Easy Principles to Becoming a Master Designer

Rule Three: Contrast, Contrast, Contrast

Good contrast in your design goes hand-in-hand with your color selections. Contrast is the value difference between the colors on your design. Value is how bright or dark the color (ink) is. Ever see a blank white canvas and as a joke someone says: “Hey – it’s a white cow in a snow storm!” This is an example of no contrast. White on white is no contrast – you can’t see anything.

Elementary right? I mean what kind of stupid tutorial is this? I’m explaining that the piece I’m designing needs to be visible?? This is a retarded concept for a tutorial right?

Wrong.

Because unfortunately, I see lots of problems with designer’s contrast all the time. Not only that, but contrast, when used properly can be an important tool.

Here is one big mistake I see frequently: Designers use color difference to produce contrast instead of value difference. For instance… a medium value blue sitting on top of a medium value red produces some contrast. You CAN see the difference between the two. But when you have two colors together of the same value – it produces what is known as “vibrating.” You’ll notice that at the line where the blue and red meet your eye seems to oscillate back and forth between the two. It almost feels like the text is pulsing.



If your goal is to produce something really vibrant – you can use this technique. But it’s hard on the eyes and most people will find it annoying. Here is another example of the same design using different colors that have more contrast:

This second one is obviously much easier on the eyes.

A quick way to evaluate your design to see if there is sufficient contrast is to convert the entire thing to grey scale momentarily and see if the design still looks clear and easy to read. In Illustrator you do this by selecting your design, and select: Edit>Edit Colors>Convert to Grayscale. In Photoshop you’ll need to flatten your work then you can select: Image>Adjustments>Desaturate. This will convert it to Grayscale.

In either case, you’ll want to undo this action once you’ve had a chance to see how your design looks put to this test.

Here is a sample of the same design –one with good contrast, one with bad contrast. And just under each one is how they both look in grayscale.

You can clearly see how much easier it is to read the text in the design on the left, particularly when it’s converted to grayscale. The design on the right uses less contrast and more color difference to define the shapes.

One question I get all the time is: “what opacity setting should I use for a background water mark?” I think a good watermark background should be between 10%-15% opaque. Once again – this is all about maintaining contrast in your design. If the background is light – then the watermark should obviously also be fairly light and vice versa. Here is an example of a good and bad watermark:



The last little thing I want to note about contrast is how it can be used as a tool. If, for instance, you have a need to direct your audience’s attention to something specific on your design – you can accomplish it with contrast! You might keep the entire design relatively light and then make the one spot you want your audience to focus on dark. Here is an example of a well designed landing page:


This is a page on E-Harmony’s tour section of their website. While they want to give people a “tour,” what they REALLY want to do is get people to actually sign-up. So, when you look at this page – what is the biggest darkest thing on the page? It’s a non-clickable picture of a girl and the “Get Started Now” button. Obviously they want you to click on the “Get Started Now” button. Look at how much bigger and darker the “Get Started Now” button is compared to the “Next Step” button. The Next Step button is what someone on the tour SHOULD be pushing to continue the tour – but how tempting is that Get Started Now button? And why? Why does it jump off the page at you? Simple – CONTRAST!

This concludes a fairly basic but fundamentally critical lesson in design. Thanks for taking the time to read this. Four more basics to go. After that I promise I’ll teach you how to draw!

Here is the link for more Easy Principles to Becoming a Master Designer:

http://www.gomediazine.com/design-tip/rule-three-contrast-contrast-contrast/

Thanks for the link Andy!! Great points to know…

Wheres the other Bloggers?

It’s funny, I’ve been jumping on here for the last few days and adding to the blog and knew as soon as I would do that, Slick would stop blogging! At least here. Slick has another blog that is really well done but I do miss his post on here and hope he realizes he isn’t stepping on toes when he blogs..he’s always so afraid about the toes thing. Other than that we’re ramping up for a couple of things including the Holiday Gift Giving Season and how Tech will play into some of the choices this year. The Magic price points will be between 299 and 399 for electronics.

I’ve already decided I would love to get myself a iPod Touch. Even thought I really don’t need an MP3 player, audio device, they look so very cool! I’m in my phone contract so an iPhone isn’t on the list but the touch seems like it would be fun to play with. Whats on your list?

Just got in the new Medal of Honor Airborne from EA for the PC. We’re excited to be able to take a look at the full control that is supposed to be available with the characters. We’ll be sure to give you the heads up on the gameplay as well as the Multi-player capability as well.

Andy

Logitech extends the Notebook

One of the greatest features of laptop computers is that you can just about take them everywhere. The downside to all this mobility can actually be the lack of it as well. Notebooks in most cases tie you to them. Want to send an email? You would be in front of the notebook to type it out.

The Hip Twist will be a condition we will no doubt hear about in another 10 years that will rival carpal tunnel. Hip Twist, my own definition, is achieved by the twist of the body to type on that other keyboard on the laptop, separate from your work system.

Logitech has a solution that not only looks good but also is easy on the pocketbooks! The Alto Cordless is a system that allows the user to place the notebook computer on a stand which features a USB 2.0 hub with three ports. The ease of the unit is to flip open and snap together. After that is done, easily connect the notebook (up to 15.4) running XP or Vista with an available USB port. The Cordless keyboard runs off 2 AAA batteries and has many of the features found in Logitech Keyboards. The full size keyboard includes many buttons for customizing and easily selecting functions for multimedia, internet and applications. While the unit could be carried in a notebook bag, it’s more for the desktop fixture and with the wireless keyboard can be used without having to twist the body to type.

I saw this unit at Costco for under $60 and the MSRP is $99 More Info can be found at http://www.logitech.com/

Genius G-Pen F610 Tablet

New tablet from Genius, The G-Pen F610 functions under the Mac OS X and Vista/XP/XP 64/2000 operating systems. The working size for this ultra slim tablet is 6″ x 10″ and features a Electronic Users Manual and Macro key manager for the 29 macro programmable keys along the edge of the tablet. The Pen on the unit sports what Genius is calling 1024 Level Pressure sensitivity giving users control over the line flow and size in programs such as Corel Painter and Adobe Photoshop.

The tablet support in Windows Vista also adds to the functionality of the unit with handwriting recognition, sticky notes and Office 2007 Digital Inking as well. Shipping with the tablet is Corel/Ulead PhotoImpact 12se for working with photos, Office Ink, Free Note, Macro Key Manager and Power Presenter LE. The tablet plugs into the USB slot on the PC or Notebook and the wireless pen powers with a AAA battery.

The unit is one of the slimmest we’ve seen and the frosted plastic cover that lifts off the tablet will give the user the ability to trace images easier with the pen. Some of the hot keys that are a part of this tablet include the ability to magnify, flip3D, access music, photos, messenger and email. All with a point and tap, users can work with Office Apps and save, print or cut info from documents. Resolution for the unit is set at 2000 lpi. One are that disappointed us in the pre-install was with the documentation which ships in just about 20+ languages for install. To get info on the program such as Office Ink, the program needs to be installed. Even the Electronic Program guide on the disk did not seem to offfer up info about this program.

If size is an issue, this is certainly going to take up a minimal amount of space on the desktop and store easily due to its slim footprint. For those looking for other sizes, Genuis has an expansive line of tablets from the G-Pen 340 with a 3″ x 4″ work area to the Pen Sketch 9 x12 which also comes with a mouse. More info can be found at the Genius website at http://www.geniusnet.com/