As a common man when we talk about Graphic designing, we visualize eye catching advertisements, logos, magazines, or special shapes and graphs all things that come to our mind, right? But now a day’s graphic designing is not only limited to advertisements, logos but also this has a broad meaning. Everywhere we see graphics creations in our day-to-day life. When we are at home, we realize that so many eye-catching things like printed cloths, packaging of food items, makeup items, designer boxes, cards, papers, calendar, album, books, newspaper, magazine and many more. On the other hand, if we are outside, we attract towards so many beautiful banners, hoardings, advertisements, templates etc. When we are online, we get beautiful designs on web page on our mobile, laptop screen, video game, movie, vector graphics etc. All these are the products of graphic design. Therefore, when we fascinate towards all these objects, and we mesmerize and say ‘wow’, ‘beautiful’, or ‘awesome’. In little deeper sense it is truly an art and professional work. But what is exactly it? So now let’s know about what graphic designing is.

Graphic Designing –

It is an art as well as craft where artist create visual content to communicate or convey his message through visual art. Designer use so many techniques, design, picture, and typography to meet user’s specific needs and focus on the stuffs or displaying objects. It is a technique of conveying message, ideas through visuals designs.

Truly saying it is a black and white concept. To know more about the concept of this, you must have solid understanding of the elements and principles that make up design or visual.

If you are looking for technical definition of graphic designing, we have got this for you –

Graphic Designing Definitions –

“Graphic design is a profession, applied art and academic discipline whose activity consists in projecting visual communications intended to transmit specific messages to social groups, with specific objectives. Graphic design is an interdisciplinary branch of design and of the fine arts. Its practice involves creativity, innovation and lateral thinking using manual or digital tools, where it is usual to use text and graphics to communicate visually.”

“Graphic design is the art or profession of visual communication that combines images, words, and ideas to convey information to an audience, especially to produce a specific effect. In other words, graphic design is communication design; It’s a way of conveying ideas through visuals and design.”

Fundamentals of Graphic Design –

These are the basics units of any visual design that form the designer structure and convey its visual message. The fundamentals of graphic design are:

(1) Line – A Line is made of a set of points which is extended in opposite directions infinitely.  Line is a long or short thin or thick mark which is drawn or painted on a surface. This is the basics of any design elements. This can be curved, straight, thin, thick, long, short, two or dimensional etc. It is a simple an element of design.

(2) Shape – It can be as the form of an object or its outline, outer boundary, or outer surface. Everything we see in the world around us has a shape like square, rectangle, and oval or the three-dimensional rectangular prism, cylinder, and sphere in the objects. There are different types of shapes like geometric, abstract, and organic shapes. All these are the essential elements of a design.

(3) Colour – This is one of the most important elements of any design. This is playing a vital role in attracting attention or to influence thoughts and opinions of specific users or consumers. There is a psychology behind the feelings that colour can induce, evoke, reaccommodate, or indicate.

(4) Typography – It is art of arranging letters and text in a way which makes message clear, comprehensible, logical, and visually appealing to the reader. This is crucially important as it can greatly influence the design’s messaging. It includes font style, different weights (bold, regular, or light), spacing, appearance, and structure which aims to stimulate certain emotions and convey specific message to the audience.

(5) Texture – It refers to how something feels when it is touched. This is the quality of a surface of a material, an object, etc. that can be known by the sense of touch. For example, it can be soft, hard, smooth, rough, fuzzy, slimy, glossy, simple, dull, etc. It is another element used to get attention. It can be added to other elements like shapes, colours, images, and type.

(6) Size – In simple term, it is how small or large something is. It is used as an indication of prominence, and it can also draw visual interest in a design by using different dimensions.

(7) Space – It refers to the place or area of the design that are left vacant or not used. These parts consist of any distance or areas between, around, below, or above other design sections. Graphic designers intentionally place spaces in the design to add emphasis to areas of the design.

Principles of Graphic Design

Graphic designers also adhere to the principles of graphic design, which are basically a set of standards or guidelines that help a design achieve effective composition. These basic principles assist in creating balance and stability in design or design.

(1) Repetition – It means the act of repeating, doing, saying, writing, or using something again. Once we have chosen our design or formats, repeat those patterns or formats to maintain consistency throughout the design. This repetition ties all things together and strengthens the design to present our work in organised way.

(2) Contrast – It is used to highlight the certain aspects of the design. Contrast makes the differences between elements and emphasizing the key elements of your design that you want to stand out.

This indicate the best arrange the various elements of a page layout to make sure the elements of the overall design are linked to one another. The principles of graphic design include the followings:

(3) Balance – It refers to the ability to keep steady with an equal amount of weight on each side of the page layout and achieving visual balance by using symmetry and asymmetry in graphic design. This is accomplished by balancing the design in weight – meaning shapes, lines, and other elements are distributed evenly. Balance is a significant because it provides structure and stability to a design.

(4) Alignment – This refers to the act of aligning or state of being aligned, especially the proper positioning or state of adjustment of parts in relation to each other. It is almost keeping the design well organized and structured. All aspects of the design should be aligned with the top, bottom, centre, or sides to create a visual connection between the elements.

(5) Proximity – It indicates the quality or the state of being near, proximate or closeness in space or time. It means how near something is to another thing. It creates a visual relationship between the components of the design. It minimizes clutter, increases viewer comprehension, and provides a pivotal point for viewers. It doesn’t mean that the similar elements need to be put right next to each other, it just means they should be connected visually.

(6) Pattern – A pattern is the regular way in which something happens or is done. It is an arrangement of lines or shapes, especially a design in which the same shape is repeated at regular intervals over a surface or design. To make our design more efficient and effective we need to follow the same patterns throughout the same project, or design.  

(7) Audience Culture – Audience culture not only places you in a better position when it comes to identifying consumers’ needs, or behaviours, or habits, but it also aids marketers in creating direct marketing campaigns aimed at a diverse audience and are better equipped to help them connect with the brand. It is a cunning marketing strategy in it own, and if applied right, it can do miracles. We need to put audience culture to good use by studying them in depth and modifying their marketing strategy to fit the needs of the consumers in general.

(8) Movement – It is the act or process of moving; change of place or position or posture. For motion designing, designers should understand the motion work and a particular manner or style of moving.

(9) Proportion – It is the relationship between the size or amount of two things or more things. In other words, it is harmonious relation of parts to each other or to the whole: balance, symmetry. Designers should know about the balance in their piece of work and how things fit together harmoniously.

(10) Rhythm – A rhythm is a regular series or patterns of sounds or movements. Graphic designers need to use same rhythm thought out their project to make it stronger, to recognise the brand and creating its value.  

(11) Harmony – It means a pleasing combination of musical notes, colours, etc. Harmony as a principle of design is the sense of cohesiveness between the elements in a composition. The elements shouldn’t be the same or completely different but related in some way. Colour palettes or similar textures can create a sense of unity between different components.

(12) Scale – Scale refers to the relative size of a design element in comparison to another element. In design, the principle of scale refers to the relative size of one object compared to another. Scale can also refer to the size relationships of different visuals within a singular piece of art.

(13) Dominance and Emphasis – Designers design one element to have more dominance than another by giving it more visual weight. The greater its visual weight, the more an element will catch the eye and display dominance. You create dominance through contrast, emphasis, and relative visual weight. Identical items can’t dominate each other.