HIERARCHY
ARTS 210 – GRAPHIC DESIGN I
BINGHAMTON UNIVERSITY (SUNY)
HARPUR COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

This exercise was intended to familiarize students with the concepts of typographic hierarchy and layout, in an abstract way, without the use of the computer. Students were asked to create 4 precise and identical squares in two rows and two columns. The main idea was that from the distance any text could be perceived as multiple lines of various thicknesses, length, intensity spacing and position. Students, by using just 3 simple kinds of lines instead of text were invited to create interesting visual hierarchy in each square by designing several blocks with three major sections inside as following:

• HEAD (main title): the most important part of text usually presented with large type; In the project should be represented with just one thick black line.

• SUBHEAD (secondary title): the second most important part of text usually presented with type smaller then one used for headline but clearly larger then the rest of the text (text copy); in the project this should be represented with one or two black lines thinner then one used for the head and thicker then one used for the rest of the text.

• TEXT COPY (text body): the least important but the largest part of any text; in the project should be represented with several (6-20) black lines thinner then those used for the subheads and heads. 
  
  * Students weren’t allowed to use any letterforms, and everything had to be made by hand, without the use of the computer.
  

• In the first square, students have to create simple hierarchy starting with lines representing head, subhead and text copy. They could repeat this several times within the same square creating harmonious composition of seemingly repeating blocks of lines (representing text blocks). Students were invited to think about horizontal positions and consider the lengths of their lines. 

• In the second square, students could different positions (horizontal and vertical lines) and experiment with spacing between lines and blocks. Also they could include vertical orientation and again several blocks of text. 

• In the third square, students were asked to position lines (and consequently whole blocks) on a 30 or 45 degree angle and achieve different visual interest with multiple blocks of lines (text) on the angle. 

• In the fourth and the final one, students could use any method they wished, but they had to introduce one color (any color of their choice) line just for the head to achieve emphasis. Here too, they could use several blocks of lines (representing text blocks).