legibility
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- saintlukas
i'm not a designer, i'm an application developer looking to improve my interface work, since i'm pretty much a one man show...my very experienced and talented designer/art director/etc friend, the very one who pointed me to this site, said an interesting thing to me which i was surprised to hear. i was mentioning his work on a page in a magazine he does, and that the text was darn hard to read against the background...his response was that the design was good the way it was, and that "legibility is overrated"... is that a commonly accepted idea among all you guys and girls out here? i would have compared this idea to saying that my applications actually performing their intended actions and purpose was a secondary concern to adhering to a set of programming principles... let me have it, folks, show me the error of my ways...
- abba_cadaver0
"never mistake legibility for communication"
Was a quote from david carson and hopefully this is what you're friend was trying to say. Sometimes you're dealing with a subject that should be frustrating and the feeling you leave them with is more important than "the facts". More often than not, this is not the case for instance in creating interfaces, Usually people are looking for information and there should be a nice balance between words and pictures. and etc...
- Mick0
The response he gave you is a "shuttup, you're not a designer response ;)
Legibility is an important part of any communication piece. As for his site, I guess it depends on the important of the text as to how legible it needs to be.
Lots of designer use text in the form of a subliminal element that is meant to be glanced at and scanned rather than digested word for word.
Communication is always no.1 priority - communicating a message whether it be art, information, or whatever. Legibility is an important part of communication.
- sexypixel0
if you couldnt read his article, and it bothered you that you couldnt read it, then he didnt do his job properly, i think
- brundlefly0
I agree with sexypixel....
let us have a look and you'll get better insight
- unknown0
I would say that in the real world the designers task is to make good compromises between aesthetics, function and economy. Its always much easier to ignore one or two of these factors, and yes, sure designers can be artists too, but preferably in their sparetime. This however doesnt mean that I cannot use one of my 'hobby paintings' for a proffesional assignment, its just that there has to be a good purpose for it.
- akzidentist0
Design is all about function.
Pure beauty lies in the pure function.