What is graphic
design? from AIGA Career Guide:
Suppose you want
to announce or sell something, amuse or persuade someone, explain a complicated
system or demonstrate a process. In other words, you have a message you want to
communicate. How do you “send” it? You could tell people one by one or
broadcast by radio or loudspeaker. That's verbal communication. But if you use
any visual medium at all-if you make a poster; type a letter; create a business
logo, a magazine ad, or an album cover; even make a computer printout-you are
using a form of visual communication called graphic design.
Graphic designers
work with drawn, painted, photographed, or computer-generated images
(pictures), but they also design the letterforms that make up various typefaces
found in movie credits and TV ads; in books, magazines, and menus; and even on
computer screens. Designers create, choose, and organize these
elements-typography, images, and the so-called “white space” around them-to
communicate a message. Graphic design is a part of your daily life. From humble
things like gum wrappers to huge things like billboards to the T-shirt you're
wearing, graphic design informs, persuades, organizes, stimulates, locates,
identifies, attracts attention and provides pleasure.
Graphic design is
a creative process that combines art and technology to communicate ideas. The
designer works with a variety of communication tools in order to convey a
message from a client to a particular audience. The main tools are image and
typography.
Image-based
Design:
Designers develop
images to represent the ideas their clients want to communicate. Images can be
incredibly powerful and compelling tools of communication, conveying not only
information but also moods and emotions. People respond to images instinctively
based on their personalities, associations, and previous experience. For
example, you know that a chili pepper is hot, and this knowledge in combination
with the image creates a visual pun.In the case of image-based design, the
images must carry the entire message; there are few if any words to help. These
images may be photographic, painted, drawn, or graphically rendered in many
different ways. Image-based design is employed when the designer determines
that, in a particular case, a picture is indeed worth a thousand words.
Type-based
Design:
In some cases,
designers rely on words to convey a message, but they use words differently
from the ways writers do. To designers, what the words look like is as
important as their meaning. The visual forms, whether typography (communication
designed by means of the printed word) or handmade lettering, perform many
communication functions. They can arrest your attention on a poster, identify
the product name on a package or a truck, and present running text as the
typography in a book does. Designers are experts at presenting information in a
visual form in print or on film, packaging, or signs.When you look at an
“ordinary” printed page of running text, what is involved in designing such a
seemingly simple page? Think about what you would do if you were asked to
redesign the page. Would you change the typeface or type size? Would you divide
the text into two narrower columns? What about the margins and the spacing
between the paragraphs and lines? Would you indent the paragraphs or begin them
with decorative lettering? What other kinds of treatment might you give the
page number? Would you change the boldface terms, perhaps using italic or
underlining? What other changes might you consider, and how would they affect
the way the reader reacts to the content? Designers evaluate the message and
the audience for type-based design in order to make these kinds of decisions.
Image and
Type:
Designers often
combine images and typography to communicate a client's message to an audience.
They explore the creative possibilities presented by words (typography) and
images (photography, illustration, and fine art). It is up to the designer not
only to find or create appropriate letterforms and images but also to establish
the best balance between them. Designers are the link between the client and
the audience. On the one hand, a client is often too close to the message to
understand various ways in which it can be presented. The audience, on the
other hand, is often too broad to have any direct impact on how a communication
is presented. What's more, it is usually difficult to make the audience a part
of the creative process. Unlike client and audience, graphic designers learn
how to construct a message and how to present it successfully. They work with
the client to understand the content and the purpose of the message. They often
collaborate with market researchers and other specialists to understand the
nature of the audience. Once a design concept is chosen, the designers work
with illustrators and photographers as well as with typesetters and printers or
other production specialists to create the final design product.
Symbols and logos are special, highly condensed information forms or identifiers. Symbols are abstract representation of a particular idea or identity. The CBS “eye” and the active “television” are symbolic forms, which we learn to recognize as representing a particular concept or company. Logotypes are corporate identifications based on a special typographical word treatment. Some identifiers are hybrid, or combinations of symbol and logotype. In order to create these identifiers, the designer must have a clear vision of the corporation or idea to be represented and of the audience to which the message is directed.
Edited by Sharon Helmer Poggenpohl
Copyright 1993 The American Institute of Graphic Arts
