Just as a musician repeats notes to form a unifying melody in a song, so too can you use repeating visual elements to form a unifying structure in your page. One of the primary purposes of the principle of repetition is to tie together otherwise separate visual components of the design. Repeating visual elements such as lines, shapes, images, textures, and so on froms a visual rhythm that strengthens the overall organization of a design and makes it seem more unified and cohesive.
I try to use similar repetition on every blog post, so I keep the same words bolded, the same color scheme, and I try to keep the images in a similar place. There will always be some form of green in my posts and some form of pink. I also choose these colors because they look the best against the black backdrop of my blog. This chapter definitely helped me to see the importance of repetition, I didn’t realize this before but the unity of a newspaper article or a a presentation is extremely important. It also seems that every chapter in this book goes from explaining the term, to then showing 4 or 5 examples, I feel that it is very helpful in learning what it is we need to know.
Key Terms
Unity – is achieved when all of the separate elements on a page look as if they belong together.
Gestalt – a structure, configuration, or layout whose specific proerties are greater and more unified than the simple sum of its parts.
Figure/Ground – a fundamental gestalt law of perception that helps us visually identify objects (figure) as distinct from their background (ground).
Proximity – items that are spatially located near each other seem part of a group.
Closure – humans have a natural tendency to visually close gape in a form, especially in familiar forms. We seek to close forms to make them stable.
Continuation – the human eye seeks the relationships between shapes, and continuation occurs when the eye follows along a line, curve, or sequence of shapes, even when it crosses over negative and positive shapes.
Similarity – visual elements that are similar in shape, size, color, or proximity, and direction are perceived as part of a group.
I thought this was a good example of repetition (especially unity), I actually had one of class rooms, but couldn’t download it. You can see the continuation in the the lines and how wach shapes matches up. The proximity of these lockers is extremely close together, thus forcing them into a group. It definitely falls into the category of similarity as most of its parts are similar, and it is thus a gestalt structure as its specific parts are unified. Its unity comes in the size of each locker, how many rows each sized locker is given, and the colors of not only the lockers but the locks as well.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mybloodyself/18931570/sizes/s/
Graham, Lisa. Basics of Design: Layout and Typography for Beginners. Albany, NY: Delmar, 2002. Print.