Design Elements

SFCC, Spokane, WA

All visual arts, including photography, share a common visual language, which requires an understanding of design elements. These elements are the basic building blocks of a visual language that transcends time and culture. With a basic understanding of these elements, you can create a coherent image that speaks to people across borders and generations. Photographic composition is the art of arranging these elements within the frame to communicate a thought, feeling, or emotion. Like other forms of communication, understanding the message can only be achieved through a structure that allows for a basic understanding of the visual language being expressed.

Here is an essential list of design elements:

1. Point:

Point is the smallest element of visual communication and is often represented as a dot.

2. Line:

Lines range in size, width, texture, and presentation. Standard lines are vertical, horizontal, diagonal, zig-zag, and curved.

3. Shape:

Shape is a two-dimensional enclosed space representing either an organic shape (natural non-geometric shapes developed from curvilinear lines) or a geometric shape (including squares, circles, rectangles, triangles, and other standard geometric shapes).

4. Form:

Form is a three-dimensional enclosed shape that resembles organic and geometric shapes. The difference between shape and form is that form will have shadows.

5. Texture:

Texture defines an object’s surface quality. This can be implied, created, or actual.

6. Value:

Value is a spectrum applied to a hue. A hue refers to the purest form of a color, such as red, blue, or yellow. The color can have a dark value (closer to black) and a light value (closer to white). For instance, a dark red and a light red are different values of the same hue.

7. Space:

Space is the surface area between, before, and behind an object in a composition.

8. Color:

Color defines a shade in an image that is not black or white. Color can be organized into categories, such as hues, values, compliments, and intensity.

9. Movement:

Movement is how a person’s eye travels over a design. The most important element should lead to the next most important. This can be done via positioning, emphasis, and other design elements. (In photography, movement is an element due to the unique ability of the photographer to stop motion and blur motion, depending on the shutter speed).