MODULE 6: IMAGING AND DESIGN FOR SOCIAL IMPACT

LESSON 1: GRAPHIC DESIGN FUNDAMENTALS

What is Graphic Design?

Graphic Design is a process in which we use typography, images, colors, icons and other
illustrations to communicate visually. This term was first coined by William Addison
Dwiggins on 1992 as he called himself a “graphic designer”. However, graphic design is a
thousand-year-old craft which dates back to ancient cave drawings. In today’s era, we use
graphic design not just to communicate visually but also to having good user experience (for
software developers) and also to boost/improve one’s emotions (with the use of colors). The
fundamentals of graphic design varies from PowerPoint presentations, web/mobile
applications, posters, logos, and even paintings.

The basic elements of graphic design are the following:

• Lines
• Shapes
• Form
• Texture
• Balance

Line
A line is a kind of shape which connects two or more points. It is also considered as one
of the essential element of graphic design. Lines can be thick, thin, curved, or jagged.
Figure 1 shows the different styles of a line.

Lines can be used and commonly found in drawings or illustrations, textures or

patterns, as well as on text composition – whether to give emphasis, divide or organize
content, or to guide the viewer’s eye. Impacts on lines also differs based on their attributes.

These attributes include:

• Weight
• Color
• Texture
• Style
 Figure 2 Lines used in patterns
Source: Eshelman, K. (2012, August 21). Retrieved July 25, 2020 from
http://galatiak12art.blogspot.com/2012/08/line- designs.html

Shape
A shape is a two-dimensional external boundary of an object. Any object outline that
has height and width can be considered as a shape. Together with lines, they form the
foundation of your design.

There are two (2) major categories of shapes in design:

• Geometric – these are regular and mathematical shapes.
• Organic – these are freeform shapes.

Figure 3 shows the different examples of geometric and organic shapes.

 Figure 3 Example of geometric and freeform shapes
Source: Lewman, L. (2018, February 18). [Digital Image].
Retrieved July 25, 2020, from
https://www.slideshare.net/LeahLewman/elements-of-art-
shape-88242623

Shapes can be used in organizing or dividing contents, create illustrations, and in adding
interest to one’s work/design.

Figure 4 Using shapes in a poster design

Form

A form is a three-dimensional shape. Shadows, perspective, depth, and sometimes texture

creates a form. Without these attributes, a form is just a shape or series of shapes. Plain
images/objects and flat designs can be enhanced by adding shadows or lightings to create
an illusion of a form. It also gives the object a sense of place. Figure 5 shows that a ball, if
you make it two-dimensional is just a circle.
Texture

Texture refers to the physical quality of the surface of an object in an artwork or design. It also
refers to how an object look or feels like. An object might be smooth, rough, shiny, hard, or
soft. It can be in 3D (real texture) or 2D (visual texture). Texture adds depth and visual
interest to the flat images or objects.

Texture can be used for:

• Establishing visual value or a focal point in an artwork.
• Having contrast within a design
• Making an artwork visually balanced.

Figure 6 Real texture (left) and visual texture (right)

Balance

Visual balance is the creation of visual equilibrium by relating elements such as line, shape,
color, space or form in terms of their visual weight. Basically, there are two kinds of visual
balance:

1. Symmetrical balance. From the name itself, symmetrical balance, which includes
radial symmetry is when both two sides of a piece are equal. If you fold your
artwork or piece into two or if you put an imaginary line between your artwork,
each half is identical or visually similar to the other half.
 Figure 7 Symmetrical design example

2. Asymmetrical balance. Both sides of your composition does not contain the
same elements but contain almost the same visual weight.

Figure 8 Asymmetrical design example

LESSON 2: BRANDING AND IDENTITY

Branding and identity can be found everywhere. Look around you, you may see some of
your personal items, product packaging, documents, or some sort of advertising. All of them
have one in common – identity.

Branding is simply what people thinks about you, your company, your product or your
service. For example, we think of Albert Einstein as the epitome of intelligence, and that is
how he was branded. Identity or visual identity is the visual representation of a brand. It can
be in a form of image, choice of color or typography, and many more. For example, we quickly
recognize the company and its service but just looking at its logo, typeface, or color
combinations.

