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Five Depth Clues

April 18, 2022 By Sandy Breckenridge Leave a Comment

Five Depth Clues Cover Photo

“Details matter. They create depth, and depth creates authenticity.” —Neil Blumenthal

After Five Basic Removals, the ninth tutorial of the Graphic Design Basic Element Series covers Five Depth Clues.

Blumenthal is a transformative lifestyle eyewear brand’s designer, creator, and CEO. Examining his branding, you quickly learn that he understands why details matter in design, even abstract design.

What are Removals in Art & Design?

Transferring the ability to sense dimension and distance in a two-dimensional design requires implementing one of The Five Depth Clues. If a clue isn’t effective in a rendering, the eye will not sense the third dimension, or the intent of the design or illustration will be flat.

The Five Depth Clues are:

  1. Overlap
  2. Scale Change
  3. Foreshortening
  4. Defusing
  5. Shadow

Overlap

Overlap and Size Change Depth Clues
Overlap and Scale Change Depth Clues

Most everyone likes to walk in nature. Time spent in a forest offers real-life examples of each of the five depth clues.

Imagine standing on a walking trail in front of a grove of trees. Take note of the circumference of the tree trunks. How does their appearance differ depending on their position, size, and shape?

The partly hidden trees are blocked because the closer trees overlap from your vantage point. In a flattened view, the nearest tree is visually in full view. Therefore, the distant tree is only partly visible. This effect is the first depth clue to note, and its term is called overlap.


Scale Change

Another depth clue is a scale change and is easily identifiable from the same vantage point. In our nature example two trees that appear the same size are really different heights in the forest. The tree positioned at a distance seems much smaller. Scale change is another clue to convince viewers that the artist’s creation illustrates dimension and space.

Foreshortening

Foreshortening Depth Clue Illustration Example
Foreshortening Depth Clue Illustration Example

While standing on the same path, look back to where the walk began. Notice how the walkway appears more narrow. To garner an authentic sense of perspective, the depth clue of foreshortening is another vital clue.

A snapshot from a mountain vista of a long winding road is another perfect example when the use of foreshortening is noticeable and adds dimension. Another example happens when standing toward the front of a long and narrow building. The height of the back of the building appears to be much shorter.


Defusing

A misty or foggy day is perfect for capturing the effects of defusing. Imagine looking toward a vast field of flowers. The foreground flowers are clearly defined. However, when the viewer looks beyond them and focuses on the flowers in the distance, their shape loses definition. The flowers appear diffused and less vibrant in hue and tone.

Shadow

Light plays an essential role in providing depth clues. For example, an artist or illustrator can use three ways to create cast shadows. Each depth clue description depends on the position of the light and how the opaque surface blocks the light around the object.

Three types of shadows:

  1. Cast
  2. Formed
  3. Foreshortened
Three Types of Shadow Depth Clues
Three Types of Shadow Depth Clues

Cast

A cast shadow is the most obvious and can vary in size. The length and width are dependent on the light’s angle, and how much of the object’s volume is blocked by the surface. The value will vary along with the tone. There are usually three tonal values, with the darkest seen closest to the object. As the shadow’s distance stretches away from the object, its edges appear softer and less defined.

Formed

A formed shadow has softer and less defined edges than a cast shadow. The light source is closer to an overhead position. This relationship creates a more subtle shaded shape that creates the illusion of volume, mass, and depth. Sometimes the eye will have to squint to notice the shadow mass.


Foreshortened Shadow

Foreshortened shadow depth clues hug the object and mimic and distort its shape depending on the angle of the light. Therefore, a shadow created when using this depth clue has a condensed value and intensity. It is in direct contrast to the object’s angle from the light that it is blocking.

Online Learning Resource: The following link offers a very definitive and helpful resource to learn how to illustrate each of the five different types of shadows that provide clues of depth.

Art Play

By now, your photo collections are providing you with enough depth clue examples. Browse through your art play journal and find each of the five depth clues. Plan time to render clear and straightforward illustrations of each while including examples of the three variations of shadows. Your art journal is steadily becoming an inspirational resource for your ongoing creativity.

A design idea can always be repurposed in another illustration while incorporating different concepts and ideas! Your imagination is limitless.

Supportive Art Resources

Learn about a resource book you might enjoy adding to your art library, click > Key to Painting Light and Shadow by Rachel Rubin Wolf

Downloadable Tutorial Guide

Please feel free to download the 5 Depth Clues tutorial image.

