustration and Drawing 5

  • An illustrator shades a drawing with nothing but small dots, packed closer where it is darker. What is the technique called? Wikipedia, Stippling. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Illustration and Drawing
  • Graphite pencils are made of clay and graphite. What does adding more clay do to a pencil? Wikipedia, Pencil, Grading and classification. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Illustration and Drawing
  • In a vector drawing program, what defines the shape of a Bezier curve? Wikipedia, Bézier curve. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Illustration and Drawing
  • Shading is built from closely spaced parallel lines, then a second set is drawn at an angle across the first. What is the result called? Wikipedia, Hatching. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Illustration and Drawing
  • Which input device lets an illustrator hand draw images into the computer with a pen-like stylus? Wikipedia, Graphics tablet. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Illustration and Drawing

Production and Printing 4

  • A client needs 50,000 catalogs. For which kind of job is offset printing best suited? Wikipedia, Offset printing, Modern offset printing. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Production and Printing
  • A club orders 200 printed T-shirts. Which printing technique pushes ink through a mesh, except where a stencil blocks it? Wikipedia, Screen printing. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Production and Printing
  • A newspaper photo looks like continuous gray tones, but under a loupe it is made of dots. What is this technique called? Wikipedia, Halftone. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Production and Printing
  • Before files go to the press, a production artist preflights them. What does preflight confirm? Wikipedia, Preflight (printing). Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Production and Printing

Communication and Career Skills Within the Work Environment 3

  • A designer creates a symbol that will identify a company's goods in the marketplace. What kind of intellectual property is such a mark? U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, What is a trademark?. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Communication and Career Skills Within the Work Environment
  • A designer draws an original illustration for a client. From what moment does copyright protect it? U.S. Copyright Office, What is Copyright?. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Communication and Career Skills Within the Work Environment
  • To limit eye and neck strain, where does the OSHA workstation guide put the top line of a monitor screen? OSHA eTool, Computer Workstations: Monitors, Monitor Quick Tips. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Communication and Career Skills Within the Work Environment

Multimedia and Photography 6

  • A camera is set to save raw files instead of finished pictures. What does a camera raw file hold? Wikipedia, Raw image format. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Multimedia and Photography
  • A photographer wants to freeze a soccer player in mid-kick. Which shutter speed setting does that? Wikipedia, Shutter speed. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Multimedia and Photography
  • A product photo is shot in dim light at a very high ISO setting. What is the usual cost to the image? Wikipedia, Film speed. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Multimedia and Photography
  • A voice-over is exported as an MP3. What was the MP3 format designed to do? Wikipedia, MP3. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Multimedia and Photography
  • Photos for a slide presentation arrive as HEIF files. What is the High Efficiency Image File Format? Wikipedia, High Efficiency Image File Format. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Multimedia and Photography
  • To be sure of one good exposure, a photographer takes several shots of the same product at different camera settings. What is this technique called? Wikipedia, Bracketing. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Multimedia and Photography

Digital Image Manipulation 4

  • A photo will print 6 inches wide and 4 inches tall at 300 pixels per inch. What pixel dimensions does it need? Written to the NOCTI Job Ready Credential Blueprint for Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Image Manipulation; the answer is arithmetic on the numbers in the question, worked twice
  • How is a vector graphic built? Wikipedia, Vector graphics. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Image Manipulation
  • In an image editor, a layer mask is added to a photo layer and part of it is painted black. What happens to that part of the layer? Wikipedia, Layers (digital image editing), Layer mask. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Image Manipulation
  • Why is the GIF format a poor choice for a color photograph? Wikipedia, GIF. Written to NOCTI Advertising and Design (4219), Digital Image Manipulation

How this list was compiled: Our own questions, written to the competency list of the Job Ready Credential Blueprint for Advertising and Design (code 4219, version 01, copyright 2022) that NOCTI publishes at https://www.nocti.org/wp-content/uploads/Blueprints/JRAdvDes4219.pdf , read 2026-10-15 and again 2026-10-16: a written assessment of 202 questions in 3 hours over nine areas (Computer Literacy 14%; Typography 12%; Digital Literacy and Application 20%; Color Theory and Application 10%; Digital Illustration and Drawing 10%; Production and Printing 7%; Communication and Career Skills Within the Work Environment 7%; Multimedia and Photography 12%; Digital Image Manipulation 8%), plus a performance assessment of two jobs. This bank holds 50 in those proportions. The Teacher assessment for Advertising and Design (code 5319) prints the same nine areas and weights. Every definition was read on 2026-10-15 or 2026-10-16 on the public page named under its question: Wikipedia, the U.S. Copyright Office, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and the OSHA computer workstations eTool. Every size and count is made up for the drill, and each computed answer is arithmetic that was worked twice. Licence: Questions, choices and explanations are original work of this site.

How it works

This free NOCTI Advertising and Design practice test has 50 questions of our own, sorted by the nine areas of Job Ready blueprint 4219. It is unofficial and not affiliated with NOCTI, which does not sponsor, endorse or review it.

Read the full guide

Nine areas, in the blueprint's shares

Digital Literacy and Application is 20% of the written assessment and Computer Literacy 14%. Typography and Multimedia and Photography are 12% each, Color Theory and Digital Illustration 10% each, Digital Image Manipulation 8%, and Production and Printing and Communication and Career Skills 7% each.

The clock

All 50 questions in 45 minutes is the pace of the written assessment. The blueprint prints no pass mark, so a round ends in a score and no verdict.

Left to the workstation

The two performance jobs need design software and a printer: a computer comprehensive prepared and printed to the given specifications, and a flyer redesign exported as a PDF and printed.

  • Six picas make an inch and twelve points make a pica, so 72 points make an inch.
  • A tint adds white, a shade adds black and a tone adds gray.
  • Print size in inches times pixels per inch gives the pixel dimensions a photo needs.

Questions and answers

How many questions are on the NOCTI Advertising and Design test?

The Job Ready blueprint, code 4219, lists 202 written questions in 3 hours, given in one, two or three sessions. The two performance jobs take another 2 hours and 45 minutes.

Is this also practice for the NOCTI Teacher test in advertising and design?

Yes. The Teacher assessment, code 5319, prints the same nine areas with the same weights and 202 questions in 3 hours, so one practice test serves both.

Where can I find the NOCTI Advertising and Design blueprint?

NOCTI posts it free at nocti.org/credentials/blueprints. The PDF lists every competency, the weight of each area and ten sample questions, and none of those samples is used or reworded here.

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