LAYOUT and ARTWORK - II - Emphasis, Thumbnails, Miniature, Keyline, Layout

EMPHASIS: Although varying degrees of emphasis may be given to different elements, one unit should dominate. It's is the designers responsibility to determine how much Emphasis is necessary, as well as how it is to be achieved. The important element may be placed in the optical center or removed from the clutter of other elements. Emphasis may also be achieved by contrast in size shape tone, texture and color and also white space.

The Kinds of Layout

* THUMBNAILS or MINIATURE: A designer needs to explore many alternative solutions. Thumbnails are the second step in design process. Thumbnails sketches are like exercising any muscle of our body. The more you exercise the more powerful it gets. Thumbnails are usually small because they are meant to be fast and undetailed. But they are drawn in proportion of the dimension of the finished piece. These small sketches are generally drawn in the experimental stage to show the different ways of arranging the elements. Not every designer use's a thumbnail sketch, however some skip this step altogether and begin with the rough.

* ROUGH LAYOUT: Once the range of ideas has been fully explored, select the best two or three for refinement. Here it begins to present more details. The purpose of the rough is to convey the idea to agency personnel It is the same size as the future advertisement but the illustrations are roughed in, the headlines are lettered hastily. The copy blocks are represented by horizontal parallel lines.

* COMPREHENSIVE: The "comp" is very exact. This is the piece of art that you will you present to the client. It is based on the finished but it is much more carefully done. The client is able to judge the design from this because it looks like the finished printed piece.

* ART WORK / KEYLINE: The job is not ready for actual production. The comprehensive may look exactly like the finished piece, but it cannot be used to produce the final printed design. Everything must be sent to the printer "Camera ready" which means it must be converted into black&white art work.

Now a days most of the design works are done in computer, where all the images are converted in a digital format. Both the compressive and art work can be obtained in a floppy or a MOD (Magnetic Optical Disk) and can be sent to the printer.

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