The Do's and Don'ts of Web Design

Starting a webpage can be a bit of a daunting task if this is your first dance with design. Thankfully, webpages are like many other forms of media and therefore lend themselves to the same basic design principles. Still, because we are working on webpages in particular, there are certain things we need to keep in mind.

Colors and Images

This is something that applies to design in general, dark text is easy to read on a light background. Light text is hard to read on a dark background. Now this doesn't mean that one can't use light text on a dark background, and doing so can actually create a very dramatic effect, but caution needs to be exercised and usually this technique should be used sparingly, (i.e., don't have pages of white text on a black background).

Speaking of, try not to use elaborate patterns in background and put text over them. When web development first blew up, everyone had to have a pattern or picture as the background in their webpage. We now know better. Furthermore, patterns in the background will force images in the foreground to fight with them for dominance...And when a reader's eye sees this situation, it won't know whether to focus on the foreground or the background, leaving your webpage looking like one big jumbled mess.

And what about the text?

We have to remember to keep things simple in design, with text being no exception. First, limit yourself to two fonts for a single webpage. Again, a reader's eye has trouble concentrating and making sense of too much going on, so just stick with two. And when writing out large blocks of text, try to use headings and make sure they contrast with the normal text. It goes for regular print as well, but often when a reader reads a magazine or webpage, they will quickly scan through it to get the pertinent information. What better way to help them scan your page then to have contrasting headings? It helps to ensure a reader finds what he needs to, and encourages them to stick around to see if your website can help them more.


On a final note about text, make sure there is plenty of spacing around your text in regards to other elements on your page. Things can get a bit hard to read if all your text is crammed in and rams into every picture on your page. And also try to limit the use of caps in your webpages. It really should only be used to draw attention to something very important, and not for ANY RUN OF THE MILL WORD OR PHRASE.

These are not by any means the hard and fast rules to web design, and if you are indeed serious about web design, it would certainly behoove you to take a formal design class to learn about color, contrast, weight, eye movement and a whole host of other things. But do keep in mind what you have learned today. If you heed them, they will serve you well.

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