Layout and composition are the building blocks of design. They give your work structure and make it easier to navigate, from the margins on the sides to the content in between.
Composition is important because it is the way your content is arranged. It doesn't matter if you're working with text, images, or elements in a graphic; a thoughtful, well-composed layout will guide your viewer through your media work in the order you want them to see and understand.
You can master layout and composition by thinking like a designer. There are five basic principles that can help you transform your work and sharpen your eye for design. Keep them in mind during your next project, and look for ways to apply them.
Proximity
Proximity is all about using visual space to show relationships in your content. It's pretty simple—all you have to do is make sure related items are grouped together (for instance, blocks of text or elements in a graphic, as in the example above).
Groups that are NOT related to each other should be separated to visually emphasize their lack of a relationship. This makes your work easier to understand at a glance, whether it's purely text or something more visual.
Negative Space
Negative space (occasionally called white space) is an important part of every composition. This is the spaces between your content, between lines, and even the outer margins. Negative space helps you define and separate different sections; it gives your content room to breathe. This example highlights where space is required so that none of the elements are too close together.
There's no one way to use negative space correctly, but it's good to understand its purpose. If your work ever starts to feel cluttered or uncomfortable, you might need to adjust the size of elements or make the difficult decision to remove some of them in order to ensure your work is not so cluttered that this becomes a distraction.
Alignment
Even without realising, we deal with alignment all the time. Whenever you type an email or create a document, the text is aligned automatically. When aligning objects by yourself, the most important thing is to be consistent. It might help to imagine your content arranged inside of a grid, just like the example above. Notice how there's an invisible line centering each image to the text? Each grouping is also evenly spaced and aligned, with equal-sized margins. This attention to detail makes the composition easier to navigate. Without consistent alignment, your work could start to feel disorganized.
Contrast
Contrast is when one item is different from another. In layout and composition, contrast can help you do many things, like catch the reader's eye, create emphasis, or call attention to something important. In the example, contrast is created through colour, the different text styles and different sizes of objects. This makes the design more dynamic and, therefore, more effective at communicating its message.
Hierarchy
Contrast is also closely tied to hierarchy, which is a visual technique that can help the viewer navigate your work. It shows them where to begin and where to go next using different levels of emphasis.
Establishing hierarchy is simple: Just decide which elements you want the reader to notice first, then make them stand out. High-level or important items are usually larger, bolder, or more eye-catching in some way.
Repetition
Repetition is a reminder that every project should have a consistent look and feel. This means finding ways to reinforce your design by repeating or echoing certain elements.
For instance, if you have a specific color palette, look for ways to carry it through. If you've chosen a special header style, use it every time.
It's not just for aesthetic reasons—being consistent can also make your work easier to read. When viewers know what to expect, they can relax and focus on the content.
HAVE A GO
Using your layout plan and making any changes based on the princples related to arrangement that you just learned, you are designing EITHER an A3 Poster (portrait orientation) OR an A3 Magazine layout (landscape - two A4 pages next to each other). Your poster or magazine layout should represent one of the 'Principles of Design' or about Typography. Your design will explain what the principle is and also show it through the way it is arranged.
To create your design, you may collect some elements, such as images. If you wish to include images, find them on a royalty free website such as Unsplash.
Open InDesign go to File>New>Print and then select A3 for your poster (and portrait orientation) or select A4 for your magazine. For the magazine you will need to duplicate your pages so you end up with a spread of two pages.
To insert images in InDesign go to File>Place and select the image from the folder you have saved it in. To adjust the frame and size of the image at the same time, hold Ctrl+Shift on Windows or Cmnd+Shift on a Mac. You can find out more about adjusting size and frames here but make sure to watch the whole video.
Create a title and / or some subheadings or captions. If your computer allows, try downloading a font from dafont.com and installing it.
Include a few sentences that explain the principle of design. This should be in your words, not copied and pasted. This will ensure the entire design does not breach copyright or plagiarise (ethical). It also gives you an opporunity to think about what really matters. Try to communicate the principle through visuals as much as possible.
Use the principle that you have just looked at to decide your layout, arrangement and use of colours.
File>Save>Save As> InDesign document so that you can edit further later.
File>Export> Export As>PDF This is so you have completed version.
Magazine Layout Mood Board
Poster Layout Mood Board