Mix
Information can be ordered so that its structure is legible without the designer's personality intervening. The grid is not a convenience for placing things; it is the argument that objective presentation is possible.
Type
Aa Gg 1234Neutral grotesque, from your system
Aa Gg 1234Archivo
Colour
3 areas where the seam opens · 28 rules the corpus holds · 0 resolved — nothing decides between them
Layoutboth legislate
Swiss Style
Build a module matrix: columns crossed by horizontal flowlines. Every element occupies whole modules.
grid · Necessary · our ranking
Column count in the range 4 to 12 for a screen layout; gutter equal to one module unit.
grid · Our reading
Hairline rules permitted where they separate grid fields; never decorative.
rule treatment · Our reading
+2 more
Manga
Panel order is fixed by the binding direction and cannot be mirrored without inverting every sequence built on it. In right-bound Japanese publishing that order runs right to left and top to bottom, and panel, balloon and page turn all follow it.
reading order · Necessary · our ranking
Panels of deliberately unequal size and shape. Size controls pacing.
Necessary · our ranking
Gutters are asymmetric: the gap between rows is larger than the gap between panels inside a row, which is what makes the eye complete a row before dropping to the next.
No source attached
+2 more
Typographyboth legislate
Swiss Style
Set type in a neutral grotesque. The constraint is the class, not a particular typeface: Akzidenz-Grotesk, Univers, Folio and Neue Haas Grotesk/Helvetica were all in use.
Necessary · our ranking
Use very few distinct sizes and very few weights in one composition.
Documented · Source not yet verified
Set flush left, ragged right. Justified setting is forbidden.
Necessary · our ranking
Hierarchy comes from systematic placement in the grid. Where size signals importance, it is drawn from a few formats that are whole multiples of the grid field.
Seen in the work
Set all text to a shared baseline rhythm derived from the grid module.
Documented · Source not yet verified
45 to 75 characters per line.
measure · Not part of the aesthetic
Do not rank by size alone or by colour alone.
Our reading
+6 more
Manga
Balloon text is set vertically and read right to left (tategaki).
Necessary · our ranking
Sound effects are drawn as part of the artwork rather than typeset — lettering shaped, scaled and placed as a picture element (kakimoji).
Necessary · our ranking
+1 more
Colorboth legislate
Swiss Style
Restrict colour to a small number of flat areas, used functionally and never decoratively.
Seen in the work
Ground light and near-neutral, ink near-black, text contrast comfortably above the AA minimum of 4.5:1.
Not part of the aesthetic
No particular hue is required. One Müller-Brockmann series alone uses green and blue, red, and magenta and turquoise; choosing the hue is left to the designer.
Seen in the work
+2 more
Manga
Interior pages are printed in a single black ink on off-white stock, with tone standing in for colour.
Documented · Source not yet verified · disputed
Imagerycarries through
Manga
Tone is a screened field with cut edges — a halftone structure specified by frequency and density — rather than an unscreened continuous ramp. Gradation tone, in which dot size varies across the sheet, belongs to the screened family.
image treatment · Necessary · our ranking
DO NOT specify a screentone LPI value for screen output.
image treatment · Web translation
Black line art of varying weight underneath everything. Tone and speed lines presuppose it.
line · Necessary · our ranking
+2 more
Motifcarries through
Manga
A conventionalized graphic vocabulary carries emotion, motion and emphasis: standalone icons readable without context (manpu — sweat drops, vein marks, nose bubbles) and context-dependent effects that need the surrounding drawing to mean anything (speed lines, focus lines). Together these are keiyu, shape metaphors.
Necessary · our ranking
Pagecarries through
Manga
Production formats, stated as publishing facts rather than compositional choices: pages are drawn oversize on B4 manuscript stock (257 x 364 mm) and reduced for print. Magazine serialisation is B5; the collected tankoubon is B6, 128 x 182 mm.
Documented · Source not yet verified
Interfaceoutside this language
Swiss Style
Zero. No rounding on any element.
radius · Our reading
None. No elevation, no depth simulation.
shadow · Our reading
+1 more
Motionoutside these languages
Swiss Style
No canonical position. Any motion is an addition to the language, not an expression of it.
Our reading
Manga
In the print serial there is no enacted motion. Motion is depicted — by speed lines, focus lines and panel sequence — never animated.
Necessary · our ranking
Hard limitsruled out
Interface not applicable · Swiss Style
Motion not applicable · Swiss Style
Motif prohibited · Swiss Style
Form not applicable · Swiss Style
Motion not applicable · Manga
Form not applicable · Manga
Above is the default pair, rendered at build time. Changing the ingredients needs JavaScript; every rule shown is also on the individual record pages.