Mood Boards

With all of the pieces that go into graphic design, designers need a method of organizing their ideas and inspiration for a project. Mood boards are the perfect way to fulfill such a task. A mood board is a means of arranging all of the relevant information a designer has found to create a piece. They are a snapshot into the brain of a designer, allowing for an image of the style or concept they are trying to create. Paired with a wireframe, clients will know everything that they can know about the design that is being created for them. A mood board is a quick and efficient way to portray the ideas for a design that a graphic designer has to others.

A proper mood board acts as a guide for the designer to keep the design consistent throughout. To be effective, certain aspects must be included in a mood board. One of those items is the typography that is to be used. Knowing which fonts and typefaces fit into the design and when creates a consistent hierarchy throughout the piece and helps to ensure that the consumer has an easier time using the product. Establishing the typography also prevents the designer from adding too many fonts and making their work too busy. Other items that must be shown on the mood board are the color palette, textures, and patterns. Once again, consistency is key in design. A design that is too busy will deter clients from interacting with the product. This is why the inclusion of these elements is so important. In her blog post, Ashley Morgan expands on this idea by saying, “Handing a client a detailed and well-designed mood board not only shows them your capabilities as a designer but also gets them pumped for the design process.” All of the mentioned items are crucial to making a successful mood board, however, they are not the limit. A designer should consider all relevant information to the design and add it in. This includes, but is not limited to pictures, button styles, and menu styles. A mood board’s purpose is to give everyone involved a clear idea of what the final design will look like.

"Spending the time to do a more detailed mood board instead of a grid of images helps push everyone to make more specific design decisions that can be directly applied to the full website design." -Ashley Morgan

Even though many different components need to be included in a mood board, that does not mean that they have to be something professional and composed. There are many different styles of the mood board. Melena from the Do Good Work YouTube channel says that mood boards can be “organic and done in many different ways” and emphasizes the importance of the “strategic critical thinking behind your preparation process” before the final design. A strict mood board is very organized and clean. These are the types of mood boards used to show to a client or a designer’s team. Messy mood boards are the opposite. They simply show the designer’s thought process and the track that they took to get to the final product. Anything relevant to the project that has helped the designer with their process should go on the mood boards. Along with all of the previously mentioned items, a messy mood board can include screenshots, work by other designers, keywords, etc. Overall, a mood board is meant to help a designer through their thought process, and help others see what the designer is thinking.

Organizing every aspect of a design into a mood board is a crucial part of the design process. It allows designers to refer back to their inspiration as well as set boundaries for their design to maintain consistency. Including as much information as possible allows clients and design teams to visualize a design throughout the process of its creation. Graphic designers need to be able to properly stay organized and relay their design concepts to others.