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Moving the Eye Through Design A Visual Primer
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An overview of the visual arts fundamentals, Moving the Eye Through 2-D Design provides a g Moving the Eye Through Design
step-by-step approach to understanding what causes us to look at a painting, photograph, t
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or any two-dimensional media and what is needed to maintain visual interest. This volume e
introduces a goal-oriented method that applies aspects of line, shape, value and colour directly E
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to moving the viewer’s eye to and through a composition. With this method, artists learn to e
incorporate feeling into the creative process from the outset rather than leaving it as a subjective T
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afterthought. Equally applicable to the fine arts, applied arts and digital media, Moving the Eye
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Through 2-D Design provides a simple and comprehensive methodology through which artists
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can create dynamic art. g
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Buy Shaver is Professor in the Foundation Program at The University of the Arts, Philadelphia. -
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ISBN 978-1-84150-363-9
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9 781841 503639 Buy Shaver
intellect | www.intellectbooks.com
Moving the Eye Through 2-D Design
Moving the Eye Through 2-D Design
A Visual Primer
Buy Shaver
intellect Bristol, UK / Chicago, USA
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Intellect. The1,1'11.PamallRoad.fiVIllOO(ls. Bristol.8516JIG.UK
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Chicago. IL60637. USA
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Contents
Introduction 7
Chapter 1: Visual Dynamics 11
Chapter 2: Line 17
Chapter 3: Shape 45
Chapter 4: Value and Depth 63
Chapter 5: Visual Interest 87
Chapter 6: Colour 101
Chapter 7: Feeling 125
Chapter 8: Colour Systems 137
Introduction
Id on’t quite remember when I began to teach using the method that I have described
in this book. I know that it has developed incrementally over the past fifteen years.
Since 1990 I have taught at a number of Philadelphia area art institutions, instructing
students in drawing, painting (both watercolour and experimental), installation art and
two-dimensional design.
By the time my daughter was born in 2001, I was regularly teaching a first-year college
course on the basic elements of two-dimensional design. At the introductory level, the visual
arts are typically separated into three categories – drawing, two-dimensional design, and
three-dimensional design or sculpture. Two-dimensional design, the focus of this book, is
the study of the basic elements – line, shape, value, texture, motion, depth and colour. These
are the components of any artwork created on a flat surface such as a page or canvas. In two-
dimensional design you learn how to create the basic elements and how their relationships
to each other and to the picture plane, affect the composition’s feeling or meaning.
For example, if an image of a tiger is rendered realistically, photographically or in a
simplified manner as in a logo, the tiger will be perceived differently in each version. And
the tiger’s relationship to the other elements, whether it be alone against a green background,
crouching at the top of a composition or one of many tigers moving across the page, will
each affect the composition’s feeling or meaning. Is the tiger ferocious, meek or majestic?
Generally, it is not just one element but the combination of many elements and how they
relate to each other and to the picture plane that evoke feeling.
Any two-dimensional composition or design – a photograph, painting, drawing, magazine
or web page – is dependent on the ability to create and control these various relationships.
And in order to understand the complexity of these relationships, you must understand the
individual elements – line, shape, value, texture, motion, depth and colour.
Typically, most first-year courses focus on one element at a time. For instance, students
learn process and vocabulary of line, then move on to shape. To ensure that each element
is discussed, courses often amount to a brief introduction to the fundamental skills and the
concepts behind them.
For example, with line, students are often taught how to make lines – straight and curved,
thin and thick – using various tools such as pencils (hard to soft) and pens (markers, technical
Moving the Eye Through 2-D Design
and ruling). Much time and energy is spent learning the process of creating painterly lines,
evenly spaced lines, and lines that are crisp and mechanical. This approach develops the
hand skills inherent in freehand and mechanical mark-making. However, too little time
is devoted to understanding the complex relationships between the basic elements, which
affect how a composition is perceived. So when students are required to apply lines to their
own work, they typically do not have a clear understanding of how to proceed. The students
revert back to making art as they had done in the past and their work does not progress.
Understanding and developing these skills is important, but there hasn’t been an easy-to-
understand and widely accepted approach to connect these skills to each other and to the
art-making process as a whole. Beyond teaching a work ethic inherent in the acquisition of
these hand skills, what are we doing with line? How do you use line to clarify a composition’s
feeling or meaning?
