EXPANDING GESTALT: ANALYZING OPPORTUNITIES FOR VISUAL DESIGN CREATION AND EDUCATION BY COMBINING GESTALT PRINCIPLES WITH NEW TECHNOLOGIES

Gestalt principles describe the way humans visually perceiving organize information. The word "gestalt" comes from German meaning the quote essence or shape of an entity's complete form". Gestalt psychology was first introduced by philosophers and psychologists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and later embraced by artists, photographers and designers. Over the last 100 years the significance of this field has grown as more is known about the underlying neurological physiology of human perception.

The whole is greater than the sum of parts" is a phrase that artists photographers and designers are very familiar with. Using Gestalt principles as part of the visual design process has continued as new computer based design tools have become a fundamental component of creation process. Many of the new technologies are used to create various types of still moving and interactive graphics. This has resulted in many techniques from other fields like animation HCI (human computer interaction) and cinematography been taught alongside Gestalt the standard design principles. The combination between Gestalt principles and other fields has opened new creative avenues for applying the exploration of Gestalt principles as well as teaching them.

An introduction to the core Gestalt principles will be presented with a discussion of new technologies giving insight to Gestalt. We will discuss how the new scientific discoveries have mixed with new visual, graphic and motion based technologies for creating output which relates to Gestalt design principles. Examples will be analyzed of recent work being done with motion graphics, next generation interactive graphics, 3D computer graphics followed by best practices used to deliver that content while challenging students both technically and creatively. Finally, there will be a brief discussion analyzing some emerging next generation technologies and how they will further expand Gestalt design potential in the near future.