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Our next tutorial will describe the Division Principles of Basic Shapes found in design and a downloadable tutorial image.


To follow along, click > Art & Design Tutorial Table of Contents

5 Basic Removals

January 27, 2022 By Sandy Breckenridge 1 Comment

Examples of 5 Basic Removals in Graphic Design

“Talent is a pursued interest. In other words, anything you are willing to practice, you can do.” – Bob Ross

After Five Basic Relationships, the eighth tutorial of the Graphic Design Basic Element Series covers Five Basic Removals.

Bob Ross Publicity Photo
Bob Ross publicity photo

Ross’s quote comes from years of observation and is quite realistic. He experienced a long career as a recognized artist. He also taught oil painting on the TV series, The Joy of Painting, which aired from 1983 to 1994. It ran on the PBS channel and still streams on various cable services.

People tune into his streaming oil painting series to listen in while he paints; his infectious personality entertains because he is upbeat, instructive, humorous, and positive.

He describes elements in his renderings as happy little trees and flowers while sharing how to turn brush stroke mistakes into birds claiming how mistakes are opportunities.

Ross understood to develop creative talent, treat it like strengthening a muscle with exercise. He knew the more a person plays, practices, and devotes time to an art practice, the more adept they will become at implementing their desired result.

What is a Removal in Art & Design?

We saw an example of a removal in the last tutorial describing Basic Design Relationships when learning the characteristics of a negative/positive removal.

There are four additional removals that your eye will notice with ease in nature, design, and art.

They are: pop out, hinge out, slide out, slice off, extend out.

Pop Out

The first condition to understand is that a pop-out can pop in or out! The negative/positive removal pops out then the removed shape is recycled elsewhere in the design. But what would a pop-in look like?

Example of a pop out and extend out in graphic design
Example of a pop-out and extend-out in graphic design

Imagine two different colored cubes side-by-side. Out of each cube, remove the same size shape. Next, pop in the cut pieces into the adjacent block.

As long as a glimmer of light is seen between the two shapes the removal’s pop in relationship remains obvious. If the eye is not able to differentiate between the pieces, this relationship will appear as an overlap.

Architecture can illustrate a practical example. Imagine a piece of siding popped out of an exterior wall of a building. Perhaps, a stained glass window is installed in its place.

The window becomes a pop-in because it is easy to distinguish the different materials. The builder can recycle the sliding and pop it in elsewhere to complete the exterior.

Slide Out

Have you seen or owned a wooden pencil box with a flat sliding lid? When opening the box the lid slides out and away from the base of the box. This action creates a visual example of a slide-out. The top edges of the two sides of the box and the lid covering the remaining part of the box retain a referral relationship of edge-to-edge. The section of the box’s top that slides is now a slide-out.

Slide-outs offer an edge-to-edge relationship while also defining a new relationship encompassing the section of the surface that extends to cover an additional area of the design.

Slice Off

Example of Slice Off in Graphic Design
Example of slice-off and a hinge-out in graphic design.

Imagine a banana sliced in half. When one half slides partly to one side or the other without losing its connection the appearance is an example of a slice-off.

The banana could be sliced diagonally, horizontally, or even vertically and generate this relationship.

The slice-off could be edge-to-edge or edge-to-point as long as the identity of the banana is not lost. If one section of the banana moves too far away they will appear as two halves having the only similarity being both pieces are bananas.


Hinge Out

A perfect visual of a hinge-out is seeing a bird open their beak. In a two-dimensional perspective, the two sections illustrate a point-to-point relationship. The two angles between the top and bottom beak create the relationship when opening.

A hinge-out can have an edge-to-edge relationship, too. Imagine a perspective illustration of a lake with a featured tree reflecting in the water. It can appear like the tree is one continuous plane. But, the refection is now an edge-to-edge hinge-out.

Extend Out

Example of an extend-out in graphic design
Example of an extend-out in graphic design.

Finding a practical example of an extend-out is more challenging. Imagine two overlapping large, flat stones in a garden. A mason wants to use them as a frame around a bush.

He uses a stone die cutter to make a square hole through both stones by cutting out the overlapping sections. Once he cuts through both, he removes the two identical pieces to reveal the ground where he can now plant the bush.

While looking down, the two stones now would appear two-dimensionally as an extend-out. The connection of cut stones makes the relationship obvious.

The mason can repurpose the two removed pieces and place them elsewhere in the landscaping. Recycling is a design tool, too.

