How AI is Transforming the Conference Space

How AI is Transforming the Conference Space

Inspiring Design Trends for 2022

Inspiring Design Trends for 2022

Top 5 Social Trend Predictions for 2022

Top 5 Social Trend Predictions for 2022

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Category: Graphic Design

01 Feb
2022

Inspiring Design Trends for 2022

by Keely | in Graphic Design, Marketing | on 01 Feb 2022

As we welcome 2022, we say goodbye to 2021 – a year that had the ongoing pandemic, the prominence of the Black Lives Matter movement, and continuing our best efforts to combat the climate crisis with 77 countries in the world announcing full or partial bans on plastic bags.*

Trends in the design world are more than just random fads, they express a year’s worth of phenomenon, and these events have changed the way businesses in all sectors around the world communicate with their consumers.

So what are these trends? We’ve highlighted 8 below:

 

1. Happiness is key

The past couple of years have certainly made people revaluate their priorities and recognise what is most important, so I feel this had to go first on the list. Mental health is such a huge part of our lives, now more than ever, and it’s come to realise that the ‘bigger is better’ mindset is not always the case. This outlook will inspire a tone of voice that’s happier and more carefree throughout the year, to help bring more comfort and positivity.

 

https://atelier-bingo.fr/ (atelier-bingo)

2. Maximalism

‘Go big or go home’ is what applies to Maximalist design! Say goodbye to that white space and be extravagant with colour and pattern edge to edge of the artboard, having no fear of clashing combinations. This style creates so much energy and freedom, which you could say is like a burst of expression through the restrictions after lockdown.

 

 

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3. Bold backgrounds

Bold and vibrant colours are set to take over from the more muted style of colour that’s been popular over the past couple of years. Bright block colours are certainly a way to make visuals stand out – as long as it’s done right and doesn’t take over the main focus of the page. The aim of these backgrounds isn’t to overwhelm text and icons, but to make the right information stand out, so it’s important to use them in bursts paired with white space or more muted tones.

 

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4. Colourful visuals that are inclusive

Similarly to the bright backgrounds mentioned above, icons and illustrations are heading towards this same style. These visuals portray a message at just a glance, and capture the reader’s attention over any piece of text, with most icons representing the same thing in any language – meaning they’re a great way to get your point across and communicate. Making all visuals inclusive is also a big trend of 2022, displaying the diversity of humanity respects and appreciates what makes everyone different, in terms of age, gender, ethnicity, religion, disability and sexual orientation.

 

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5. Serif Fonts

Sans-serif fonts are widely used in design as they portray a style that’s more modern and approachable. Last year however, Serif fonts started to come back and it seems are here to stay in 2022. These classic serif fonts can look outdated if they’re not used in the right way, but they are however, traditionally used in books and news articles and are seen to represent trust and reliability – so it’s no wonder they are a popular choice with banking brands. There are now so many different serif typefaces in all different styles and personalities, and paired with a nice sans-serif font they can look really effective – such as how Nationwide have utilised this on their website.

 

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6. Nostalgia – retro is new again

With all the unknowns and unfamiliarity in the world at the moment, people are in need of comfort, enjoyment and maybe a bit of escapism – so what’s better than throwing everything back to the 90s! Netflix’s ‘Stranger Things’ bought back the nostalgic 80s vibe, capturing the era of loud patterns and neon colours, and similarly the 90s style brings back a sense of familiarity and happiness, with the bright colours and funky shapes. MailChimp have captured this style perfectly on their website, aiding their text with nostalgic and fun visuals – and using a serif font I may add!

 

7. Motion

Motion within branding has been a trend for the last couple of years and continues to be a vital focus for brand creation. Adding movement and animation not only outlines the personality of a brand, whether it’s on social media or on your landing page, it creates much more engaging content, making a brand much more memorable.

 

  

8. Responsive logos

It’s a known thing to designers, that many clients wanted to ‘make the logo bigger’, however bigger doesn’t necessarily mean better – what’s most important is that the logo is always visible. With content being viewed on such a range of devices and responding to many screen sizes, it’s important that the logo adapts to still be identifiable on the largest screen and the smallest screen. Whether it’s using an icon to distinguish the brand – like Kodak have created, or abbreviating the name – like we have done for The Niche Vehicle Network, the brand is still recognised at each state.

 

As mentioned earlier on, the events from previous years have changed the way businesses in all sectors around the world communicate with their consumers, and looking through all these trends and their examples above, we can see a crossover with many companies already within their styles.

We hope this year brings more positivity, and the upcoming design trends look to reflect this with more visual aspects; from more inclusive representations to nostalgic and vibrant bold colours, inspiring well-being and happiness.

 

 

References:

*The 12 Best Things That Have Happened in 2021 So Far — and How We Can Keep Making Progress (globalcitizen.org)

26 Feb
2021

The importance of text hierarchy

by Keely | in Graphic Design, Marketing, Uncategorised | on 26 Feb 2021

Typographic hierarchy is a system for organising text, which allows the reader to immediately understand the order of importance of what’s to be read. This is important in any design, as the easier the piece is to read visually, the more likely it is to be read and to keep your audience engaged.

