The document provides tips to improve graphic design skills in 60 minutes. It discusses key principles of design such as contrast, repetition, alignment and proximity (CRAP). Examples are given of how to apply these principles to create visual hierarchy and guide the viewer's eye through a design. Specific design elements like grid structure, white space, color, and typesetting are also examined in detail with examples of proper and improper applications. The overall message is that understanding and applying basic design principles is key to creating effective visual communication.

1. You’ve got the tools,
now get the chops.
TIPS TO IMPROVE YOUR GRAPHIC DESIGN IN JUST 60 MINUTES
J O A N N E Q U I N N
T E A M L E A D E R / C O M M U I C A T I O N S & S E R V I C E P R O M O T I O N
F A L V E Y M E M O R I A L L I B R A R Y
V I L L A N O V A U N I V E R S I T Y
L I B R A R Y C O M M U N I C A T I O N S C O N F E R E N C E 2 0 1 4

2. 2
“Do one thing everyday
that scares you.”
- ELEANOR ROOSEVELT
Why I’m here…

3. 3
If you're lucky enough to do
well, it's your responsibility to
send the elevator back down
- KEVIN SPACEY

4. WE’RE
HERE
4
Why we’re all here…
How to
Brand a
Library
WHY
(…and how design helps.)
Your company’s brand is Its most important asset.
It must be cultivated, protected and reinforced.
• Builds trust, loyalty and longevity
• Distinguishes your company or product from the competition
• Showcases your organization's core values
• Creates top of mind awareness
• Delivers on the brand promise.

5. or
Or the
BAND?
5
What
Design does
… the CITY
A good example… vs.. Chicago
http://albumcovergallery.blogspot.com/2010/06/chicago-cover-gallery.html
e.g.: What do you think of first…
Chicago the band has a remarkably strong brand identity.
While their sound has changed a lot, their design aesthetic has remained
constant. Both their most defining feature and their curse of anonymity,
their lengthy series of albums with numbered titles (like editions of a
magazine) and variations on the band logo on the cover are iconic as hell.

6. advertising.
print.
advertising.
Internet marketing.
digital animation.
About me.
C H I C A G O
E X A M P L E D A T E D
A N D S O A M I !
T O T A L 7 0 s
C O M I C G E E K

7. Falvey
Library
at
Villanova
University
There are more than 10,000
undergraduate, graduate and law
students in the University’s six
colleges
.
The library is two buildings – one is
four floors, with a newlly renovated
Learning Commons, and an ‘Old”
hall, which has a Reading Room
currently hosting a public
restoration of Baroque painting by
Pietro daCortona. The library has
1.2+ million items, and is visitied by
500,000 yearlly

9. Eight on the team.
Senior copy editor
Writers, coordinators,
Photogs, and a
FABULOUS INTERN
(Student workers
are the bomb!)
Displays
Communication & Service Promotion Team
Blogs
Print NL
Videos
Displays
Publicity
Signage
PR
Social media
Communication & service promotion at Falvey
library.villanova.edu

10. Event Publicity Print Newsletter
Service Promotion
Support Team
Exhibit Signage
Instagram/Tumblr

16. Not just
Print!
C O M M U N I C A T I O N &
S E R V I C E P R O M O T I O N
T E A M
Social
media
Events Blog
Print
Materials
Display
s
Design’s
“VOICE”
is what resonates
______
Librarian
Assistance and
friendly,
approachable
service is our
Product
Social Media
Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest
01
02
03
04
05
Events
400 events annuually
Video
Blog, instructional vids, catalog tutorials, promotional.
Displays
Two large glass displays, reference area, special exhibits, promo
Blog
Library News updated 5-7 weekly; Subject librarians and Digital
Library also have blogs

17. 17
Design Education Strategy Information
Great
Networking
(Potentially!)
D.E.S.I.G.N.
deconstructed
W H A T G O E S I N T O I T
CHOPS

18. 18
h
B
c
1
a
<
: >
h
Job 1:
Call to Action
J A C K
D A V I S :
A R T O F
T H E L O G O
O N
C R E A T I V E L
I V E
Know your audience Instant engagement
Storytelling –
beginning,middle and end
Fresh ideas
Breaking through the clutter
Unique Selling Points
Budget
Great ideas don’t need a
big budget – distribution
does. Be creative!

