*Footprint Graphics* or *Land Patterns*?

each CAD system developer picked their own names for what you are referring to; footprints, geometries, land patterns, cells, etc. but moving forward into the future we (the IPC) have found it useful to refer to them as "land patterns" and use the name "footprint" in a different way. You can think of a footprint as what you would see if you picked up a component and pushed it into sand or clay, the imprint it leaves would be its footprint, which is its actual physical size. The land pattern on the other hand describes the size of the pads needed to solder the leads to the board, which have wildly differing dimensions depending on what you are trying to do (wave soldering, reflow, high-density, etc.). So for a given part it will have one footprint but maybe several land patterns.
 
And, for the record, even though many of us are trying to use standard terminology, MANY are NOT, so you will still hear people talk about footprints as the pattern you see on a circuit board, probably forever!