Regardless of your business's industry or size, any space can be enhanced by using the right visual graphics and design. In part one of our guest blog series, we discussed how using layers with magnetic receptive graphics, such as Visual Magnetics' MagnaMedia®, can create dynamic designs and extend your brand message.
To help you on your next Visual Magnetics project, we've collected five quick tips for designing in layers from Visual Magnetics Creative Director Tori Deetz:
Think of the graphic as several layers from the start of your design. Concept your initial design to include a "background layer" and "messaging layers." Doing this from the start makes it easier to think of your layers as distinct pieces that fit together to create an entire graphic.
Build borders into promotional messaging layers. Borders help your messaging stand out and they also allow these layers to go anywhere on your base graphic, since they disguise seams. Banners are also a good way to incorporate longer messages onto a base graphic.
Create designated layer sections on your base graphic as guides for other layers. For example, when building a small, freestanding kiosk element for an in-store application, design a background layer with a blank section designated for an additional lifestyle image layer and another for a product image, giving the display maximum changeability and making it easy to install. Smaller layers with pricing and promotional messaging can then be layered on top of your product and lifestyle image layers.
Laminate layers to make them extra durable to touch and easier to clean. This is especially helpful for high-traffic interactive installations, which get touched on a day-to-day basis. You should also choose a thicker Visual Magnetics material such as POLYeight™ to use in layering applications, since the thicker media responds best to layers.
Don't limit your experiments for designing in layers to in-store or menu board applications. Layers work wonderfully with digital wall coverings, wayfinding and interactive applications, too!