Visual Design April 15, 2019
Visual design makes our work, aesthetic, clear, and usable. We’ll start exploring some principles of typography and layout in this class. Keep in mind that theory will only take your design work so far. You have to produce work, look at it, and try again in order to actually improve.
Learning Objectives
- analyze a design according to principles: contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity (CRAP)
- differentiate between display typefaces and text typefaces
- identify features of fonts appropriate for interfaces
- establish basic typographic hierarchy
- use spacing to make text readable
- use proximity to make relationships clear
Starter Files
- Type and Composition (Download)
Resources
- A CRAP way to improve usability by David Travis
- Explore typographic layouts at Typewolf
Further Reading
- Learning to See by Oliver Reichenstein
Tools
- Google Fonts
- SkyFonts to sync web fonts from Google Fonts