Tip 1: Take note of spacing
An important aspect of design to take note of is spacing. Have you ever looked at a flyer or poster where the photo was too close to the edge or too much content was squeezed in? It makes the viewer uncomfortable and the information presented becomes harder to take in. It is important to allow all your elements on the page to have enough space to breathe. Some things you can take note of in terms of spacing:
When laying out a design on a canvas, make sure to give it an ample margin all around. This makes your artwork neater and ensures there is a clear space around it
Always check whether elements (text, images, graphics etc.) are too close or too far from each other
Make sure there is also some space left around images, photos etc. Overlaps or close elements could be an intentional design choice, however if you are unsure, sticking to a clean and neat design is best.
Tip 2: Ensure your colours work well together
The use of colours and preference can be very subjective. There are however some general rules of thumb when it comes to colours and things you can take note of:
Tone / personality you want to convey and the audience you are targeting: edgy and modern could use a mix of dark and bright colours while a feminine and soft design could use a mix of pastels and nude colours
Contrast: generally in your colour palette you want to have a mix of shades, tints and tones. This helps to make the next point - legibility, easier.
Legibility: test out colours and make sure that they can be read. For example if you’re using a light colour text against a light colour background, it becomes hard to read. Try choosing a darker colour for the text so there is contrast. The same goes for any graphics / illustrations.
If you are not too sure what colours to use, you can have a look at the colour wheel, palette generator websites or pinterest to put together a colour palette that is appropriate for your design. If you have a brand identity, ensure you stick to those colours only. Check out some of the colour resources below:
https://pigment.shapefactory.co/ (Good colour contrasts)
https://www.pinterest.com/homefeed/ (Search colour palette inspiration)
Tip 3: Use illustrations / clip art to make the design more interesting
The use of illustrations / clip art and icons can enhance your artwork and make it more unique and fun. You can have a go at creating your own illustrations or you can use stock image sites to download some to add into your design. Always ensure you check the license / usage of the image, some may be for personal use only, meaning that you cannot use it for any commercial purposes. Others may require you to add in attribution to the creator of the artwork.
If you’re using illustrations in your design, take note of the following:
Make sure that the background is transparent. One of the sure ways to make any design look cheap is if your illustration is on a coloured background but it still has a white background behind it.
Check the resolution and size of the illustration you are using. If you are not using a vector file in a vector software, then the image is most likely a raster file (made of pixels). This means that if the image is small, you won’t be able to blow it up for a large artwork.
Illustration style: choose an illustration that matches the tone of your design. If you are doing an elegant, high-end brochure; it wouldn’t match the style well to choose a very colourful and cute illustration. If you have multiple illustrations in your design, also take note of the styles across all of them. They should be consistent in style in order to create a professional and coherent design.
Below are some good resources to find illustrations:
https://www.freepik.com/ (free and paid)
https://www.flaticon.com/ (free and paid)
https://creativemarket.com/ (paid - they have new freebies every week)
https://blush.design/sketch (free and paid)
Tip 4: Use high quality photography / stock images
A lot of the things to take note of for photos are the same as the illustrations above. When choosing photos, make sure you go to stock image sites that have a commercial license if you need to use it for your business.
Whether you are downloading a stock image or taking your own photos, always ensure that the image you are using is high resolution. If it’s pixelated, it will look unprofessional. To create uniformity between your images, try to source images that have the same tone. You could also apply the same filter or make sure that they are edited in the same way (think saturation, colour, contrast, brightness etc.), this is also dependent on how the base image looks, however generally this works well for photos you take yourself.
Below are some stock images sites you can check out:
https://unsplash.com/ (free)
https://www.pexels.com/ (free)
https://pikwizard.com/ (free)
https://kaboompics.com/ (free)
https://www.123rf.com/ (paid)
Tip 5: Choose a good font and take note of spacing
One of the most important elements of any design is the typography. In most designs you usually have a title, strapline and some body copy. To make a design interesting, professional and relevant; explore fonts outside of the generic ones the system provides. Google Fonts is a good place to start to get some professional yet free fonts. There are also a lot of interesting fonts you can buy from marketplaces such as Creative Market. Other things to take into consideration when working with the text in your design:
Check the spacing between lines of text (leading). If the space between lines is too far or too close, it becomes hard to read. Larger bodies of text in smaller pt size may need larger spacing between the lines while smaller bodies of text in large pt size (such as headers or titles) may need less.
Hierarchy and sizing: Titles and headings that are meant to be read first can be considerably larger, followed by subtitles or straplines then body copy (larger bodies of text).
You can use different typefaces for different applications. For example using one font (perhaps something more decorative) for the header, and another font (something more legible) for the body copy / larger bodies of text. Try to stick to 2 typefaces at most when starting out, otherwise it can start to get messy.
Large bodies of text are easiest to read left aligned
Tip 6: Be careful of the placement of elements and check alignment
Alignment and placement of all the elements on a page is one of the fundamental principles of design. If things are thrown across the page without intention and awareness of other elements, it’s easy for the design to look messy quickly.
There are many different kinds of grids and layouts you can explore with design, however when starting out, there are two kinds of layouts you can try.
Consistent alignment: this first one works well when there is not a lot of content on the artwork, for example a simple flyer or a social media post. This type of layout makes sure that all of the content is generally in the same alignment on the page. For example: if your title is central aligned and placed in the middle of the page, you can ensure that all other elements on the page are centrally aligned too. This helps the entire artwork feel balanced and neat.
Balancing the page: If you want to try out a more interesting layout, you can try balancing elements on the page. You can do this by making sure that no part of the page is too ‘heavy’, meaning that all your elements are not pushed to one side.
Recap
6 tips to take into consideration when designing:
Spacing of elements
Ensure an appropriate colour palette is chosen
Use illustrations to add interest to the design
Use high quality photos
Choose a good font
Be careful of placement and alignment
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