Principles of Design

By Stephen Chmilar

Have you ever looked at a picture you like and wondered why you like it? Have you ever
wanted to make your art more dramatic and eye catching? Well this tutorial will help
you!

Ok let’s start off: Contrast

Like it or not, we live in a world full of contrast. They’re differences between tall and
short, black and white, young and old, female and male, living and dead, organized and
chaos, hard and soft, red and green, sky and ground, organic and geometric, good and evil
and so on. Here’s a bare bones example of contrast:

Picture 1

In Picture one we can clearly see that the black circle is contrasted to the white square
canvas. So we have 2 contrasts here: big and small, black and white.

Now let’s look at a picture example:

 Picture 2
In Picture 2 we can see a contrast between the small people and trees compared to the tall
skyscrapers.

Next we will look at Balance.

There are two types of balance: Symmetrical and Asymmetrical balance.

Symmetrical means that the balance on either side is close to perfect. Most buildings are
Symmetrically Balanced, look at the design of a Skyscraper and you’ll see that it’s pretty
even all the way up. Example of a Symmetrically Balanced model:

Picture 3
The model in picture 3 is perfectly balanced on each side. However, if you go look at
yourself in the mirror or look at other people, they are infact Asymmetrically Balanced.
Asymmetrical means that the balance is off. Here’s an example:

Picture 4

In Picture 4 we see that the cat’s fur is not even on her face. She has much more black fur
on her left side of her face. Another example would be my face, it has a scar on the right
cheek and my mole pattern is different on either side of my face. Most organic things are
asymmetrical.

Faces aren’t the only kind of balance out there. There are also balances between:

-Warm and Cold colours

-Strong and Dull colours
-Black and White
-Earth and Sky
-Subject and Background
-Right and Left
-Top and Bottom

Our next Principle of Design is Scale and Proportion.

People who have taken Life Drawing know all about these two. Scale is the size of an
object compared to other objects in a piece. And Proportion is the size of a part of an
object compared to the rest of the object.

For example: (next page, did you know that the buildings, people and cars in picture 2
were made out of Lego?)
 Picture 5

In picture 5 we can clearly see that the carrot in the picture is medium sized and is out of
proportion. My Mom grew some pretty weird carrots.

Scale also works very well with contrast. If we put a small circle next to a big circle we
see:

Picture 6

In picture 6 we see that the big Circle appears to be a lot bigger then the small circle.

Next we’ll look at Repetition and Rhythm.

Sounds a little musical doesn’t it? Well there are a lot of patterns out there and we often
don’t see it. For an example:

Picture 7

Here we can see a clear repeating pattern and rhythm of the chairs and shadows. Rhythm
is a little harder to show in a visual form, it comes to play when you do a redo certain
aspects with some variation. For an example in Picture 7, the chairs are all not completely
align and there’s a gap down the line and there’s some ever so slight lines near the top
left hand of the picture.

Next is Unity and Variety.

You should know that Unity is the togetherness feel that things belong together and that
Variety is the spice of life (just don’t go saying that every day). Variety is change. In
picture 7 we saw a lot of Unity in the picture thanks to the black and white film
production to help show the white chairs, shadows and grad gown. Too much unity can
be too boring and too much variety can cause a headache because we’d be looking at
chaos. But some pieces are built on chaos…

Anyway, here’s another example:

(Next page)
 Picture 7

In Picture 7 we see that the picture is held together thanks to a unity of shapes, all the
leaves belong together. The leaves are not all the same, some are smaller, some are
crinkled up, some have more snow on them, some are different colours, thus producing
variety, as well as the colour differences between orange and green. An example of
contrast.

Now we’re going to tie all these things together with our next 3 Elements, first we’ll take
on Directional Forces.

Go back and look at pictures 2 and 7 and see where your eyes guide you.

Now look at these edited versions of those two pictures on the next page.
 Picture 8

Picture 9

In picture 8 picture 9 we can clearly see the natural directional forces that move our eyes.
In picture 8 we can see that the lines are directing us to the organic forest at the end of the
street and away from the skeleton on top of one of the roofs. In picture 9 we can see that
the lines help focus on the young lady in the picture and she becomes the subject of our
next Principle of Design: Emphasis
Emphasis or Focal Point is to help the viewer to focus in what the main subject of the
piece is. Another example would be a yellow sun in a black and white piece. But of
course we hardly place the main focal point right smack in the middle of the frame,
canvas or medium. It’s always best to have a character slightly off center. Here we bring
in the Rule of Thirds. The Rule of Third states that one should divide the picture into 9
parts, and the main subject should go in where the lines interact, example of the guide:

Picture 10

In picture 10 we can see that the red circles are where our subject should be, let’s see if
this translates to a different picture:
 Picture 11

As you can see, the main focal point in picture 7, 9 and 11 is the young woman’s face,
with her body on the one of the rule of third’s lines. She is off center creating

With the Rule of Thirds helping, the subject has become our focal point and the top right
hand of the picture has become our last Principle, Subordination. We make it blend into
the scene so it doesn’t cast much attention, much like the skeleton in picture 2 or:

Picture 12
The marshmallow man on the bottom left hand side. It was close to Halloween at Lego
Land. You wouldn’t have seen him if I hadn’t pointed him out.

So let’s recap, the Principles of Design are:

-Contrast
-Balance
-Scale and Proportion
-Repetition and Rhythm
-Unity and Variety
-Directional Forces
-Emphasis (Focal Point) and Subordination

Remember to observe these and practice these as you continue to do your art. Now that
you are aware of these Principles and Elements you’ll be able to create better work and
find out why you like other pieces more.

Links:

http://schmilar.blogspot.com - my blog
http://www.digimill.net - the host of this tutorial and several others, as well as news and
interviews.

All images by Stephen Chmilar.