Flat text design principles and combinations

In the modern design of computer popularization, a large part of the text design work is completed by the computer instead of the human brain (many graphic design software has guided the production of artistic Chinese characters, and provided dozens of hundreds of ready-made fonts). However, the audience facing the design work is always the human brain rather than the computer. Therefore, the computer is powerless in terms of the need for people's thinking to design, such as creative and aesthetic design activities.

Here, I would like to talk about the several principles of text design and the combination of words in graphic design. A special reminder is that this should be done by the human brain. The computer cannot replace it.

First, the principle of text design

1. Readability of text:

The main function of the text is to convey the author’s intentions and various information to the public in visual communication. To achieve this goal, it is necessary to consider the overall appeal effect of the text and give a clear visual impression. Therefore, the text should be designed to avoid confusion, to make people easy to understand, easy to understand, do not design for the design, forget the basic function of the text in the design is to better, more effectively convey the author's intentions, express the design Themes and ideas.

2. Give character personality:

The design of the text is subject to the style characteristics of the work. The design of the text cannot be separated from the style features of the entire work, and it must not conflict with others. Otherwise, the effect of the text will be undermined. In general, the character's personality can be divided into the following categories:

(1) Dignified and beautiful.
(2) Elegant style.
(3) Gorgeous and noble.
(4) Strong and straight.
(5) Simple and refreshing.
(6) Strong sense of modernity.
(7) Strong visual impact.
(8) Deep and heavy.
(9) Has a sense of weight.
(10) Majestic majesty.
(11) Do not shake.
(12) cheerful and lively.
(13) jumping brightly.
(14) Strong sense of rhythm and rhythm.
(15) Energetic.
(16) Vigorous and simple.
(17) Plain and minimalist.
(18) modeling is wonderful.

3. The text should give the appearance of beauty:

In the process of visual communication, text is one of the image elements of the screen and has the function of conveying emotions. Therefore, it must have a visual sense of beauty and give people a feeling of beauty. Good font design, combined with clever text can make people feel happy, and leave a good impression, so as to obtain a good psychological response.

4. Be creative in design:

According to the requirements of the theme of the work, highlighting the personality color of the text design and creating unique and distinctive fonts give people a unique visual experience that is conducive to the performance of the author's design intent. At the time of designing, we should seek out the morphological features and combinations of words, constantly modify them, and ponder over them repeatedly so that we can create individualized texts so that their external forms and design patterns can arouse people's aesthetic pleasure.

Second, the combination of text

Whether the design of a word is successful or not depends not only on the writing of the font itself, but also on the proper arrangement of its use. If the text in a work is not arranged properly, is crowded and disorderly, and lacks the order of sight flow, it will not only affect the beauty of the font itself, but also it is not conducive to effective reading by the audience, and it is difficult to produce a good visual communication effect. To achieve a good arrangement, the key lies in finding out the intrinsic links between different fonts and giving them a harmonious combination of different opposing factors. While maintaining their individual characteristics, they also obtain an overall sense of coordination. In order to create a visually contrasting visual effect, you can select contrasting factors in terms of style, size, orientation, brightness, and so on.

In order to achieve the unity of the overall combination, but also need to choose the style, size, direction, brightness and other aspects of the same coordination. Contrasting and coordinating factors are applied to the needs of expressing the subject in a subordinate manner, which can result in a contrasting and coordinated textual composition effect with visual aesthetic value. In the combination of words, we should pay attention to the following aspects:

1. People's reading habits:

The purpose of the text combination is to enhance its visual communication function, impart aesthetic emotions, and induce people to read with interest. Therefore, in the way of combination, we need to follow the order of people's psychological feelings. The following is the general reading order of people: In the horizontal direction, people's sightlines generally flow from left to right; in the vertical direction, the sightlines generally flow from top to bottom; when the angle is more than 45 degrees, the sightlines are from top to bottom. Less than 45 degrees, the line of sight flows upward from below.

2. Font shape features:

Different fonts have different visual trends. For example, there is a movement of left and right flowing in a flat body character, a feeling of flowing up and down in a long body, and a movement in a forward or diagonal direction. Therefore, when combining, it is necessary to perform different combination processing according to the differences in the visual orientation of different fonts. For example: flat body characters are suitable for horizontal arrangement and combination, long body characters are suitable for vertical combination, and italics characters are suitable for horizontal or inclined arrangement. The rational use of the text's visual dynamics is conducive to highlighting the theme of the design and guiding the audience's attention to the light and heavy flow.

3. Have a design tone:

For the work, each piece has its own unique style. Under this premise, the combination of different fonts on a single page of a work must have a design tendency that conforms to the style of the entire work, forming an overall mood and emotional characteristics. It is not possible to create a style for each type of text. The overall tone should be overall coordination and local comparison. In the unification, there is also a clever change that produces a contrasting and harmonious effect. In this way, the entire work will have a visual sense of beauty and meet people's appreciation needs. In addition to achieving the tone of the design with a unified text personality approach, it is also possible to consider the tone of the word's unity from a directional point of view, and to use the psychological feeling of color to achieve the effect of a unified tone.

4. Pay attention to the use of negative space:

In the text combination, "negative space" refers to the space other than the screen space occupied by the font itself, ie the word spacing and the surrounding blank area. Whether or not the text combination is good or bad depends largely on whether the negative space is used properly or not. The line spacing of the words should be greater than the spacing of the words, otherwise it is difficult for the viewer's eyes to read in a certain direction and order. The space for different categories of text should be properly focused and differentiated by using blank spaces. In order to highlight the morphological characteristics of different parts of the font, appropriate blanks should be left and the classification should be centralized.

In a picture layout, the combination of words should be relatively concentrated. If the picture is the main appeal factor, the text should be arranged in a compact and appropriate position. It should not be over-dispersed so as not to cause confusion in the viewer's line of sight due to the unclear subject.

Creativity is the embodiment of the designer's level of thinking and is the most important criterion for evaluating the quality of a design work. In the field of modern design, all production processes are performed by computers, and the human design work is limited to thinking. This is a good thing. It saves many unnecessary processes and provides better conditions for creation, but in some At the necessary stage, it is still impossible to completely let the computer do it. After all, people are alive.

Source: Design China