19. 19
Job 2: Looking good.
Design is like fashion…
01. Trends 02. Points of Reference 03. Audience 04.Distribution Channels

20. 20
…but, of course,
fashion can be downright fugly.
Bad typography Poor art & consistency Over designing Bad production

21. 21
But really,
who’s to judge?
Most can judge if something looks good, but do you know
WHY one piece is more successful than another?
I will try to expose the framework or skeleton behind what is
successful work.
Most successful pieces can be stripped down to adhering to
certain design principles.
Of course, art is art, and can be subjective, but you’ll find
most commercial pieces stick to the same rules.

22. 22
Joshua tree epiphany: Good design is as easy as…
1. Learning the
principles
2. Recognizing
when they’re
not being
used
3. Applying
Robin Williams them
(no, not that one.)

23. 23
“When gathering these four principles from the vast maze of design theory, I thought
there must be some appropriate and memorable acronym with these conceptual
ideas that would help people remember them.
Well, uh, there is a memorable – but rather inappropriate – acronym. Sorry.”
- ROBIN WILLIAMS

24. Multiple
sclerosis day
care centre
24
K U A L A L U M P U R - 1 9 9 0
1 2 3 4
Robin distilled the filter “checklist”
into four basic principles:

25. Multiple
sclerosis day
care centre
25
K U A L A L U M P U R - 1 9 9 0
C 2 3 4
CONTRAST
• Creates an organizational hierarchy for readers/viewers
• Avoid elements that are merely similar
(make them identical OR very different)
• Adds visual interest
• Don’t be a wimp
Test for:

26. Multiple
sclerosis day
care centre
26
K U A L A L U M P U R - 1 9 9 0
1 R 3 4
REPETITION
Test for:
• Repeat some element of design throughout
the piece such as color, shape, texture, bullets
• Adds consistency
• Helps to unify all parts of a design
• Helps to organize information

27. Multiple
sclerosis day
care centre
27
K U A L A L U M P U R - 1 9 9 0
1 2 A 4
ALIGNMENT
• Every item should have a visual connection with
something else on the page
• Nothing should be placed on the page arbitrarily
• Find a strong line and use it
• Helps to indicate relationships between elements
• Alignment helps to create order which generally makes us
feel better about the quality of a page/document
Test for:

28. Multiple
sclerosis day
care centre
28
K U A L A L U M P U R - 1 9 9 0
1 2 3 P
PROXIMITY
• Group related items together
• Grouping implies a relationship between
pieces of information
• Proximity organizes information and reduces clutter
Test for:

29. Multiple
sclerosis day
care centre
29
Test for:
K U A L A L U M P U R - 1 9 9 0 C R A P

30. 30
Our Desktops
L O T S O F
O P T I O N S ,
L O T S O F T O O L S ,
L O T S O F
A U T O M A T I O N ,
T E M P L A T E S A N D
P R E S E T S
Microsoft Products
Word, Frames, Publisher
Apps
Mac apps/phone & ipad
alternatives: Phoster, or old
versions of Quark DesignPad,
Pagemaker, etc.
Open Source
The digital space is a challenging,
constantly evolving, dynamic
working environment.
Adobe Creative Cloud
The digital space is a challenging,
constantly evolving, dynamic
working environment.
Quick Survey: What’s everyone using?