Let’s cite one example. We can easily associate the school by simple looking at their color
combination. For instance, if we see colors red and maroon, we can easily connect it with
PUP, or red and green for UP.

Branding and identity are not just for products and services, we can even apply it to how we
work or what type of output we produce. For example, the use of bright and bold colors are
often associated with the famous painter, Vincent Van Gogh.

Lucidpress (2018) enumerated the seven steps to creating a brand identity design:
 1. Establish clear purpose and positioning. Recall why you or your company exists,
who your target audience are, and what makes you or your service unique from your
competitors.
2. Conduct thorough market research. Having a deep analysis on your target
audience on what their personalities are which will lead you to the next step.
3. Get a personality. Based on your research, determine your brand’s personality.
Brand personality make a huge impact on the visuals of your marketing materials.
4. Create a polished logo. In creating your logo, it should be simple, scalable, and
memorable. Observe the logos of famous companies like Amazon, Google, and IBM.
What do these logos have in common?
5. Create an attractive color pallete. Your color pallete should be simple and contain
one to three primary colors. Once you have established your color pallete, you may
play with their color family. For example, if you choose blue as you primary color, you
may use sky blue, baby blue, and other colors under the blue family to support your
primary color.
6. Select professional typography. When selecting fonts, it is important to consider
these things:
a. Do not make it fancy. Fancy typefaces only make your text
confusing. Example:

b. Don’t mix fonts/typefaces. Do not mix fonts or typefaces in a word or

sentence as it may give mixed interpretations to your audience.
Example:

c. Mix contrasting fonts/typefaces. This is not similar to the above

item. This means you may use serif typefaces for your product title and
sans serif for the subtitle
Example:
TARLAC AGRICULTURAL UNIVERSITY
College of Arts and Sciences

7. Choose on-brand supporting graphics. Your brand identity should have a visual
library that include icons, images/photographs, design assets, and other supporting
graphics.

LESSON 3: LAYOUT AND COMPOSITION

Layout and composition are the building blocks of design. These two focus on the
arrangement of your objects or elements on your design. Your good texts, images, or other
elements in the graphic will turn to waste if your layout is not well-composed.

We might be confused sometimes in using lay out instead of layout. Please take note that
these two are not the same. Lay out is a verb phrase which simply means to arrange
something, while layout is a noun which means how things are organized.
 There are five basic principles of layout and composition:
1. Proximity
2. White Space
3. Alignment
4. Contrast
5. Repetition

Proximity

Proximity is the process of placing related elements together. Elements that are not related
to that group should be separated to show that these elements are not related to that group.
Take family reunion as an example, you are grouped by family, and anyone who don’t have
any relationship to your family should be separated. In design, block texts or graphics that are
related should be grouped together to make your design easier to understand.

Figure 9 Sample design which shows the division of related elements.

White Space
White space is not literally the white spaces that you found on the design but rather the
negative space between lines, paragraphs, and element on the design. In his article
Importance in White Space in Design, Pratik Hedge described white space as:

“White Space in design composition is same as use of Silence in a musical composition.

Without proportionate use of Silence, music is unstructured; some may call it noise. Similarly,
without White Space, design is unstructured and difficult to consume.”

There are two types of white space:

• Micro white space. Mini spaces between paragraphs, lines, menu items, or other
elements in a design composition.
• Macro white space. Large spaces between contents and elements.
How important is white space in design?

Hedge (2017) listed some of the importance of white space in design.

1. Improved comprehension. Spaces between lines in a paragraph makes the

content legible and easily scanable to the readers/viewers.

Figure 10 White spaces makes the content more readable.

2. Focus and attention. Macro white spaces help guide the viewers to the focus
area in the design.

Figure 11 Screen grab from Apple website

3. Increased interaction rate. If used wisely, white space in design helps the viewer
to get the message quickly even without looking at the instructions. Take a look at
Google’s homepage UI. White space helps the viewer to get the message, which
is to search.
 Figure 12 Screen grab from Google homepage

4. Guide the user through local grouping. White space helps you to achieve the
proximity of your design.

5. Branding and Design Tone. Let us look back at the steps of brand identity
design, the way how are you going to apply white spaces in your design helps you
create your own brand’s personality.

