Aparent Visual Magnitude - "Visual magnitude" is a scale used by astronomers to measure the brightness of a star. The term "visual" means the brightness is being measured in the visible part of the spectrum, the part you can see with your eye (usually around 5500 angstroms).

Astronomers usually refer to "apparent magnitudes", that is, how bright a star appears to us here at Earth. Apparent magnitudes are often written with a lower case "m".

For more on magnitude see http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/academy/universe/mag.html