Designers or people considering a career in design should always understand the importance of design elements in bringing their creative ideas to life. A design composition is the final product of ensuring all the elements are correctly aligned, and any good designer knows that balance is a key concept that makes a design successful.
The concept of balance goes beyond aligning things proportionally. If you’re starting out as a freelance designer, you must know the basics of design principles and ideas. The mention of asymmetry in the title was intended to convey that asymmetry is the starting point for achieving balance in any design.
In this article, we will delve deeply into:
- The Principle of Balance in Design History
- Types of Balance in Design
- Ways to Achieve Balance in Your Designs
As I mentioned, even if you are unfamiliar with other design principles, it is crucial to be well aware of balance and its importance for designers, especially if you’re beginning your career with no prior experience. For example, today, people rely on smartphones to access the internet, so web designers or UI/UX designers must ensure that the user experience is appealing and minimal for people using small screens. This is why I’ve written an entire article about the principle of balance in design, just in case you’re looking for a deep understanding of this concept. Here, I’ve made sure to cover everything so that you don’t have to worry about researching more. So, dive in!
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What is meant by the Principle of Balance in Design – History
The idea of balance was well observed long before people started recognizing different art forms. In early ages, and even in prehistoric times, artists emphasized bringing order to their creative process. For example, let’s look at Leonardo da Vinci. His works can all be defined by his meticulous approach to incorporating balance in detail, especially in popular art such as The Last Supper or Vitruvian Man. He believed in proportion and symmetric elements to complete his art.
But what exactly is the principle of balance in design?
In today’s era, people tend to rely more on minimalistic ideas. Graphic designers and artists should focus on creating artwork that is visually appealing to viewers. If you’re planning to tell a story through an image, different elements such as color, typography, shapes, sizes, lines, or other images should be placed in a uniform way that establishes a clear focal point. A balanced composition, where everything works together, is accepted by the majority of viewers. This means that an evenly balanced design has elements that are strategically arranged, so each element has a role to play. These elements come together to form a concept that communicates the ultimate idea behind the design.
I know what you’re thinking: these are all textbook concepts. So, what else should you understand about a sense of BALANCE? Well, the types of balance in design
Types of Balance in Design
Now, it’s time to dive deeper into the subject and explore the different types of balance in design. You guessed it right: symmetrical and asymmetrical balances are the most common concepts found in designs.
Symmetrical Balance
The visual weight concept I discussed first in the introduction is key here. If you draw a line vertically or horizontally, the weight is equally distributed. This applies to the distribution of color, font size, and typography as well. Symmetrical designs are easy on the eyes of the audience, and their appeal is generally positive. When you alter the visual weight of elements, it can drastically change the whole concept of the design. Here’s an example below, with elements equally distributed on either side, making it easy to grasp the concept.
A small tip: symmetrical balance can often be utilized by brands for their packaging, poster designs, and unique logo designs that can have a lasting impact on the audience. This will surely appeal to a wide audience, helping them to easily register the message. I feel that when minimal colors are used in creating symmetrically balanced artwork, the effect is even better. Let’s take a look at this example below:
Asymmetrical Balance
I know what’s on your mind: the title of this article keenly mentioned asymmetrical balance. Why? Well, here’s the answer. What I feel is that asymmetrical balance helps lift the mood of a photograph or design with defined focal points, movement, or tension. Practically, this means that visual weight is not evenly distributed, and one side of the design will be visually heavier than the other. We can explain it better by noting that each item is seen on different sides of the plane. Normally, viewers tend to find faults in things that appear misplaced, and this is a great way to attract a new audience. When normal human eyes treat these disorganized designs that aren’t mirror images, they get the most attention.
As a tip, I feel the way asymmetrical design helps bring balance can also help draw more attention to the piece. Balance doesn’t always mean order and correctness. So, as part of your marketing, make sure that, along with creativity, you incorporate asymmetrical elements into your brand pieces, like logos, t-shirt designs, and book designs. The viewer’s perception of your next project will change if everything radiates around asymmetry.
Off-Balance (Discordant)
Off-balance, or discordant balance, is another type of balance that can help achieve the desired effect in your image. Designers can experiment with off-balance or discordant effects. I know there’s a slight confusion between off-balance and asymmetrical designs, but both have different ways of adding visual balance without actually balancing elements.
A design that’s filled with asymmetrically balanced objects merely shifts the perspective in an image, while off-balance designs create a feeling of unrest. Asymmetry has a quality that makes it easy for human eyes to see the appeal. However, this also means you can’t create disorderly designs without proper placement.
Off-balance doesn’t care about direction or weightage, but something in the off-balance creates chaos that attracts the audience to the design. It also leaves a distinct mark on your design. You can check out photographs where they try to balance things at different paces, but they also achieve a unique effect. You can check out photographs where they try to balance things at different paces, achieving a unique effect similar to what you might see in programmatic ad examples where visual disruption is used to capture attention.