6. Creates a breathing space for users. A lot of people believe that in design, one
must maximize the space by putting contents on it. However, this might make your
design stuffy. Having enough white space makes your eye rest, helps us breathe
and not to be overwhelmed with the information.

Figure 12 Making design with breathable space (right) is better than

stuffy design (left)
Alignment

Alignment helps designers to organize different elements in their composition. This is similar
to the alignment that we see in MS Word or other productivity tools. Effective use of
alignment give your composition a definitive structure and a creative balance. Alignment
may be left, centered, right, or justified.
Contrast

Contrast means one element is opposite to the other element. This does not only apply to
colors, but to typeface and size of elements as well. Contrast helps you to catch the viewer’s
eye, create a direction, or giving emphasis to something. For example, if you use dark color
for your background, you should use light color for your foreground; or if you use different
test style to give emphasis on your content.

Figure 13 The use of different text styles to create contrast.

Repetition

Repetition simply means to use of the same typefaces, color palettes, or other elements to
achieve consistency in your composition. This create unity in your composition or make your
projects connected to each other. For example, if you create a PowerPoint presentation, you
should use only the same color palette or text style in all of your slides.

LESSON 4: TYPOGRAPHY

Typography is the art of arranging texts that makes it readable and appealing to the viewer.
It involves font style, typeface, and text structure.

Some people often misuse the term “font” as typeface. So, let us explain first the difference
between font and typeface.

Font refers to the variation of weights of a typeface, while typeface refers to the text style.
Font also refers to the format or storage mechanism of a text like .otf and .ttf. For example,
Arial Narrow, Arial Black, and Arial Rounded are fonts under the Arial typeface.
 “Typeface is to font as song is to .mp3” – Nick Sherman

Table 1 shows the difference between a font and a

typeface.

Table 1 – Difference between font and typeface

Font Typeface

Types of Fonts

Fonts can be categorized into three:

• Serif
• San Serif
• Display

Serif

Serif fonts are fonts that have little strokes called serif on each end of the letter. They
are typically used in formal or traditional projects. Examples of typefaces with serifs
are Times New Roman, Baskerville Old Face, and Californian FB.

Figure 14 Serif in letter T (in circles).

Sans Serif

Sans serif are fonts with no extra strokes. Sans serif simple means “without serifs” as
sans is a French word for without. These fonts are normally found in mobile phones,
and computer screens. Examples of this type are Calibri, Arial, and Roboto.
 Display

Display fonts are sometimes called as fancy or decorative fonts. It can be script, blackletter
or all caps. These type of fonts are used in special occasions like invitations, titles, or
posters. Examples of display fonts are Advertising Script, Bangers, and Forte.

Choosing a font or typeface

Whether you are new or old in graphic design, one dilemma that most graphic designers
experienced is on what fonts or typefaces are they going to use. One mistake that beginners
commit is the misuse of fonts or typefaces. In choosing a font/typeface, it should portray the
message that you want to say to your viewers. In design, fonts and typefaces do matter.

Figure 15 shows the different interpretations of these notes with the same message but
using different typefaces.

Figure 14 Serif in letter T (in circles).

Credits: digitalsynopsis.com

There are typefaces are that overused and outdated like Comic Sans, Papyrus, Jokerman,
and Curlz MT. Though there is nothing wrong in using them, these typefaces are being
discouraged to use.

In choosing typefaces on your design, limit yourself to one or two per project, and you may
play with their family of fonts for emphasis or contrast. You may combine serifs and sans
serifs, display and serifs, or display and sans serifs.
 LESSON 5: COLOR

Colors are very essential to your compositions. One may use a combination or one or more
colors. It may be our instinct to choose color but there is a science behind it, called Color
Theory. Color Theory describes how different colors contribute to each other and how they
appear as they are mixed into other color schemes. Before we proceed to different color
schemes, let us go over some terminologies used in color.

• Hue. Refers to pure, vibrant colors.