Art Play

Taking photos is a perfect tool to accumulate visual examples of every design element imaginable. Nature is an incredible canvas, and awareness can teach our eyes how to see beauty as a relationship between its creations.

Take some time before the next tutorial in the series. Find and photograph examples of the 5 Basic Removals and add them to your art play journal. Then enjoy sketching, painting, or drawing what you can imagine.

Supportive Art Resources

Design is StorytellingA stimulating book on art design to add to your art library is by Ellen Lupton titled: Design Is Storytelling

“Designers tap into people’s emotions to trigger feelings of delight, desire, surprise, and trust…” as stated by Lupton.

She provides a trove of design examples of storytelling. She describes how color entices the senses as it invokes a connection to taste and smell. She accounts how designers stimulate an emotional story through their creative choices and provides quite a tribute of examples.


To see an exciting example, click > The Coffee Taster’s Color Wheel

The content applies when an illustrator paints an image. Art and illustration are storytelling. An artist or designer shares the story through a two-dimensional visual that comes to life in a three-dimensional experience.

Downloadable Tutorial Guide

Free free to download the 5 Basic Removals tutorial image.

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Our next tutorial will describe the Five Depth Clues found in design and a downloadable tutorial image.


To follow along, click > Art & Design Tutorial Table of Contents

Basic Picture Arranging Principles

January 2, 2022 By Sandy Breckenridge 1 Comment

Two Mice Side by Side
Picture Arranging: Image illustrates two mice that are the same size centered and positioned side by side.

“Symmetry, as wide or as narrow as you may define its meaning, is one idea by which man through the ages has tried to comprehend and create order, beauty, and perfection.” — Hermann Weyl

After Basic Surfaces Enrichments, the sixth tutorial of the Graphic Design Basic Element Series covers Basic Picture Arranging Principles.

The above quote by E. M. Forster, a brilliant German American mathematician who gave lectures in the early 1900s on “Space, Time, Matter” revealed his deep appreciation for philosophy and how the topic relates to his findings on relativity.

Leave it to the complexity of a physicist to describe how a simple relationship of objects in art and their placement lends to its visual appeal while convincing the viewer of its relation to position, direction, and size.

Positioning objects
An example of object position to one another and their relationship to the entire space.

Position

As a graphic design arranging principle we describe the term position in art as both a verb and a noun.

To position as a verb infers the action of placing an object in relation to another object within the scope of the image.

As a noun, the viewer takes in the entire scope of the picture and determines its relationship within that space.


Direction

Previously we covered direction in relation to making a mark, such as the direction of a line.

When describing arranging principles it is the point along which something lies that describes this relationship.

Some examples are:

  • Center
  • Right
  • Left
  • Up
  • Down
  • Between

Direction can become more complex as we’ll learn in the next tutorial that covers Five Basic Relationships.

Size

Big Cheese Little Mouse
An example of how altering the size of objects will change the main subject for the viewer.

In design, size describes the quality of a thing which determines how much space it occupies.

The action of sizing an object can also make a statement.

Sizing helps in determining if an object becomes the focal point or a supporting element. The two illustration examples of the mouse and cheese make this point by altering the size proportions.

In one the mouse is the focal point. In the other illustration, cheese becomes the main subject.


Art Play: Rearranging Objects

An artist can place an element to build interest and move the eye into the artwork. This can entice the viewer to relate more deeply to a dominant object and allow other illustrated elements to be supportive of the theme.

Take some time in your art journal and play with an object that would normally be sized relative to other objects in its natural environment.

See how much fun you can have changing its position, size, and direction. You might place it in the foreground and make it small, or in the background and change its color. Notice how the eye relates to the object as you make these changes.

Downloadable Tutorial Guide

Please feel free to download the image guide for Basic Surface Enrichments.

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Our next tutorial will describe the Five Basic Relationships found in design and a downloadable tutorial image.


To follow along, click > Art & Design Tutorial Table of Contents

Basic Surface Enrichments

December 5, 2021 By Sandy Breckenridge 2 Comments

3 Crow Image Example of Surface Enrichments
Note: The illustration of the three crows demonstrates the use of the three additional surface enrichments: color, texture, and pattern.

“There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns.” — Edward de Bono

After Four Basic Surfaces, the fifth tutorial of the Graphic Design Basic Element Series covers three additional Basic Surface Enrichments.

The quote by Edward de Bono acknowledges one of the descriptive design terms as a repetitive action that limits creativity. The way the term or word pattern is used in design is as a noun that enriches creative visual appeal often making art more interesting.