In many university and college art programmes, the basic elements are taught to students
who are interested in a wide variety of art practices – painting, graphic design, industrial
design, photography, film-making, illustration and printmaking, to name a few. In addition,
first-year college students have various skill sets. Some are proficient in the hand skills
required of drawing and painting, and some are better acquainted with photography and
film-making. So I wondered: how do these hand skills help a student to become a better
graphic designer when they could use a computer to produce a crisp, mechanical line more
efficiently? How does line, for example, pertain to photography? What must each student
know about the basics to guarantee success in their various future endeavors?
I was determined to connect what I was teaching directly to the process of making
art. I wanted my students to learn the basic skills and concepts in order to build a clear
understanding of and expression in art. It became obvious to me that I would have to clarify
the individual elements and simplify how the elements related to each other and to the
composition as a whole.
This struggle to clarify what I was teaching as well as engage the various interests of my
students came at the same time as I was learning to care for my newborn daughter. Anyone
who has had children knows that your understanding of time changes. Days passed without
the usual arrangement of dividing day from night. As my wife and I both worked, our
days were long and our nights seemed to be parcelled out into hourly segments – feeding
schedules, diaper changes and dealing with various ailments. With a lack of sleep, days folded
into nights and our weeks simply passed by in this soup of repetition. My wife and I were
told to keep it simple and remember three things: when the baby is crying check to see if
she is hungry; if not does her diaper need changing? Or does she need to burp? Strange as it
sounds, when you have little sleep remembering these three things proves nearly impossible.
Did you try burping the baby? No. I forgot.
All the while I struggled to clarify for my students the basic elements of design. How were
they going to remember all of the various elements and nuances when asked to create art?
How were they going to remember the many components of two-dimensional design if I
couldn’t even remember three things – feed, diaper and burp?
8
Introduction
Over time, I began to simplify my method of teaching by asking one simple question:
how do you get someone’s attention visually? For me, the answer was visual dynamics, or
contrast, motion and noise. These are the three visual elements that capture the viewer’s
attention. Visual dynamics enabled me to connect directly the basic elements of 2-D design
to a single, unifying goal: moving the eye.
It is my belief that to be successful visually, an artist must firstly get the viewer’s attention
and secondly must control how the viewer perceives a composition. In other words, to get
someone to look at your work and to understand a composition you must control how the
viewer’s eye moves to and through it. This is accomplished by using the simple concept of
visual dynamics – contrast, motion and noise. Visual dynamics is the quickest and most
dependable way to move the eye to and through a composition. And every basic element of
design can be used to create and control visual dynamics. For example, line is not addressed
as a separate entity but as an element to create contrast, motion and noise. When you add
other basic elements to line such as shape, value and colour, each additional element is
another tool that provides greater control over a composition’s visual dynamics – the level
of contrast, the speed and direction of motion, and the type of noise. While the basic skills
are developed, the focus remains on how each element relates to visual dynamics and to the
composition as a whole. As each new element builds on the previous one, the art-making
process becomes easier to understand. And, by focusing on the concept of moving the eye,
the fundamental skills are no longer separate from each other or the art-making process.
Instead, from the very beginning, the fundamental skills join together and clarify this
process. The goal and the process remain simple, consistent and easy to remember. As a
result, everything that is created – from an initial sketch to a finished design, or from a
painting to a magazine layout –can utilize this same approach.
However, there is one more element that must be included: feeling. The introduction of
feeling at this initial stage is invaluable. Artists often talk about feeling in the visual arts. But
feeling is a very complex topic. It is difficult to qualify and difficult to verbalize. Many artists
know intuitively that feeling must be included with the basic principles, yet are puzzled
as to how it should be addressed. And most often, feeling is presented as an afterthought,
if at all. But, just like the basic elements, feeling is integral to the design process. Does a
composition have a joyous or sombre feeling? Or, as I mentioned earlier, can you create an
image of a tiger and make it ferocious, meek or majestic? I believe it is important to connect
the basic elements of design to feeling as quickly and clearly as possible. And remarkably, by
controlling contrast, motion and noise you simultaneously develop a composition’s feeling.
From each simple line exercise to more complex value studies, visual dynamics – contrast,
motion and noise – move the eye to and through a composition and clarify feeling.
The principles described in this book are based on my teaching methods. Moving the
Eye Through 2-D Design is a common-sense overview of the fundamentals of the visual
arts. It is a step-by-step approach that teaches artists how to get the viewer to look at their
artwork and, just as importantly, how to maintain the viewer’s attention visually. The book
addresses the basic elements of two-dimensional design, including line, shape, value and
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