31. 31
Tools
A S G R A N D P A P P Y S A Y S ,
A N Y J O B I S E A S I E R
W H E N Y O U H A V E T H E
R I G H T T O O L S !
V E Y O U R S E L F A
F I G H T I N G C H A N C E !
T
Maybe some folks can make this sing, but…
• Hard to break the templates
• Kills the art of it
• Difficult to get your vision to happen
• Hackneyed clipart
• Font treatments tempting/fun – but look
amateurish.

32. 32
Adobe: Photoshop, InDesign,
Open Source: GIMP, Scribus

33. 33

34. 34
No guarantees/not condoning, but…
After about 5 minutes of looking, I found…

35. Deconstructing
the c.r.a.p.
W H A T T O L O O K F O R I N
G O O D D E S I G N
a
) w
INSPIRATION
w )
GRID
Alignment,
01
02
03
04
05
CONTRAST
Proximity – white space
COLOR
Consitency
TYPE
Repetition
ART
Sensitivinty – and INSPIRATION. Where the rubber hits the road
& why you get paid the big bucks!! :-)
C
R
P A
S

36. Grid
D E F I N I T I O N & H I S T O R Y
Philosophy
• Emerging from the modernist and constructivist
ideals, the Swiss Style: simplicity
• Beauty in the underlines of a purpose, not beauty as
a purpose in itself.
• “form follows function” battle-cry of Modernist
architects after the 1930s.
• minimal elements of style such as typography and
content layout VS textures and illustrations.

37. 37
El Lissitzky was an artist, designer, teacher,
and theorist of the Russian avant-garde. Leading
figure in Russian Suprematicism and greatly
influenced Constructivism & Bauhaus movements.
• Believed artists can be agents for change and
experimented with production techniques that
went on to dominate graphic design in 20th c.
• Architect in Germany in the early 1910s, in the
years just after the 1917
Revolution/Propaganda posters
• e turned to abstraction, which he believed was
the most effective tool for pursuing a new art for
a new, post-revolutionary world.
• Typographical elements are the building blocks
for abstract compositions
• Language disassociated from its conventional
literary context acquires new meaning.
• His books, pamphlets, and posters were made to
be disseminated widely and used by the masses.

38. 38
Tschichold wrote Die Neue Typographie
• Set rules for standardization of practices relating to
modern type usage.
• Condemned all typefaces except for sans-serif types,
• advocated standardized sizes of paper
• set forth guidelines for establishing a typographic
hierarchy when using type in design.
• Penguin Books and while he was there he developed a
standardized practice for creating covers
• personally oversaw the development of more than 500
books between the years 1947-49.
Every period of his career has left a lasting impression on
how designers think about and use typography, and it will
continue to affect them into the future.

40. Before
W H E R E A R E T H E
E R R O R S ?
Messy, Overcomplicated Grids
Grid refers to a systematic design that is thought out in advance to
create a pleasing, intuitive layout of page elements.
A well-designed grid will make the final page
• easy to scan, understand, and interact with.
• A lack of grid structure can have the opposite, negative effect!
Notice how in the example:
• Nothing really seems to “line up” with anything else.
• None of the call to action buttons are aligned..
• Slows viewer down
Think about Visual Hierarchy: gaze heatmaps
• “Visual Hierarchy” refers to how designers use design language
proximity,size, color, motion, etc. communicate which elements on a
page are most important.
• Directs the prospect’s gaze along an “eye path” that helps them
accomplish their goals,
• Persuades them to take a desired action.
Don’t draw your prospect’s gaze away from the
main point and the primary call to action

41. 41
After
H O W T O F I X I T
EG: McDonalds:
Clean & simple visual levels
Conventionial left menu, all columns left aligned with clear spacing
Elegant use of continuation and closure
Usage of visuals address the ‘skim’

42. 42
Heatmaps
Use faces to your advantage when creating a visual hierarchy.
Humans typically prefer faces than other objects or pieces of
information. Further, if we see a face that appears to be looking at an
object, we tend to look at that object too.
PAULA SCHER

