Having a foundation in design is your key to success in this industry. A great place to start is to learn graphic design principles. By learning the design principles, you can incorporate them into your design process and start taking away some of the guesswork.
The principles take time to understand and implement, so I will take the time for you to explain them thoroughly. In the video below, I cover symmetrical, asymmetrical, and radial balance.
Symmetrical Balance
Symmetrical balance is probably one you’re most familiar with. It’s when your layout has an equal amount of weight on each side. The simplest way to think of symmetrical balance is the mirror effect, as seen in the layouts below. Since the all the elects in the layout are centered, the left and rights sides mirror each other.
However, this isn’t always the case. The goal of symmetrical balance is equal weight. In the next layout we can see that both sides of the layout have one block of text and one image, which provides equal weight on both sides.
In another example, we can see here that the styling of the title on the right side is still symmetrically balanced even if the axis is tilted. It balances the image on the right mimicking the same shape.
Additionally things to call out in the layout above is the use movement in the title because of the arch of the text. It also takes advantage of the Gestalt principle of closure. It’s not a full circle, but our mind finishes the shape for us.
Asymmetrical Balance
Asymmetrical balance is when the layout is not symmetrical, but still feels balanced. This type of balance creates more visual interest to a design. So… I have designed, not hundreds, but thousands of magazine layouts. Even still, I do not know how to explain how to achieve asymmetrical balance in words, but the idea is similar that you want equal weight.
In the layout above, you can see a change in the grid structure. The 5-columns allows the main texts blocks in the body copy to take up 2 columns each and then a single columns for the caption. The image bleeds on the left side, which breaks the left-alignment of the text. Last, the large drop cap forces white space around the text, which balances out the heaviness of the image.
Radial Balance
Radial balance is when your elements are laid out in a circular or spiral pattern. I feel like this isn’t used that often… What’s the point of radial balance?!
There isn’t one because circles don’t have points…
I’m partially kidding. Circles are naturally symmetrical, to get radial balance just right, we rely on scale and movement.
In the layout above, they layout is essentially a circle. It doesn’t have to be a perfect circle, but the movement surrounds a central object, in this case, the headline.
Radial balance doesn’t always have to be a circle. It can also be a spiral, which you can see in the layout below. The spiral is further emphasized by the gradient of the watch colors.
Conclusion
That’s a majority of what you need to know about balance in graphic design. The biggest take away here is the balance is about distributing the weight of your elements equally.
A great way to explore balance in design is to do an option of each type of balance and then choose which one feels best to you. You’ll get the hang of it as you work on more projects.
Recent Comments