Introduction to Graphic Design

We don't have to go to a museum or gallery to see graphic design - it comes to us. Everything from a web site to a ketchup bottle is designed by a visual communication professional. Graphic design and advertising are integral parts of contemporary popular culture.

The desire to communicate has always been a desire of man, as evidence of early cave drawings. Then, as time passed, man used various technologies to improve their communications. For example, the introduction of the Gutenberg press enabled the mass production of books. Photography was then introduced to further our ability to communicate. Computers then incorporated the use of cameras to manipulate and create new pictures.

Graphic Design is defined as a way to communicate ideas to a specific audience, having the ability to cope with constant changes in trends, technology, and tastes. It refers to the application of the design process, which determines the look and structure of human made objects, to visual communication. Graphic design can also be thought of as a visual language that is used to convey a message to an audience. It is a visual representation of an idea that relies on the creation, selection, and organization of visual elements to create an effective communication.

The purpose of graphic design is to present information to an audience through visual communication. Businesses want to portray a certain message with their logos, fliers, advertisements, etc.. During the design process the client defines the visual and verbal needs that must be met, and the designer fulfills those needs. Logos are a way for companies and groups to gain public recognition, and are designed with certain symbols and mental associations (such as emotions and services offered) in mind. Packaging is used as a way to create visual appeal for buyers

Brief History

Design is thousands of years old, but it wasn’t until the industrial revolution that many societies became consumer based and manufacturers needed a way to advertise their products. Design went from a nature base to a manmade reality as discoveries in science, technology and psychology were made. Invention and innovations in computer programs have allowed a more creative and complicated form of graphic design.

Before movable type, the system of printing and typography using movable pieces of metal type, made by casting from matrices struck by letter punches, printing was done by carving a complete image of a page into a piece of wood. The remaining surface area was inked and when a sheet of paper or parchment was pressed down, the ink was transferred and the image was reproduced. This process was tedious and very difficult. The image had to be carved in reverse so errors were abundant and impossible to fix without starting over completely.

In 1041 a type of movable type was developed in China. Clay characters where placed side by side to create the image. Johannes Gutenberg took it the next step 400 years later and produced the first movable metal-type printing press. His most famous work was the Gutenberg Bible (1455). The high quality and relatively low price of the Gutenberg Bible established the superiority of movable type, and printing presses rapidly spread across Europe, leading up to the Renaissance, and later all around the world.

For centuries, the only commercial printing press was the letterpress, a process of assembling metal type characters into a matrix, inking them, then pressing a sheet of paper over them. Phototypesetting, a darkroom-operated mechanical device that projected letters, one at a time, onto a strip of photographic paper, was invented in 1949 but didn’t gather momentum until the 1960s..

In the 1960’s and 70’s printing was divided into two areas. There were those who ran the presses and took care of the finishing details and the graphic designers. Since 1980, graphic designers have evolved their work from the mechanical assembly into the finishing details.

The 20th century introduced numerous technologies, which helped to develop the computer graphics industry. In the 70's creative and artistic exploration stimulated the development of technology to create artistic designs. The introduction of high-end computers in the 80's gave designers and artists the ability to further expand their artistic creativity.
Modern graphic designers spend most of their time on computers developing design ideas and selling them to their clients.

Tricks of the Trade

Even though we live in a rich 3d visual environment we are limited to the confines of the flatlands from print and screen to represent that environment. To compensate for the lack of dimension designers have come up with tricks to fool us into believing that we are viewing objects in 3d.

Some of these tricks are effective and some are not. And though some of these tricks work best in one situation they don’t all work in every situation.

History has brought us through Italian architects the perspective drawing system. Through geometry we trick the eye into seeing depth. Perspective drawings may be the oldest and until recent years the best representation of 3d space.

Another way to represent a three dimensional object is to unfold the object and have each surface represented on a flat plane. This runs you into problems when detail and unsymmetrical lines are present.

When dealing with graphic design, there are basic steps that need to be taken and fulfilled before the designing process should begin.

The first and most important decision to be made is what you want to say in your design. Knowing the purpose of a design will help to decide what and how the message should be communicated. When brainstorming about a designs message, it is important to create a layout of things. Creating a layout will help to organize the visual elements that you wish to implement in your design. It is important to note that adding more visual elements to a design makes it more complicated. Lisa Graham, author of “basics of DESIGN layout and typography for beginners” has come up with a personal motto that can be taken into account and used by all. It states: “Keep It Simple, Stupid” or written short hand as KISS; the idea behind this being to not over kill your design with too many elements.

The second step to creating good design is to decide who your audience is. The better you know your audience the easier it is to create a design that will appeal or persuade. The main goal of many design factors is to attract the attention of your audience and communicate your message effectively.

