Every lesson

How colour behaves in ink, on screen and in the eye. Wheels and models, palettes small enough to hold, and why the same red is two different colours on paper and a phone.

Watch · RYB versus CMY, and what the real primaries areColour Literacy ProjectMunsell colour system

Letterforms from the inside: how type is drawn, spaced, classified, licensed and set, in Latin and in the scripts that do not sit on a baseline.

Watch · The History of TypographyFonts In UseLetterform Archive

Where things go and why. Grids, thirds, figure and ground, the crop, and the argument that structure is the strongest thing on a page.

Watch · Composition for Noobs | Beginner GuideThe Public Domain ReviewGrid systems, Modulor and the rest

Seeing before rendering. Proportion, gesture, light on form, and the working drawings nobody frames.

Watch · How to draw accurate proportionsLine of ActionProko

Why a picture says more than it shows. Signs and symbols, gestalt grouping, metaphor, and the same image read differently in two countries.

Watch · Semiotics: an introduction to SaussureStanford Encyclopedia: Peirce's theory of signsGestalt principles, Interaction Design Foundation

Movement as a design material. Easing, timing, the twelve principles borrowed from animation, and when a transition is doing a job.

Watch · The 12 principles of animationThe twelve principles of animationMaterial Design motion

Pages that have to be read in order. Grids, pacing, the opening spread, and the cover that has to work in a second.

One idea at twenty metres. The Swiss argument, the Polish answer, type as the whole image, and what a printed sheet actually costs.

Making a number legible. Charts that fit the question, scales that do not lie, maps, wayfinding, and where a chart becomes propaganda.

Working in Figma the way a studio does, with its AI tools in the work. Auto layout, variables, components, images made in the file, Figma Make and templates at scale.

Photoshop from the first file, with its AI tools in the work. Layers, masks, cutouts, honest retouching, adjustment layers, Generative Fill and its credits, type and export, ending on one phone photo made into a post and a story.

Illustrator from a blank file, with its AI tools in the work. The Pen tool, shapes and Pathfinder, type and outlines, global swatches, Text to Vector Graphic and its credits, and SVG, PDF and PNG export, ending on No. 4's wordmark and four icons redrawn.

InDesign from a first document to a file a printer accepts. Parent pages, grids, threaded text and styles, linked pictures, CMYK swatches, preflight and PDF/X export, with its AI tools where Adobe has shipped them, ending on No. 4's four-page A5 leaflet.

Canva for people who already use it, with its AI tools in the work. Plans and the AI allowance, a Brand Kit set once, templates with locks, resizing, Bulk Create, teams and print-ready files, ending on a week of posts from one kit.

How a working designer takes a logo from the brief through research, a hundred thumbnails, a spaced wordmark or a symbol, clean vector drawing and tests at every size and colour, to the client presentation and a finished file pack, ending with No. 4's mark.

Posts, carousels, stories and ads designed for the phone. Sizes and safe zones for 2026, the carousel's first and last slides, Meta's own ad guidance, type that reads at arm's length and A/B tests, ending on one No. 4 shoot made into a week of posts and two ads to test.

Choosing an illustration style for a brand, drawing it in vector or in Procreate, and writing the rules so characters, mascots and icons stay in one hand, ending on No. 4's spot illustrations.