Web designers can find inspiration in everyday items around them. Watching movies is certainly one of the most inspiring activities for people with such creativity.
There are many things web designers can learn – either at the beginning of their career or later on – from movies such as Star Wars, Pan’s Labyrinth, Hellboy II, and even Fight Club.
And there are simple lessons and complicated ones – the ones which must be watched and learned over and over again. Same applies to movies. A web designer can both enjoy a movie and want to break down different scenes and learn from them. The entire art of cinematography it is an art of designing itself.
We all know that, for the website to be successful, you will need an astonishing web design, great content and, last but not least, a reliable partner such as cheap web hosting. So, there are a lot of moving parts which must fit precisely well and do their job.
Long story short, here are some lessons web designers can learn from movies:
Color and contrasting colors
One movie to start with is the Star Wars franchise. George Lucas has proved himself quite a designer. In the past year, we saw Porsche and Lucasfilm jointly designing a starship, and also a United Airlines plane designed with “The Rise of Skywalker” theme.
Back to the movie, Star Wars features some interesting contrasting colors, like black (Darth Vader’s clothes) and white (his stormtroopers). Then there is also the red lightsaber of Darth Vader, thus more contrast.
The lesson here for web designers is to use contrasting colors to get the user’s attention. In this way, the composing elements of a web page will stand out.
Then there is the movie Fight Club, in which Tyler Durden wears red clothes or has blood on him, all to make the reference to the color red. An intense reference to a color will send a message, and the same applies to websites.
Symmetry and balance
Symmetry and balance are equally important in movies and in web design. They are used in movies like Star Wars or Hellboy II. There are many scenes, actions or structures which present a symmetrical or balanced image.
The effect it has on the viewer is that of order, and keeping the elements balanced on the sides of the main point of interest will make the users feel they landed just in the right place and enjoy a simple navigation. The clearer the image the user has, the easier is to navigate through the menu. Also, symmetry will enforce the idea of a pleasant experience, which can be improved by a simple menu on the web page.
Focal point
Nevertheless, as a web designer, you must not forget to have the focal point which catches the eye and the attention. There are many movies with plots and construction that does this. One of them is Pan’s Labyrinth.
And everything is linked in web designing. We could recall here the contrasting colors and symmetry when speaking about focal points. The same applies for the user’s attention.
Repetition
When it comes to repetition, the stormtroopers in Star Wars are the perfect way to illustrate it. Usually, in fantasy and SF movies you will find many takes which use the repetition as a mean of illustrating. Translated in web design, this helps to highlight the importance of certain elements.
Using bold font
Last but not least, using bold font will make everyone skip whatever they were looking at on the web page and focus on that. Is a great way to catch attention, as it is in the beginning of the Star Wars movies – remember that floating text with bold font? That was used also to emphasize the words and make the viewer focus the attention from the very beginning.
These are some of the lessons a web designer can learn from watching movies. Nevertheless, there are many movies in which web experts can really find themselves. Here are some examples: Jobs, The Social Network, The Internship, Pirates of Silicon Valley, or even Her.