Beyond Black & White: Contrast in Graphic Design
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It can be used to guide the user’s attention, highlight important information, and enhance the overall user experience. For example, you can use contrast to make your call-to-action buttons stand out, or to differentiate between different sections of your website. One solution to increase contrast is to make the headline H1 header much larger and bolder, as you can see in the example above. The word “contrast” is probably the first thing you looked at when you turned the page.
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In any graphic design artwork that uses text, it will be crucial to focus the eye of the viewer in the main elements you want them to read first. Here we can find endless examples from flyers to advertising, but just to make the point, here is an example of a music festival in France. Its clear that you will first read the festival name, then the dates and finally the location. You can create contrast just as effectively with other elements, like size, shape, texture and more.
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Contrast is often used to create visual interest, highlight important information and catch the reader’s attention. Contrast in color design is not only possible but also highly effective. You can create contrast by using colors that are opposite each other on the color wheel, or by using different shades, tints, or tones of the same color.
Contrast of Shape
At the end, it’s a combination of all these elements that will make your graphic design look appealing. In graphic design, contrast refers to the difference between elements in a design in terms of color, tone, texture, size, shape, or any other visual attribute. It is used to create visual interest, hierarchy, and emphasis within a composition.
Having a contrast of size adds visual interest in the composition, and will help you establish the key elements in your layout so you can be sure the viewer is focusing on the right area. Contrast is not just black and white - understanding the importance of contrast in graphic design and exploring different types of contrast will elevate your design deliverables. And is usually a combination of all those types of contrasts that will create a good design.
Look at the lowercase “e,” for example, and you will see there are thicker and thinner parts of this letter, making the overall impression of the Times New Roman font lighter and the Helvetica font heavier. We can further contrast this, of course, with size and by adding bold attributes to the bulkier font Helvetica. When we contrast type, we choose fonts that look very different from each other.
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I’ll never forget the night that I really understood the importance of contrast. It was one of those nights, dark with heavy rain that randomly fell in buckets. I was turning at an intersection and although I had been down that road many times before, it was one of the first times I was driving and not a passenger. Well, that night I got into a car accident, partly because I hadn’t seen the car coming head-on. Thank goodness we were both O.K., but it’s odd the things that flash through your mind in an accident. As the car skidded in the night, I thought about graphic design.
For example, large, white text on a black background, followed by gray text on the same background combines value and size. Let’s take a closer look at a real-world example to illustrate the power of contrast within the principles of repetition and rhythm. Imagine a website for an art gallery, dedicated to showcasing a diverse range of artistic styles and periods. The homepage employs repetition through a consistent grid layout for displaying artwork thumbnails. This grid structure establishes a rhythm of viewing, allowing users to browse through the art with ease. The dynamic interplay between repetition and contrast is akin to the heartbeat of a composition.
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Readers' sight will be drawn to larger items first, so enlarge the objects you want to emphasize. Finally, another way to achieve contrast is through typography. In the following picture, your eyes are immediately attracted to the red apple.
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Color contrast is the most popular type of contrast in graphic design and most well-known principle for non-designers and it’s not a surprise as color theory is a key principle in graphic design. As it happens with different types of contrast is used to drive viewer attention and make your design more visually interesting. Without significantly interrupting their lives, graduate students can earn degrees at Savannah College of Art and Design, an institution that emphasizes flexibility and accessibility. A master of arts in graphic design and visual experience is among the 13 online master's degrees delivered from the Savannah, Georgia, campus. This adaptable degree is ideal for full-time workers, caregivers, and others who want to pursue graduate education but need flexibility to do it.
While there's really only two different typefaces used in the design, there's a great contrast between both type and color. This principle is especially important if you're working with a very limited palate, because you won't be able to rely on color to help you establish contrast in your design or layout. Contrast of size is not applicable to just text; it can also be the images in the design.
This effective use of font size and style contrast not only enhances readability but also creates an engaging reading experience. Paired with a wealth of white space (the breathing room around visual elements — also called negative space) and proper alignment, the bold colors in this design contrast and draw the eye right to the heart of the content. At the same time, repetition of the text treatments and shapes ensure the design still feels cohesive. Contrast is a fundamental principle of design that helps guide the viewer’s attention, establish focal points, and communicate hierarchy and meaning. Designers manipulate contrast to achieve balance, readability, and visual impact in their designs.
It is the combination of the various contrast techniques that offer optimal results. Using contrast in a balanced way won't seem like a punch in the eye to the viewer but will naturally inspire them to look at the key points in your layout. Using contrast in a balanced way ensures that your design will be interesting. Remember that the contrast definition in graphic design indicates it is meant to communicate a message or inspire the viewer to respond to a call to action. Contrast can be created using color, size, shape, and typography.
The famous adverts for the iPod expertly used contrast to focus the viewers attention on the music player. The ads featured a silhouetted character on a brightly colored background. The iPod and earphones appear in white and stand out clearly against the silhouettes and colored backgrounds. Not only is a page more attractive when contrast is used, but the purpose and organization of the document are much clearer. In the magazine spread below, Studio8 have used Contrast, Balance and Proximity laws to produce an unusual, eye-catching page with the contributors bios.
Placing two elements next to each other that are similar in every respect except the size is one way to bring in size contrast. It can be big and small images or big and small typefaces, for example. Leaving plenty of white space around a small object is another way to contrast size.
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