The Mix by Chuck Green

Wonder why certain colors, typefaces, and illustrations work well together and others don't? Want to better understand the connection between design and marketing? Need a design recipe for your Web site? Author and artist Chuck Green presents The Mix— a palette of typefaces, illustration, photography, and color, and how to create combinations that work well together.

THE MIX is a place for you and I to have a conversation about the ingredients of design—type, illustrations, photography, and color. Notice I said conversation. I want to see what you're seeing—a unique Web layout, design style, or color scheme, and I want to hear what you're hearing—about resources such as clip art, royalty-free and stock photography, typefaces, and such. In return, I'll keep you posted on what comes across my desk and suggest some combinations of ingredients that I think work well together. — Chuck Green

The graceful palette: This first palette centers on elements of design from the early years of commercial design and printing in the 1700s and 1800s—ornate script, engraved woodblocks, and limited, muted color. I chose it to kick off this series because I'm a troublemaker—I want to jump right in and challenge your thinking. Take a look!

The signal palette: Print design is two-dimensional—web design is three-dimensional—a night-and-day difference. You page through a brochure in a straight line, but you navigate a Web site top to bottom, back and forth, and layer by layer. It's much more complicated. Our challenge as web designers is not simply to communicate the message but to direct our readers through the message--to provide textual and visual signals that point the way. Chuck Green, The Mix Master, shows and tells you how.

Complentary Colors: When you're selling products that have their own clear visual identity, the challenge is to design a site that complements them. You choose colors that coordinate with the colors of the products, typefaces that fit the mood, photographs that show the products in their best light, and illustrations that build on a theme. Chuck Green, master designer, shows and tells you how.