Once the purpose, message, and audience are set a design format needs to be picked. There are many different design formats: business cards, letterheads, posters, newsletters, banners, CD booklets, billboards, t-shirts, or book jackets.

Elements of Design

1. Primary: Unity, Variety, Hierarchy and Proportion. Supporting principles that affect internal relationships of the design are scale, balance, rhythm, repetition and proximity. Overall design principles include shape, space, line, size, color, texture and typography. Every aspect of the design is interrelated.
1. Unity: Unity is the control of variety. You need variety in your design so that it stands out from the everyday things. However, at the same time to much variety can overwhelm the design and cause confusion for the viewer.
2. Hierarchy: Hierarchy is being able to control where the viewer’s eye goes to first but also allowing the viewer to read and extract the meaning of the design. Initially, the eye will travel to the things that are most unique or which stand out the most. Once the viewer’s attention has been captured, the secondary elements come into play and help to keep the viewer interested. Carefully examine the design making sure that the initial and secondary elements capture a viewer’s attention.
3. Proportion: Outer proportions and inner proportions are related and can make or break a design. The ratio of the golden mean is 1:1.618 and is found in nature. By using this ratio, a design can seem natural to the eye while appearing more interesting than the everyday.
2. Secondary: Scale, Balance, Rhythm and Repetition, and Proximity
1. Scale: Scale is like proportion but on the inside of the design. Scale can help to show relationships between elements and can also help establish a stronger hierarchy in the design.
2. Balance: The visual distribution of elements in a design is balance. Balance can be symmetric and asymmetric. Symmetric distribution is having similar elements on both sides of a central axis. Asymmetric distribution uses uneven elements to create negative and positive space.
3. Rhythm and Repetition- As in music, rhythm in graphic design uses a repetition of objects to create a feel or a mood. Patterns can be related or juxtaposed onto the design but usually evoke a certain emotion.
4. Proximity: Proximity is the placement and space given to elements in a design. Size and distance from other elements play important roles in the layout and grid systems are usually used to determine placement. Having elements close to each other create a sense of association, while having elements farther apart disassociates them.
3. More Elements
1. Shape and Space: Shapes are figures or mass in a design. Curved shapes can be thought of as sensual or soft while angled shapes give the sense of a crystal structure and hardness. Using various shapes can alter the feel of the design. An important thing to remember is the shape of the white spaces. Neutral area can also give certain feels and must be paid attention to.
2. Line: Lines are moving points. By manipulating the curvature of a line, designers can draw the viewer into the composition or point the viewer’s eye to a certain element. The type of line also can alter a design’s feel. Using a harder pen line will mean something different than a softer charcoal line.
3. Color: Color adds a deeper level of emotion and life to a design. Colors can communicate ideas that words and shapes cannot. Color can also be cultural and give a sense of a different time and place.
4. Texture: Texture adds quality and character to an element. Texture can encompass just about anything the designer wants, but cannot stand alone in a design. Without proper space and shape, texture is ineffective and distracting.
5. Typography: Typography is more than just the words on the page. The font and layout of the text can add or detract from the overall design and is one of the more difficult aspects to master. By manipulating type, a designer can create a very powerful message using relatively few words.

The Boy Scouts of America created this image. It exemplifies a lot of the elements of design. The color is used to attract attention as well as help you to remember the recognizable Boy Scout Yellow. Notice the use of shapes. There are lots of circles, which also create some rhythm. The white space is balanced on either side as well.

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With the availability of computer software and the decline in technology pricing, it seems that the market today is completely saturated with designers.

There is a quick guide to design principles they are emphasis, contrast, balance, alignment, repetition, and flow stay read the next chapters to find out more about these design principles.

During the early 2000s, printers started requesting that the jobs be submitted to the shops in PDF form and not in the “native” form. This made it difficult and often impossible to fix errors and the nature of some PDFs meant that the errors were much harder to see.

Images were virtually impossible to reproduce looking lifelike. That is where halftone images came into play. Light would reflect from the original image and travel through a screen and produce halftone dots of varying sizes on a sheet a film, which was then transferred from the film to a plate of zinc or copper. The resulting image was a reverse of the original image and dots would appear in place of the image.
Early computer fonts were bitmapped—the letters were displayed at a single, fixed resolution. PostScript fonts were vector based—the letters could be scaled easily.

As humans we can see a face in two dots and a line :) even though it resembles nothing close to an actual face. We do this becasue our own perceptions of our face is basically what we are aware of most and that is usually just out mouths and our eyes. This fact draws us to comics becasue we give them character though our associations. Comics draw us in and become a part of us when we read them much like a car becomes the extention of our body when we drive it. Self association is why comics are such an important art form and that is why they have been used for centuries.

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