43. 43
MASSIMO VIGNELLI
http://www.vignelli.com/canon.pdf

44. 44
“I don’t think that type
should be expressive at
all. I can write the word
‘dog’ with any typeface
and it doesn’t have to
look like a dog.
But there are people
that [think that] when
they write ‘dog’ it
should bark.”
Massimo Vignelli
http://www.vignelli.com/can
on.pdf

45. 45
Contrast
D E F I N I T I O N & H I S T O R Y
White Space
• Whitespace, or negative space is, the space between graphics, columns,
images, text, margins and other elements.
• It creates contrast.
• Simpler designs are beautiful and that we don’t need to create a layout filled
with text and graphical elements to deliver a clear and direct message.
• Does not have to be white, but free of any elements like text or images.
• Whitespace is also associated with elegance and sophistication
• Organizes text, organize elements and
• Guides users attention to certain elements.

46. 46
Before
W H I T E S P A C E C R E A T E S C O N T R A S T
W H I C H C R E A T E S D I R E C T I O N
Imagine you’re walking in beautiful, pristine woods. You’re excited about
your destination. Along the way, you pass some of nature’s most
beautiful sites. Trees that are hundreds of years old. A moss covered
boulder – you swear it’s shaped like Abraham Lincoln’s profile.
Now imagine that well marked path changes into one overgrown with
brush. A rock slide here, a fallen tree there obscures the trail. Suddenly,
calm vanishes as your stomach muscles tighten. Where do you go from
here?
http://www.katzanne.com/wp-content/
uploads/2012/05/WhiteSpace_example1.jpg

47. 47
After
• Open it up
• Edit,edit,edit
• Typographic controls

48. 48

49. 49
After

50. 50

51. 51

52. 52
Color
Definition
Much research exists on how buying behavior is
greatly influenced by color scheming of a
product and its advertisement.
Vignelli: signifier/identifer – not pictorial.
And sometimes, it’s just cool.

53. 53
Before

54. 54
After

55. 55

56. 56

57. 57

58. 58
Type
D E F I N I T I O N & H I S T O R Y
Type design is one of the most visible and widespread
forms of graphic expression in daily life. It is still not
noticed by all readers of newspapers, magazines or
books. Nevertheless letter forms reflect the style of a
period, and cultural background.
We are surrounded by them everywhere.”
- Hermann Zapf

59. 59
Before
Type and typography are supposed to
be a crystal goblet — transparent —
seen and read but not heard. -
Steven Heller

60. 60
After
• Buy one good font family
• Sans serif
• Doesn’t have to be expensive
• Watch for deals - mightydeals.com, etc.
• Doesn’t have to be Helvetica
• Use it and only it.

61. 61

62. 62

63. 63
From Pinterest:
Anti-type
Expressive reaction to digital
Popularity of comic books, Juno
Human hand
Sketchally rendererd,
No accuracy/finesse
Untutored/raw/Doodle pad
http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/graphic-content-
hand-lettering/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0

64. 64

65. 65
Art
Trends
Organic
Flat
Classic
Retro-vintage “general store”
typography
AUTHENTIC – ORGINIAL

66. 66
Before
F R O M A T O Z

67. 67

68. 68
After

69. 69
Krijn de Koning

70. 70
“…a space somewhere in the middle of calligraphy,
typography, sign painting and graffiti”
HAND MADE – from the heart: raw, expressive,
untutored, eccentric, lack of finesse
Newer generations prefer “experience over stuff”

71. 71

72. 72

73. 73

74. 74

75. 75
S
“…why certain basic human longings for freedom, or heroes, or
cleanliness attach themselves so easily to travel guides, bicycle races,
plastics, and laundry detergent. “
Marco Roth in The New Yorker on the new edition of Roland Barthes’
Mythologies, 4/18/12
SENSITIVITY

76. 76
What do you think of this cover?

