Web Design Is Different From Print Design

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March 29th, 2010 by James

The similarities between designing for print and design in web marketing may seem obvious, but the differences may be greater. Print designers arrange text and images strikingly on the page, and knowledge of typography and colour are important. This is also true in web design but there are other variables to take into account.

Colours are different on the web, being made from red, green and blue light (or RGB), as opposed to the CMYK (or cyan, magenta, yellow and black) system of printing inks. Web images are necessarily lower in resolution, 72dpi rather than the typical 300dpi used for print, or pages would take an extremely long time to load.

Reading text on screen differs from viewing print on paper, and typography that works well in print may appear less impressive on a web page. As not all computers have every font installed, visitors may even see something completely different. It can be prudent to stick to fonts that are generally found on most computers. Even then, some users’ browser settings may substitute another typeface.

Print design has a fixed size, while a web page may expand or contract to fit the screen. Web pages are not viewed whole. Visitors scroll down, revealing a little at a time, so the design is never seen in its entirety. Web development uses links to navigate from page to page, unlike print where all pages are present at all times. At Click Consult, we recognise the differences between web design and design for print.

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