pure design
5. Color and black-and-white photographs or graphics should not be mixed on the same page.
Never once have I heard a reader complain about this special cocktail of mixed black-and-white and color images. The designer’s task is to select the best possible images, regardless of color, and display them properly on the page following a hierarchy that indicates where the eye should go first, second, and third. The color-versus-black-and-white issue becomes quite secondary to the content of the images, their placement on the page, and the role of the images in the overall design.
6. The flow of text should not be interrupted.
Magazines have been using quotes, highlights, and other text breakers for years. However, place one of these devices in the text of many newspapers and you will find a chorus of editors repeating the same verse: Any interruption of text causes the reader to stop reading. I have found no evidence of this in the many focus groups I have observed or in The Poynter Institute’s own Eye-Track Research. (Eye-Track scientifically documented how color, text, graphics, and photos direct a reader’s eyes around a newspaper page.) Of course, interruptions can become obstacle courses if:
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