CalArts: Funds. of Graphic Design-W3: 3.8 Rhythm and Pattern 1

In this segment, we’re going to look at how color and shapes can work together to form pattern.

Pattern really relies on two things in order to work.
 It relies on rhythm and repetition. And the two are interrelated.

So rhythm is often created by the repetition of the shape creating negative and positive space.

Or as we’ve seen with colors, push and pull with different kind of contrasting colors.

So even just by repeating the word rhythm here, 
you can see how some shapes create an enclosed negative space.
And feel very different than shapes that rely purely on repetition and interlocking ผูกเข้าไว้ด้วยกัน forms.

So this actually, the repeated H here begins to actually look like a ladder, like a continuous form,

whereas the Y looks feels more like perhaps a pattern, or a series of things connected together.

So let’s start out by taking a simple shape and playing around with it a little bit and seeing what we can do in terms of color and shape and pattern.

So to begin with, instead of using a solid shape, let’s maybe use the same shape.

Let’s take this hexagon and we’ll uses it as the outline.

So there’s got an inside and an outside. So immediately, we’re having to think about two different colors.

We’ll be able to get, again get some push and pull between negative and positive space.

So one thing we could think about is really just how the shape relates to itself.

What kind of patterns can we make from looking at this shape? So if you think about just the shape overlapping,

straight away here you create two chevrons and a diamond, so you’ve immediately started to form other shapes out of the original shape.

And that’s a really interesting part of pattern.

So you could look at, depending just in the relationship between these two elements.

You can begin to build some kind of, some quite interesting, quite kind of fun relationships that can be the basis, the foundation for what your pattern might be.

And as soon as you start to have even more elements in this.

Let’s say if you start to work with three elements for instance.

You can see here now we’re building various other shapes, much more complexity.

We’ve got different scales of shapes. We’ve got repetitions of diamonds. 
We’ve got self contained shapes, more open shapes, 
and just when you’re starting to work with pattern and shape a good idea is just to play around a little bit.

And this can form the basis of building logos, identities, any of these things, as well as actually building proper usable pattern.

But there’s a lot of graphic elements that really rely on just playing around visually with forms and thinking about how they lock together, and how they make other shapes, other patterns, other forms.

So here, we’re really just working with a linear shape. 
So, there’s a limited amount of possibilities.

So we could think about things like alignment, that we looked at.

We could think about repetition for instance,

and how shapes might make other shapes.

We could think about scale

and how you might take same shapes and maybe scale them down to make another part of a pattern or an object.

And we could also think about rotation as well.

Think about how that might relate to building some kind of pattern or object.

And if you are working on making patterns like this, 
I would just really think about it in a very loose อิสระ way. 
A very playful way.

Because I think it is gonna be a great way to actually learn. About how to make pattern and how to make form just by doing it.

Especially, in an instance like this where we’re not really looking at anything that’s particularly, for a particular purpose, for a particular client or anything like that.

And all we’re really doing is looking at how shapes fit together

and so we’re looking visually and looking and learning by watching and doing,

and that’s really what graphic design is and the best way to learn about graphic design.

That kind of playful approach also means it’s kind of low risk as well,
so if we do something we don’t like or we do something that isn’t successful it doesn’t really matter. 
We can just get rid of it and start all over again.

So let’s get rid of this one and let’s start by working on a very simple shape. So let’s start with just this black square.