Design Principles

Carley GussertApril 16, 2013

Proximity• Keep items that are related with each

other together, keep others far, far away. That means do NOT leave a blank line between a story’s title and the story. They are related, keep them together!

• Use white space to provide distance between unrelated items.

Font Families• There are three major font families.

• Serif – font with a foot Example: Times New Roman

• San serif – font without a foot. Example: Arial

• Fun – all other fontsExample: Gidyup Std

Contrast• Visual attraction on the page.

• Keep elements the same or very different.

• Make darks dark and light items light.

• Place dark text on a light background and light text on a dark background

• Make big items big and small ones small.

Repetition• Aim for consistency

• Repetition will strengthen the reader’s sense of recognition.

• Repeat elements throughout your document.

• Repeat fonts, font sizes, colors and graphics.

Alignment• There are 4 different alignments.

• Left – Use for large blocks of text that need to be read. This is a traditional style.

• Right – Use for titles and small amounts of text. This is funky.

• Centered – Use for titles, is formal.

• Block – Use in newspapers.