Design Principles

There are 6 basic design principles in designing a magazine and to publish it. Designing a magazine is like baking a cake with recipe. We need to follow the steps accordingly to produce. Design isn't about whether it is a good artwork or a bad one. It all depends on the "taste" and "flair" of a person. To explain precisely and more understandable, I use a magazine named "Ceremony" from ISSUU.com. This is an online magazine about weddings in Los Angeles, USA.

1. Emphasis

The front cover page is very important, this is the page where the reader(s) to take a look at your magazine and to purchase it. Emphasis means what you want to emphasize on the front cover to attract your reader(s) and it delivers the main message of the magazine. As we know from the title of this magazine, it is targeted to female and/or couple to get things ready for their big day -- wedding ceremony. Therefore, this magazine is talking about preparations for pre-wedding day as well as on wedding day itself. The cover page is simple yet attractive because of the shoe with stones on it's heel. Girls are usually get attracted with shoes, bags and clothes and this makes them feel happy.

2. Contrast

Color, size, tonal value, typeface and shape are taken under this step. Color contrast can't be found on this but there is tonal value contrast on the magazine front page where there are some part is brighter than the other. Besides, the typeface on the magazine is san serif with different font sizes, for example the title of the magazine and the other words on it.

3. Balance

Balance in design means the elements that you put on the page is distributed equally. There are 3 ways to define balance: symmetrical balance, asymmetrical balance and off-balance. From the first sight, the front cover is balance because when it is folded into half, the shoe tend to me in the middle and wordings are at the side and bottom of the picture.

4. Alignment

The alignment for most of the wordings in the magazine is margin to the left and it has 2 and 3 columns.

5. Repetition

The border of a few pages repeated and the layout on the page number are the same. There is repetition on this magazine.

6. Flow

Flow depends on how your eye sight moves when you are reading. For example the front cover page. First you start reading the title of the page, then you start reading the first row of words on your left and all the way down before reading words on your right.