What is graphic design? Also called visual communication design, it takes "vision" as a way of communication and expression, and creates and combines symbols, pictures and words in various ways to make a visual expression to convey ideas or information. So how do you start learning graphic design from zero foundation?
First, the basic art image source: Godfried Aduobe Institute of Design students' works
Many non-professional designers have no art foundation and their career development is very limited, so a designer still needs to have a certain art foundation. Learning to draw can try to design quickly and efficiently, and compare them to get new ideas. The more skilled you are in painting, the more thoroughly you understand light and shadow/perspective/composition, and you can quickly disassemble what your eyes see, recombine changes, and get your own creative points. We can paint badly, but we should get used to painting and paint with a purpose. Be a creative designer who can draw.
1) structural diagram.
Understand the combination of geometry, space sense and three-dimensional sense from geometric painting, so as to understand the relationship between light and shadow. Structure is an important factor affecting light. In real design cases, light/shadow is very complicated, such as how many layers there are in projection, how to reflect the relationship between black, white and gray, and so on. Painting can also improve observation and understand the three phases and five tones, thus improving the quality of works.
2) Perspective principle.
The eight-character principle of perspective, that is, near the big and far from the small/near the real and far from the imaginary, and for design, any product placed on our screen is perspective. In the design process, it is strictly in accordance with the requirements of perspective, and the designer's rigor will make the work more convincing.
3) composition.
Whether it's hand-drawing or design, we all emphasize that it can't be left up and right down, there must be boundaries and the location of the content. For graphic design, appropriate blank space can bring comfortable visual experience.
Second, the skillful use of design tools is also one of the skills that graphic designers must master. Graphic designers have many design tools, such as PS, ID, AI, CorelDRAW and so on. Most graphic designers are proficient in PS, so today we choose PS to briefly talk about how to learn tools. The learning methods of other tools are similar.
When you first come into contact with PS, you should first briefly understand the origin, function and role of this tool. Open the PS tool and briefly understand the components of the interface and the role of the tool. Secondly, we need to know the common functions and specific usage of PS, such as layer relationship and application, color filling, magic wand matting, selection and copying, locking and feathering, stain removal tools, repair tools, liquefaction effect and so on. , text (characters and paragraphs) and so on.
Then find some cases to copy, because copying can make you master this tool more purposefully. Such as posters, fonts, LOGO, etc. Poster design can be copied from many excellent posters in different directions and types, such as font posters, movie posters, mobile phone posters, furniture posters, beverage posters, lighting posters, sports posters, etc. If you can't find a suitable font in the design process and don't want to pay or infringe, many designers will design their own fonts. Pass? Demon font,? Star-shaped characters, three-dimensional characters, font deformation, understand how to make fonts.
If you want to master a tool completely, you need to do in-depth research and study, practice and improve constantly in your study and work, make the tool your right hand and help you express your design ideas.
Third, the basic study of graphic design mainly requires beginners to have the ability of comprehensive creativity, layout, color and aesthetics, and brand design.
1, creative synthesis.
For designing lions, synthesis can bring fun to everyone, has a rich sense of pictures, and is a visual and creative existence. If you learn synthesis well, you will use tools more flexibly. From the simple P-picture, the splicing of materials, the drawing of light and shadow, the control of perspective, the collocation of colors, to the shaping of structure, the mapping and depiction of materials can be mastered skillfully, which is also an effective way to improve the diffusion point of beginners' thinking.
Open mind, ideas, good ideas and creativity can make designers blockbuster. However, inspiration is often only for a moment. Grasping the instant inspiration, from what you see and feel in your life to the complex inspiration diffusion, requires designers to practice constantly.
Interesting substitution
2. Layout design.
"There are rules in design and methods in creation", and there must be rules to follow in design. We often talk about contrast, alignment, intimacy, repetition and so on. However, it is not easy to use it well in our works. In actual business work, how to determine the type of layout and the level of information according to the way of information presentation? How to find the topic and describe it?
(1) body.
Let's use two pictures to let you feel what this theme is:
The subject is the protagonist, and the picture with the subject is more eye-catching. A logical thinking of judging a picture through the subject is to understand what important information this picture needs to convey. Look at the essence through the phenomenon, and then describe our theme. In the process of doing it, let your subject become radiant, through the contrast principle in layout design.
(2) hierarchy.
Theme and hierarchy are the two most important parts in the layout. The only factor that affects the level is the size of the text, but there are many factors that determine the level, such as the specific content of the copy/the minimum size of the text/the distance from the viewing page.
Through the comparison of size, the way of color matching, the difference of modeling, the blank space, the performance of projection, the performance of reality and the treatment of specialized texture, the whole is more layered and the design is smart.
How to break free from the shackles and change the form on the basis of the original vision is very important for each of our designers, and the design techniques are also unified. As long as we learn to use it flexibly, our design works will not be dull, but will catch the eye of Party A and have key points.
Display of Themes and Levels in Web Pages
(3) Color and aesthetics.
For students with zero foundation, the distance between color and aesthetics is closer. Good color is a perfect visual experience. It is very important for designers to master the feelings of color transmission, which can help us convey the theme information more accurately. Through the comparison of colors, the transmission of color emotion is directly brought to the aesthetic height. There is a saying that "color catches people". Here are some pictures for everyone to feel:
The picture comes from network intrusion.
This is the work of Polish illustrator febin_raj. Febin_raj is a color controller. Each of his works has a strong contrast between cold and warm colors. The scenery in cool colors makes people feel quiet and comfortable, and the details in warm colors are more intimate.
The ultimate goal of learning design is to make the work truly present its own ideas, not just to be a porter of pictures.
The above is simply to share with you the learning process of graphic design. There are many ways to learn design. Choose the right learning method according to your own ability.