The text hierarchy system applies to near enough everything, from print assets – letterheads, business cards and flyers, to web design – where navigation and call to actions need to be as clear as possible for the best user experience.

3 steps to consider going about this

  1. To begin with, it’s essential to recognise what message the text is trying to convey. The branding and aesthetics will come after, but to start with it’s important to find the purpose and meaning.
  2. Content should be treated as a visual component – along with shapes, icons, colour, typography etc. If colour is used to differentiate rank, think about the psychology and the meaning of that colour – red for example portrays danger or caution, and similarly in terms of type, text that’s in bold all caps can sometimes give off that same message.
  3. Put yourself in the reader’s position and try to see things how they would at first glance. Are each of the sections clear and contrasting enough to show a hierarchy of importance? The article page from one of our newsletter designs below displays the 3 main levels:

Heading

The heading or title is the first thing the reader sees when glancing through content. This is of the highest importance as if it’s not engaging enough or not visually striking, the reader may flick past and never even get to the main content.

Subheading

Next down the hierarchy are the Subheadings, and these are used to separate the text into sections. This text should be less eyecatching than the header, but more visual than the text body, as this is a summary of the main content within it.

Body

Finally we come to the body text, this section is more content heavy and includes all the meaty information, so it’s crucial that it’s easy to read to ensure the reader continues all the way through to the end.

 

With and without a designed hierarchy

We love comedy here at PDC, myself in particular loves going to see stand-up comedians – although a bit difficult in these times! Using this sector as an example, I wanted to show how the way a listings page is displayed can impact the readability.

Eye-tracking research by the Missouri University of Science and Technology shows that when looking at a website, it takes users less than two-tenths of a second to form a first impression, spending around 2.6 seconds scanning a website before focusing on a specific area. This doesn’t surprise me at all, as personally if I don’t see what I want to see straight away I just won’t bother to look.

Imagine trying to find someone specific if this were a list of hundreds of comedians:

It’s a little extreme, but as you can see, without any system of hierarchy it’s actually quite painful to sift through the text to find what you’re looking for.

However as you can see below, by using colour and varying type size and weights, it’s easier to isolate certain sections to make it much more readable and scannable:

And to make it even clearer than that as well as being a bit more visual, the use of icons can also help:

Overall, there are many styling techniques that can be used to create a textual hierarchy; size, weight, colour, position, type contrast, and a lot of the time these techniques are used in combination with each other.

Understand the purpose of the text and what message it is trying to get across, decipher what is the most important content, and then present this content in the most organised way. Remove the clutter and design a clear and readable piece for your audience – less is more!

 

 

18 Sep
2020

6 Benefits of Using Images, Flat Graphics and Infographics on Your Website and Social Media

by Keely | in Graphic Design, Marketing, Social Media | on 18 Sep 2020
  1. Why are images and graphics so important on websites, blogs and social media? One of the main reasons is readability.There’s nothing worse than landing on a page and there just being pages and pages of text, it puts people off as it’s too overwhelming to look at. However, adding visual assets to these types of pages allows it to be broken up into sections, making it so much easier for the reader to digest the information.

 

  1. An image can tell a thousand words. Sometimes an image can tell you about the information much quicker than reading a headline, as well as being much more interesting to look at. So, incorporating some of the text-heavy content into an infographic, is much more aesthetically pleasing for the reader, meaning they are more likely to read it and absorb what’s being said.

 

  1. Images can rank in Google search engines, as long as the images are significant, optimised and not a highly popular subject that’s being written about.
    A good example of this, is if you sell niche products on your website where there’s not much competition on the market, you should use the specific model/product name as a keyword, and this could become a good source of traffic.

 

  1. Stand out on social media. Everyone knows that images play a massive role on social platforms, not everyone searches for images on Google, but on social media you see things without even looking for them. When you come across a topic you’re interested in, or just a funny image you are likely to click on it, so depending on your topic, this can help you to get more views on your post content.

 

  1. Following on from the step above, these images that stand out to the reader are more likely to be shared, and therefore your content is spread out to be seen by a wider audience. Obviously presuming that the content is of value and is a topic people have interest in.

 

  1. Visual branding becomes your signature, this helps people to identify you easily, when they are used to seeing the same colours, graphics and styles repeated throughout your posts and content. As previously mentioned, an image sometimes does a better job of explaining something, so using things like character graphics is a good way to amplify your brand and make it much more visual and memorable.

  

 

With stock photos and free images sites (pexels.com, unsplash.com) now so available to us, creating blogs etc has never been easier.

The downside to this, is that because they are so freely available and easy to access, it means that a lot of people can be using the same images across their platforms – a bit like shopping at a high street store and then seeing everyone wearing the new top you just bought, it’s annoying!

 

This is why it’s important to be original and stand out amongst the rest. Using a mixture of imagery and graphics is a good option, as if you don’t have access to original photos like a lot of people don’t, you can bring out your identity and originality in graphics and infographics. Here at PDC, we can work with you to create your own brand and individuality that’s suited to your style of work. Contact us today to see how we can help you.