Mosaic or Crystallographic Balance
There’s a balance that you find in madness, and a perfect example is mosaic and crystallographic balance. Here, disorganized elements are balanced by spreading them in equal visual weights but in a purposefully chaotic plane.
This means that elements share a mix of all the above types of balance mentioned, where we create a focal point without any rigorous focus, resulting in an appealing design that looks like patterns on a mosaic tile. The intent of the designer is to create visual movement with many elements together while maintaining the overall aesthetics. Jackson Pollock can be considered a popular expressionist who created masterpieces with mosaic balances. You can see an example of calm in chaos. Graphic designers usually use this technique to create a subtle background for texts or graphics to make them the central focal point. You’ll want to bring about
Here, designers are given the choice to play as much as they like with proportion and scale. The sizes of the elements don’t matter, but they are spread across in a way that doesn’t overpower anything else in a busy layout.
I always feel like patterns create a specific type of balance that often goes unnoticed. You can utilize this as a way to create a beautiful atmosphere, especially when creating environmental graphic designs. Designers can also make use of various proportions of elements to make the designs more lively and appealing. Using complementary colors can also bring out a balance in this layout.
Radial Balance
Radial balance is the last type of balance, where visual elements radiate around a central point. Yes, you imagined it right; this is like the chemical structures you often see in textbooks or the hippie chakras you see on Pinterest. Equal weight is applied to elements moving further away from the central point and is distributed on all sides of the multiple axes that meet at that point. There is equal symmetry from the same distance from the center to the farthest point on corresponding axes. If you’re still confused, I can suggest a great example of radial symmetry, which is how the petals of sunflowers are arranged. This means throughout the radius, the balance is often depicted entirely through every element. It can also be seen in ripples created in water bodies, rings in tree trunks, or whirlpools.
Other Ways to Achieve Balance
While we discussed the main types of balance, designers can also experiment with making their final product a combination of visual heights. Here, the designer’s main aim is to create visual interest if there are too many elements in the design that are each of different visual weights but bring about balance by altering traits with the following design elements.
Color
Colors can bring balance when we use bright colors in a larger area of dark colors. However, before experimenting in such cases, it’s necessary to understand and grasp the knowledge of color psychology. For example, designers might like some perfect color combinations that work for ages, but if they don’t match your brand colors, the whole idea of color balance can be wasted. You’re trying to communicate concepts using colors to create balance.
Shape
Designers bring balance by combining many complex shapes in a composition on a flat plane. Shapes can make a complex image look more simple and easy on the eyes.
Size
Size is no exception. You can alter the sizes of elements to change the overall final artwork. Designers often achieve balance by decreasing or increasing the sizes of elements inside their canvases. From heavier visual weight to lesser, it often goes unnoticed that size plays an important role in everyone’s life.
Position
A prime example of asymmetric balance is positioning designs just to the right side, which is another great way to create a balanced feeling.
Texture
Texture creates a deep, lively effect in many designs. To make an overall balance, designers tend to ensure the texture is visible in areas where colors are used or elements are placed. Especially when fonts like graffiti bubble letters are used, the texture of the bubbles feels balanced in the overall effect.
Lines
Lines, or using different shapes and sizes of lines, create a balanced look. Thicker lines are heavier, while the visual weight is less in thinner lines. When arranged and utilized perfectly, lines can be incorporated into a design by making a border or a simple partition to create the perfect balance.
Summary
At the end of the day, finding the right balance in design cannot be understated. Even after creating a beautiful visual concept and using vibrant color hues that are rarely used, if it’s not properly balanced, it won’t have any visual impact or appeal. This can push designs over the edge and make you question your great design concept. Balancing is an art, and you have to master it.
The key to creating marketing creatives that attract and engage customers with your brand is ensuring the overall concept is delivered by achieving the right pitch-perfect balance. I hope this article has helped you understand the balance concept because, while trying to figure it out myself, I lost a little balance. Puns aside, our in-house designers at Graphically.io offer you professionally balanced designs with a turnaround time of less than 24 hours. So why wait? Happy Designing!
FAQs
1. What is the basic principle of balance?
The principles of balance in design revolve around achieving visually pleasing compositions through the thoughtful distribution of elements. This involves creating a sense of order and stability where elements are visually balanced. Two key concepts in achieving this balance are visual weight and visual direction. Visual weight refers to the perceived weight of individual elements within a composition, while visual direction indicates the direction in which elements move or focus, either towards or away from a central point.
2. What are examples of balance?
For instance, a tree demonstrates asymmetrical balance as its branches may not be evenly distributed, yet the overall weight is balanced. Radial balance is illustrated by ripples in water, where each wave radiates equally from the center. Conversely, symmetrical balance is evident in the human body’s anatomy, where the left and right sides mirror each other.