77. 77

78. Steve, who once spent three days in jelly bean factory to find just the 78
right blue for the iMac.

79. advertising.
print.
advertising.
Internet marketing.
LIBRARIES!
01.Trends: Buzz 02. Marketing 03. Take time to play Inspiration!
I think really great products come
from melding two points of view
the technology point of view and
the customer point of view.
I think really great products come
from melding two points of view
the technology point of view and
the customer point of view.
I think really great products come
from melding two points of view
the technology point of view and
the customer point of view.
W H E R E D O E S I T
C O M E F R O M ?

81. 81
Caveat: Plan ahead!
Variety of uses:
People change their minds!
Smart Objects Flexibility
within Photoshop
Non-destructive changes
Resolution:
Print vs. Screen
Vector vs. Raster
Scalability of logos:
App avatars vs.
large poster
Responsive design considerations

82. 82
Iterations:
• Consider scalability,
• Printing costs and color: will it work in black &
white?
• versatility –small device/flyers/tshirts, etc.

83. RESOURCES: Photography
A N A L Y S I S & S T A T I S T I C S
07.WikiCommons 10. Getty Images
08. Dreamstime 11. Fotolia
09. 123RF 12. iPhone filters
01.Creative Market 04. Deposit Photo
Creativemarket.com
02. Photoshop Actions 05. IngImage
03. Photoshop Styles 06. Library of Congress

84. RESOURCES: Vector Art
07.Ebay/thriftshops -
CDs
10. Dreamstime
08. Wikicommons 11. Deviant Art
09. Google 12. Iphone filters
01.Vectorstock 04. IngImage
02. GraphicStock 05. DesignCuts
03. Dover 06. InkyDeals

88. Dafont
Creative Market
Design Cuts
Scriptorium
Myfonts
Fonts.com
Blambot
RESOURCES: Fonts
A Font Squirrel N A L Y S I S & S T A T I S T I C S
Google Fonts
Mighty Deals
InkyDeals
fonts101.com
Google –caveat
fontsource, etc.
Pinterest
Ebay-caveat
Retail
Behance
Smashing Mag
Lost Type
The League of
Moveable type
TheNorthernBlock.com.uk
Manfred Klein
VitalyFriedman –alvit.de
Fonstruct –make/share
1001 Freefonts(10,000+)
Abstract Fonts (14,000+)
RegularBoldItalic.com
Neogrey
Urban Fonts
The Oatmeal
Ten by Twenty
FilizSahin–cute
Kevin & Amanda –Cute
Lettering Delights
Pinterest
Fonts.artill.de –Athletico
Typedepot
Ultratypes
Freeware Fonts Project
Glukfonts–swashy!
FontFabric
HypeforType

94. RESOURCES: iPhoneography
07.Phototropdelic 10. Rhonna
08. Halftone2 11. Pano
09. Fragment, PolyPic 12. Noir
01.Camera+ 04. JixiPix
02. Over 05. Hipstamatic
03 Word Swag 06. Etchings

95. Clockwise: Etchings • Fragment • WordSwag • Noir • Phototropedelic • Halftone2 • MokuHanga

96. Apps Gone Free – 10/5/14
Trimaginator

97. RESOURCES: Bibliography/Mags
07.Adobe.com 10. CreativeBloq
08. Dribbble 11. Behance
09. NextIssue/Issu
InDesign/Readr
12. Blogs
01.Creative Live 04. Smashing Magazine
02. Lynda.com 05. Treehouse
03. Kelby 06. Learnable

100. CONFERENCES: PepCon, InDesign
CONFERENCES: Photoshop World, City tours – Corey Barker, Scott Kelby, Dave Cross - $89

101. 101
Connect
F R O M A T O Z
Mailing Address
Falvey Library
Villanova University
800 Lancaster Avenue
Villanova, PA 19085
Contact Info
Phone: 610-519-3871
Email:
joanne.quinn@villanova.edu
Web: library.villanova.edu/news
Look for us
on Social Media
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Twitter @falveylibrary
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103. Questions?