Grids have been around a very long time, they help to organise text and image, a plan to help deal with the placing of elements on successive pages. Mathematical grids have been around since 1692 as the French type designer Philippe Grandjean constructed letterforms using grids. Type and spacing material used to be produced in fixed sizes before digital, typography was a modular system.
Josef Muller-Brockmann developed the grid system the most.
'The reduction of the number of visual elements used and their incorporation in a grid system creates a sense of compact planning, intelligibility and clarity and suggests orderliness of design. The orderliness adds credibility to the information and induces confidence. The grid determines the constant dimension of space. There is virtually no limit to the number of grid divisions. It may be said in general that every piece of work must be studied very carefully so as to arrive at the specific grid network corresponding to its requirements.'
Grids are determined by what we put into them (content) and what we require them to deliver (functionality), and only when we have defined the content and functionality, can we hope to arrive at the appropriate grid.
A grid is fundamentally about spatial relationships. Every spatial relationship needs to be considered.
As the grid has become a template that allow anyone to lay out text and image, it then establishes this idea of a rigid structure that anything can be poured into, instead of a living breathing structure.
For books it is recommended that there is no more that 18 words per line, or 7 words for newspapers and magazines.
The white areas that frame the printed portion of the page are called the margins. At the top is the head, at the bottom is the foot. The outer edge is the fore edge and the side next to the spine or fold is the back edge. The combined back edges of a double-page spread are called the gutter (also used for the veritcal space between two columns.
Jan Tschichold discovered the rules of proportions - the ratio of text area to page size is 2:3.
The golden ration has proportions of 34:21, people through the ages have found this the most pleasing. It is a natural form that parallels in nature - the way a snail's shell grows. It fosters organic and natural looking compositions that are aesthetically pleasing to the eye.
RESOURCE:
BOOK
- Graphic Design: A Users Manual - Adrian Shaughnessy
- Production for Graphic Designers 4th Edition - Alan Pipes
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