Enriching the Exploration of Surfaces

There are three additional surface descriptions to add to the list of reflective, opaque, transparent, and translucent covered in our last tutorial. Now you can add these three to the explorations in your art journal. Record the additional variations as options to visually enhance a surface.

Texture Definition: A surface with repetition of a non-recognizable unit.

Many adjectives could describe the qualities of a texture.

Smooth can be one of them, but it does not elicit the contrast needed to distinguish it from an opaque or tonal surface. Explore and create examples that demonstrate how to example enough contrast for the shape to appeal to the viewer as a recognizable texture.

Creating Appealing Textures

Take an existing surface in one of your journal explorations and play with the following descriptions. You could play with a tonal circle, square, or triangle and illustrate any of the following definitions. Below are ten descriptions to get you started. See if you can identify additional textural enrichments and add them to the list.

  • Coarse
  • Bumpy
  • Rugged
  • Lumpy
  • Pebbly
  • Ripply
  • Fuzzy
  • Gritty
  • Chalky
  • Splattery

Adding Color: Newton’s Rainbow

The visible light spectrum is the section of the electromagnetic radiation spectrum that’s visible to the human eye as color. A complete study is needed to fully wrap the mind around the topic of understanding color theory. This tutorial just touches on the option of using color to define a design surface.

Back in the 1600’s Isaac Newton defined color by using a division of seven spectrums of light placed within a color wheel. It is referred to as Newton’s Rainbow.

The seven spectrums of light in Newton’s color breakdown.

The seven colors that he described are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.

Color as a Surface Enrichment

Color can enrich both a tonal and an opaque surface. It subdues an element by giving it a sense of moving into the background, or it can be bright and vibrant that visually moves the element forward into the foreground.

Color as a Surface EnrichmentColor can also enhance every design component.

It can define a space by using a colored line to outline a shape. Color can invoke contrast. Illustrating with complementary hues can create harmony or the opposite can happen with discordant colors.

Opposite colors on the color wheel can also complement each other. Some combined color choices can be so unappealing that an image can demonstrate a feeling of friction or uneasiness.

Color can define tonal percentages as additional light alters the illuminating value of a hue.

By darkening down color like in a cast shadow suggests another form of contrast.

Explore the use of color to enhance various shapes in one of your art explorations in your daily art exercise journal. Can you alter the mood or emotion you feel when viewing the image with the use of color?

The Graphic Design Color Wheel

Graphic Design Color Wheel

An artist uses a color wheel to help determine what chromatic relationship of color values and hues are best used to illustrate their works.

The wheel is organized with the primary colors placed equidistant from each other. The secondary and tertiary colors are found logistically placed between.

The entire wheel is a logical yet abstract visual aid. It helps when determining the assigned color codes of the value of a hue and aids in the printing process.

You may also be interested in bookmarking The Perfect Painting Palette Series to learn an optimal method for mixing colors that will make your artwork come to life. 

Pattern as a Surface Enrichment

Color and Pattern The definition of a pattern: A recognizable and repeating unit of shape or form can be described as a pattern.

A pattern can contain all other surface descriptions and enrichments as long as it convincingly suggests repetition.

Nature can implicitly illustrate the use of patterns. A beautiful example is spiraling seeds in the center of a sunflower. Or, the ripple of a pebble seen in a puddle of water. A pattern can be soft and curvy, or contrasting and definitive.

A fun exercise is thumbing through a stack of magazines and noticing how a pattern is pictured in nature and man-made elements. Some examples are in architecture, masonry, landscaping, fabric, weaving, pottery, etc.

Neg/Pos Zip Bug Pattern Image
Zip Bug Design: A negative/positive pattern demonstrating reversing direction.

Once I was asked to create a pattern that included reversing the design element. The art exercise was a challenge and was fun and rewarding. Perhaps, you may be up to the same challenge?

Depending on your given allotment of time a lovely floral pattern might be the perfect first attempt in pattern making.

Downloadable Tutorial Guide

Please feel free to download the image guide for Basic Surface Enrichments.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

The next post in this series describes Basic Picture Arranging Principles. The placement of the elements can even suggest to a viewer that a two-dimensional surface demonstrates a three-dimensional perspective.

An artist can place an element to build interest and move the eye into the artwork. This can entice the viewer to relate more deeply to a dominant object and allow other illustrated elements to be supportive of the theme.

Our next tutorial will describe the Basic Picture Arranging Principles found in design and a downloadable tutorial image.


To follow along, click > Art & Design Tutorial Table of Contents

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