• Saturation. Refers to the intensity of the color. It ranges from black and white (or
grayscale) to vibrant color.
• Value. Refers to the lightness or darkness of a color. For example, from light blue to
dark blue.

Color Schemes

Of course, we can still remember the lessons about color during art lessons. We have primary
colors, then secondary colors and tertiary colors. A circular diagram of these colors is called
a color wheel (Figure 15). Using this wheel, we can create our own color scheme or
combination.

Figure 15 The color

wheel Credits: aekikuis – Color
Wheel Worksheet
 Monochromatic Color Scheme

This color scheme only focuses on one color, and often using variations by
incorporating saturations or values. For example, if you chose the color blue, then you may
have other colors under the same color family like sky blue, baby blue, navy blue, or dark
blue.

Figure 16 Example of monochromatic color

scheme Credits: Patiwat Sariya

Achromatic Color Scheme

This color scheme only revolves on using desaturated colors like black, gray, and white.

Analogous Color Scheme

Analogous color scheme selects a group of three colors that are adjacent in the color
wheel.

Complementary Color Scheme

These are colors that are direct opposite to each other in the color wheel. Usually,
a combination of a primary and secondary colors.
 Figure 18 The complementary
color scheme Credits: aekikuis –
Color Wheel Worksheet

Split-Complementary Color Scheme

Split-complementary color scheme uses the colors on both sides of the opposite color.

Figure 18 The split-complementary color

scheme Credits: aekikuis – Color
Wheel Worksheet
Triadic Color Scheme

This color scheme uses colors that form an equilateral triangle. It may be a combination
of primary, secondary, or tertiary colors.

Figure 19 The triadic color

scheme Credits: aekikuis – Color
Wheel Worksheet

Tetradic Color Scheme

Also known as double complementary. This color scheme uses two pairs of
colors complementary.
.
Understanding Color Profiles

Whenever we open an image editing application or buy a printer ink at the store,
we may observe labels like RGB or CMYK. So, what are they? They are color
profiles that we need to consider if we create designs.

• RGB. This color profile consists of Red, Green, and Blue. You should use
this profile for design that are intended for screen displays.
• CMYK. This color profile consists of Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Key
(Black). If you have a printer in your house, you probably see these colors
as inks. This profile is intended for designs that are to be printed.

LESSON 6: IMAGE

Images are not just limited to photographs, it also includes graphics, and other
illustrations. Having images on your composition makes it appealing to the eyes of
your viewer. Take magazine as an example, imagine that your favorite magazine
contains no image. You do not want to read it right? That is the power of images –
they are not just decorations on your composition.

Finding and placing the right image is not a difficult thing as long as you know what
kind of image you are going to use in your composition. Do you remember using
clip arts on your project designs? If yes, then I encourage you to not use it today as
we are over with the clip art era. Stock photos are now popular in any project.

Most people are now relying on stock photos as they are free or sometimes cost
less. There are various stock image websites all over the internet. The only thing
that you need to do is to choose pictures/images for your composition.
 Figure 21 A screen grab of
Pexels – A stock image site
Credits: pexels.com

Image File Types

There are different file types of images, and they are grouped into two
categories: vector and
raster.
• Vector. It is a type of image that does not lose its quality when zoomed in.
Your image will not be pixelated when enlarged.
• Raster. Opposite to vector, raster images become pixelated when enlarged.
• Vector Image File Extensions
• Encapsulated Postscript (EPS). This vector format are designed to
produce high-resolution graphics for print. Being a universal file type, EPS
files can be opened in any design editor.
• Adobe Illustrator Document (AI). Most preferable and commonly used
image file type by designers. If you want to create a vector image, AI is
one of the best tool for you.

Raster Image File Extensions

• Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPG or JPEG). This file type is the
most commonly used image file type. Since this is a raster type of image,
JPEG images are known for their “lossy” compression. Meaning, the image
quality decreases when being enlarged.
• Portable Network Graphics (PNG). This file type is known for having a
transparent background. Images in this type are commonly used in web
documents.
• Graphics Interchange Format. This file type is known in its animated form.
You can find them in social networking sites as posts or comments. GIFs are
often used in web pages as can load quickly due to its reduced file size.