Design Elements

• Points/Dots• Lines• Surfaces/Planes/Shapes• Form/Volume/Mass• Pattern/Texture• Size/Scale• Space• Color/Value

Point and Dots

• Point indicates a position in space• The point is the first and simplest element of visual design. • The point serves as the focus of a visual, highlighting or drawing

attention to important information.• Conceptually, it has no length, width, or depth, and is therefore

static, centralized and directionless.

• By definition we can’t actually draw a point, since to see one would require it have dimensions.

• What we can draw is a dot. • In fact dots are the building blocks of everything else. • Any other mark we make can be seen as one or more dots in

combination. • Every shape, form, mass, or blob with a recognizable center is

essentially a dot regardless of its size.

Source: http://www.vanseodesign.com/web-design/points-dots-lines/

Characteristics of a point

• The defining characteristic of a dot is that it’s a point of focused attention. • Dots anchor themselves in space and provide a reference point relative to the other

forms and space around it. • While we often think of dots as circular in nature, they don’t have to be. What they are

is points of focused attention. Dots are the focal points in our compositions.

• Dots establish a relationship with the space around it. The two most important relationships formed are the proportion of the dot and the space around it and the position of the dot within that space.

• As dots increase in size we start to see them as shapes, but they still retain their fundamental dot-like qualities and characteristics. A square placed in the whitespace of a page is still a dot. It still attracts visual attention to it, which again is the dot’s defining characteristic.

• Dots centrally placed within a composition create symmetry and are neutral and static, through they tend to dominate the space around them.

• Dots placed off center create asymmetry. They are dynamic and actively influence the space around them.

Where you can identify point ? • The two ends of a line. • The intersection of two lines. • The meeting of lines at the corner of a plane or volume. • The center of a field.

Other point generated forms that share these same visual attributes are the –• Circle• Cylinder • Sphere

• Tholos of Polycleitos , Epidauros , Greece , c 350 BC

• Tholos of Polycleitos , Epidauros , Greece , c 350 BC

• Baptistery at Pisa , Italy, 1153-1262, Dioti Salvi

• Cenotaph for Sir Isaac Newton, Project , 1784, Etienne-Louis Boulee

• The Mall, Washington, DC- example of two point denoting a gateway / passage

Line • A line is a series of points adjacent to each other. • Where a point has no dimension, a line has one dimension. • They have a length, but nothing else. In reality a line would need a second

dimension to actually see it, but we’ll continue to call them lines and not something else here.

• The fundamental characteristic of a line is to connect or unite. • This connection can be visible or invisible. • Two dots on a page have a connection even if that connection, that line

between them, can not be seen. • The dots attract of repel each other along a line.

The Relationship between Dot and Dot

Line • Where dots are about position,

lines are about movement and direction. • A line leads somewhere, your eye moves along it

seeking one or both of its endpoints. • This movement and direction makes lines inherently

dynamic. • A line is not attracting you to a point in space.• It’s directing you toward and away from points in space. • The flip side of connecting is separating. • Lines not only connect elements, they can also separate

elements. • They can connect an element to space or separate it

from space. • Lines separate and join both spaces and objects. • Lines can also cross barriers, protect, and support.

• As lines become thicker they begin to be perceived as planes or surfaces and they gain mass.

• To maintain their identity as lines they must increase in length as they increase in width.

• Changing the width of a line relative to its length has a much greater effect on the quality of a line as changing the size of a dot has on the quality of a dot.

• If a line continues to get thicker without also getting longer at some point it ceases to be a line and becomes a surface or plane.

• A single line traveling in a curve around a fixed, invisible point with an unchanging distance from that point, eventually joins it’s starting point and becomes circle.

• A circle is a line until the thickness of the line increases to completely fill the negative space inside the circle.

• The negative space itself can be seen as a dot distinct from the line/circle. • If the distance from the fixed center point is allowed to change the line doesn’t meet

it’s starting point and a spiral is formed instead of a circle.

• The thinner the line the more the emphasis is on the quality of direction. • The thicker the line the more emphasis is moved to the quality of mass and

away from the quality of direction.• The endpoints of a line can be seen or appear to move toward infinity. • As lines are allowed to enter and leave a format without seeing their

endpoints their sense of movement is reinforced. • When one end point is contained within the format the direction is no longer

infinite. • It becomes specific to the point and the tension between the end point and

the surrounding space is increased.

The Relationship Between Line and Line

• When two lines intersect they create an angle between them.

• Caryatid Porch, The Erechtheion, Athens , 421-405 B. C.

Salginatobel Bridge, Switzerland, 1929-30

• Caryatid Porch, The Erechtheion, Athens , 421-405 B. C.

• Seagram Building , New York City 1956-58

Surfaces and Plane (2d) • Two Parallel lines have the ability to

visually describe as a plane.

• Altes Museum Berlin , 1823-30

• Cloister of Mossaic Abbey , France , C, 1100

Plane

• Overhead Plane • Wall plane • Base plane

• Scala De Spagna ( Spanish Steps ) Rome , 1721-25

• Mortuary Temple of Queen Hatshepsut, Der, el, Bahari, Thebes , 1511-1480BC

• Machu Pichhu , an ancient Incan city established c 1500 in Andes Mountains

• Piazza of san Marco Venice

• falling waters Kaufmann house

• Notre dame du haut ronchamp