Welcome to Graphic Design, the second course in the Effective Communications Specialization. Over 70 different companies have provided this specialization to their employees as a resource for internal professional development. Why? Because employers know that effective visual communication is the key to attracting an audience, building a relationship, and closing the sale.
Graphic Design
This course is part of Effective Communication: Writing, Design, and Presentation Specialization
Instructor: David Underwood
Sponsored by Abu Dhabi National Oil Company
152,308 already enrolled
(3,262 reviews)
Recommended experience
What you'll learn
Apply inspired design ideas to your own work.
Skills you'll gain
Details to know
Add to your LinkedIn profile
5 assignments
See how employees at top companies are mastering in-demand skills
Build your subject-matter expertise
- Learn new concepts from industry experts
- Gain a foundational understanding of a subject or tool
- Develop job-relevant skills with hands-on projects
- Earn a shareable career certificate
Earn a career certificate
Add this credential to your LinkedIn profile, resume, or CV
Share it on social media and in your performance review
There are 4 modules in this course
This week introduces you to the importance of recognizing good design as the starting place for creating professional, attractive work of your own. We will look to the ubiquitous world of graphic design to establish a vocabulary of successful design and to find inspiration for our own projects. We will also discuss course prerequisites and review a basic digital design glossary that will help you navigate your chosen application.
What's included
12 videos6 readings1 assignment1 peer review
This week will look at the blank canvas – the untouched rectangle that will become our design project. We’ll discuss the importance of working with a grid, understanding negative space, and using appropriate margins. This week will also explore the palette of elements which, when chosen and used wisely, ensure that the finished design project is successful. We’ll cover type, color, images, and graphic elements such as borders, bars, and backgrounds.
What's included
15 videos5 readings2 assignments3 discussion prompts
It's time to start designing! In this week, we'll discuss the process of composition. We'll use the palette items covered in week 2, and deploy common visual design “tricks” such as contrast, repetition, sublimation, tension, and more. To help see both the effect and the universality of these design approaches, we'll look at design examples from art history, film, and current media. We’ll also cover the strategy of composition. We'll see that providing an obvious target, maintaining a natural visual flow, and prioritizing information are all critical to clear visual communication.
What's included
12 videos4 readings1 peer review6 discussion prompts
As we've said before, designers don't work in a vacuum. Our work will be judged by others, and, as good designers, we will learn to take that judgement constructively and in stride. In this week we’ll talk about what it means to be confident, yet open to criticism. We’ll explore the importance of revision as an ongoing component of design, as well as the need to enlist feedback and maintain distance in assessing our own work.
What's included
4 videos2 assignments1 peer review1 discussion prompt
Instructor
Offered by
Why people choose Coursera for their career
Learner reviews
3,262 reviews
- 5 stars
80.83%
- 4 stars
15.73%
- 3 stars
2.48%
- 2 stars
0.45%
- 1 star
0.48%
Showing 3 of 3262
Reviewed on Sep 2, 2020
Amazing course content, amazing instructor, really helped to think, what is Graphic Designing. It' a really detail and practical course. I really Thanked the Inspector and Coursera.
Reviewed on Jul 27, 2020
I am grateful to them. I have completed this course and now I know the basic fundamentals of Graphic Design which are highly important for a successful professional life in Graphic Design.
Reviewed on May 13, 2020
I think that the discussions would be more useful if students had detailed instructions on how to create the images in Microsoft Word or PowerPoint and then take a screenshot to make a jpeg image.
Recommended if you're interested in Business
California Institute of the Arts
California Institute of the Arts
University of Colorado Boulder
Adobe
Open new doors with Coursera Plus
Unlimited access to 10,000+ world-class courses, hands-on projects, and job-ready certificate programs - all included in your subscription
Advance your career with an online degree
Earn a degree from world-class universities - 100% online
Join over 3,400 global companies that choose Coursera for Business
Upskill your employees to excel in the digital economy