勤
Symbols Virtues
diligence
ㄑㄧㄣˊ qín
Two versions of the same picture, and both are free with no account and no watermark. The first has no background at all, which is the one to send your artist — but a phone or computer photo viewer set to dark will show black strokes on dark grey and it can look like nothing downloaded. If that happens, use the second one: identical characters on a plain white background. Either way you get the characters on their own — the square and the faint guide lines you see above are not in the file. Each character is 1000px, so a two-character download is 2000×1000, and the script and layout are the ones you picked.
Script
Characters
Same in both
Layout
Rubbing mode: white on black, as a stone rubbing. The download is unaffected.
Working steadily and attentively, without needing to be pushed.
Before you commit
Choose with care勤 is warm but ordinary. It is the word a teacher writes on a report card, so it reads as praise rather than as a personal motto.
JapaneseShared with Japanese, where it carries the same sense of diligence and also the idea of service or attendance at work.
At small sizesThirteen strokes split left and right. The left side is dense and will fill in on small or curved placements.
Meaning
Diligent, hardworking, regular in effort.
The default character for diligence in school, work and family praise.
Other characters for “diligence”
What to do next
Pick the script and layout you want above, download the PNG, and send that file to your artist. Ask them to work from the file rather than redrawing the character freehand — that is where strokes go missing.
Related concepts