11 of 365 - Biophilia effect design principle by John LeMasney via lemasney.com
11 of 365 – Biophilia effect design principle by John LeMasney via lemasney.com
The biophilia effect is the idea that when we are placed in environments that contain or seem to contain nature, we are more likely to be able to heal physically and emotionally, think more creatively, and generally function better. In environments where these outcomes are intended, it is preferable to create a natural environment or one where nature appears by posters, installations, or other means.
In this illustration, I show two large plate window environments, one where there is a brick walled view, and one in which there is a bamboo grove. The bamboo grove view, fairly immersive, would theoretically create a more creative, healing environment, regardless of if they were actually there or simply appeared to be there.
In the illustration I’ve made here, I took an average image of a female face and exaggerated the eyes, and diminished the nose and mouth to make a baby-faced bias in the viewer.
8 of 365 - Area alignment design principle by John LeMasney via lemasney.com
Area alignment design principle cc-by lemasney.com
The design principle of area alignment says that when you have a series of objects to be aligned that do not have regular shapes, that it is more aesthetically pleasing to centrally align them according to their area and weight than by central alignment of the bounding boxes.
In the illustration I’ve made here, the birds to the left are centrally aligned according to the centers of the bounding boxes, and the birds to the right are centrally aligned according to their area, form, and weight. The area aligned images are more pleasing as a series of aligned objects. These are two different ways of thinking about layout of related objects in a design plane.
“Alignment based on the area of elements versus the edges of elements.  With the advent of professional design and engineering software, elements in a design can be aligned with exacting precision. However, the alignment supported by software is based on the edges of elements — including center alignment, which calculates a center based on the edges. This method works well when elements are relatively uniform and symmetrical, but less well when the elements are nonuniform and asymmetrical. In these latter cases, it is preferable to align based on the visual weight or area of the elements, a technique that must be performed using the designer’s eye and judgment. Using edge alignment when area alignment is called for is one of the …” found in Area Alignment – Universal Principles of Design, Revised and Updated: 125 Ways to Enhance Usability, Influence Perception, Increase Appeal, Make Better Design Decisions, and Teach through Design [Book] at https://goo.gl/exykFB
6 of 365 - anthropomorphic design principle by John LeMasney via lemasney.com
6 of 365 – anthropomorphic design principle by John LeMasney via lemasney.com
Anthropomorphic design is a method by which a designer makes use of angles and curves that are inspired by the human form to evoke certain emotional responses from the user of the design. For example, the classic Coca Cola bottle makes use of anthropomorphic design and reminds the user of the curves of the female body. One might also play with the proportions and silhouette of a form to remind the user of babies or men to evoke reasonable emotional responses to those ends. Designs that have content that is aggressive, safe, loving, stable, or kind might make use of anthropomorphic forms to evoke those responses in a subconscious way.
In this illustration, I decided to start with 4 female silhouettes, using half of each to create a form that repeats and reverses the half. Then, I created a container inspired by the result of the silhouette experiment. There is no clear connection between the end results and their inspirations, but each of them has a character to them that speaks to the original forms.
Advance Organizers are a design method where an audience is given new information in one of two ways to become oriented with a new concept. In cases where the audience is newly introduced to the topic, we might use an expository advance organizer. If an alien was trying to learn about the way that a human hand functions, for instance, we might use an expository advance organizer in the form of a description of the look, feel, uses, and functions of the hand. If the alien had hand like appendages, let’s say 3-pointed claws, we might use their understanding of that in the form of a comparative advance organizer that showed the similarities and differences between the alien claw and the human hand. The purpose of either would be to grant the audience a better understanding of the new concept before going into deeper detail, training, or demonstration.
Above is an illustration of the comparative visual anatomy of serif typography and sans-serif typography, in which the letter A is used in a comparative advance organizational method, since you, the audience, is likely familiar with the letter A.
Welcome, all, to the 2014 edition of 365 sketches. This is a simple offering for the first sketch, but gives some idea of what I intend to talk about. In this series, I intend to learn more about design principles, because in the past I focused mostly on method and technique. I hope that this series teaches me as much about design ideology as past series have taught me about design method. It is perhaps evidence of “a cart before the horse” which I am trying to remedy.
The 80/20 Principle is one in which a well-working system of any kind (book, technology, structure, organization) has distributed value and power, where the 20 percent represents the most important, the most valuable, and the most protected, and the rest supports it. We are experiencing political difficulty in this country at the moment, according to this theory, because the 20 percent has been reduced too far. The same is true in design, books, movies, or other organizations of content: If there is too little to gain from participation in the whole, e.g., if only a small percentage holds the entire value, then the entire structure falls apart, and holds no value at all. The best design, according to the theory, balances value and support at a ratio near to, but not necessarily equal to, 80/20.
