Proximity

Proximity is an obvious, but often overlooked way to make a group of objects feels like a single unit. Placing objects close together within a layout creates a focal point toward which the eye will gravitate. Take a look at the digital painting in Figure 1.15. While composed of a seemingly random assortment of strokes, the five strokes that are the closest together appear to form a unified object.

Figure 1.15: Creating a group using proximity

We practice the concept of proximity on the Web when we start setting margins and padding for elements. For instance, when I define the CSS style rules for most sites, I usually change the default margin that exists between common HTML elements such h1, h2, h3 …), paragraphs, block quotes, and even images. By altering these as headings (values, I can cause more or less space to appear between elements, thereby creating groups.

If you look at the two columns of text in Figure 1.16, you’ll notice that they look very similar. The only difference is in the placement of the headings. In the column on the left, the word “Unkgnome” is equip-distant from the top and bottom paragraphs. This results in a heading that looks more like a separator than a heading for the next paragraph. In the second column, the “Gnomenclature” heading is placed closer to the paragraph that follows it. In accordance with the rules of proximity, this heading appears to belong to that block of text.

Figure 1.16: Proximity between headers and content