Humanized packaging color design method and positioning

1 The origin of the humanized design of the packaging color

There are social and individual reasons for the emergence of humanistic design trends in packaging, and there are also reasons for the development needs of the design itself.

The need for brand competition

The development of economy and science and technology has led to fierce competition in modern commerce, and the establishment of market brands. The quality of products launched by various companies is comparable, and the competition of brands has finally become “kung fu”. Although consumers are skeptical, they also believe that Can not "take the appearance of people", but only from the packaging to explore the content, and are willing to choose novel and beautiful packaging. Song Jianming’s teacher once analyzed in the color topic: “The problem solved by color design is the image problem. The main task is to solve the problem of color fashion of the product.” “Color design is like a makeup artist, changing the appearance of people is not his The task, this 'hard work' may be the task of the cosmetician, but the color designer uses the 'soft'

Color to change its appearance. This is an effective means of investing less and increasing the added value of the product. "", packaging color is an invisible key that opens the consumer's mind, and is the most important external feature of the product. Its role in creating low-cost and high-value-added products is astonishing, and it forms an irreplaceable means of information transmission. One of the attractive design tools.

Consumer psychology needs

The purpose of the design is to meet people's physical and psychological needs, and the two major needs to be the driving force of human design. The spiritual world of human beings is a vast and boundless world. The psychological and spiritual needs of human beings are rich and never-ending. The packaging color must have a novel feeling to attract the attention of customers. This is caused by the underlying internal needs of human beings.

Mozi said: “The food will always be full, then the United States, the clothes will be always warm, and then seek Li, will always be settled, and then begging for fun.” For the goods, the first thing is that people should get from the physical function of the goods. Physiological needs and satisfaction, and then from the spiritual function of the product can be aesthetic, psychological care, and reflect self-esteem and achievements. As the famous French semiologist Pierre Gerlos said: "In many cases, people are not buying specific items, but are looking for symbols of trends, youth and success."

Design develops diversified needs

Throughout the history of modern packaging design, we began with the promotion of color printing in the 1950s, experienced the Victorian era of bold and colorful packaging, but it was a light and delicate style, and at the beginning of the 20th century we advocated nourishing nutrition from nature and oriental culture. The Art Nouveau Movement, the modernist design movement initiated by Bauhaus after the Second World War, has concise, awkward, anti-decorative, functional, and rational features, sweeping the world, and gradually evolved into an unifying world. Style. Mies van der Rohe proposes that the principle of "1 iss more" is based on architectural design, but the same situation also occurs in packaging design. In this period, the packaging design is simple and the color is neutral. Highly functional and non-human, this style adapts to the lack of materials after World War II, the rapid development of economic needs and international commercial characteristics, and brought a huge social wealth. However, when people are in a monotonous, unadorned environment for a long time, they become bored with this overly-cool, rational style. To meet the ever-changing and ever-changing needs of consumers, some designers have begun to abandon the shackles of this design trend. , Explore the pursuit of decorative, changing, traditional, and humane forms of packaging color expression. Postmodernism and other series of designs emphasizing decoration and humanity have come to the fore and constantly revive the appetite of consumers. Welcome.

2 humanized packaging color performance characteristics

1) The unity of color's functionality and entertainment

The functionality of the packaging colors is reflected in many aspects. There are color-used functions for the purpose of highlighting the specific use value of the products. For example, the red color of pharmaceutical packaging indicates nourishing and fitness, the color of blue indicates anti-inflammatory and antipyretic, and the color of green indicates pain and sedation, etc.; Characteristics of the color image function, such as spicy food using red, black image color, cool beverage with blue-green image color; there are different products in different price grades, different categories of product classification, sub-categories, and stimulate consumption Mental marketing functions, aesthetic functions, and so on. The humanistic performance of packaging design not only satisfies the above functional needs, but also satisfies the psychological needs of modern people in pursuit of ease, humor, and entertainment.

A typical case is the MM's (Ma's company), which has dominated the chocolate market for many years, thanks to its popular "only in the mouth, not in the hands of" advertising, on a traditional brown basis. Despite the introduction of red, yellow and green chocolates, it attracted the largest group of consumers. The encouraging MM's connection added orange beans, red beans (return), blue beans, and purple beans, each adding a new color Market sales have been rising. Based on market research, Mars has found that the popularity of chocolates of different colors is 30% for brown, 20% for red and yellow, and 10% for orange and green respectively. Mars chocolate beans also strictly follow this figure. bag. The chocolate beans put on colorful coats not only embody the aesthetic function, but also cater to the children's “playing” children's psychology, and thus MM's have obtained a huge return from the market.

2) Unity of color appeal and emotional needs

The color of successful packaging lies in the active use of targeted appeals. Through the expression of colors, the information that needs to be transmitted is strengthened, and the emotional needs of consumers are communicated and coordinated, so that consumers are interested in the packaging of goods and promote their production. purchase behaviour. The balance between color appeal and emotional needs is often one of the reasons why consumers are willing to bag their bags because of their favorite packaging.

Coca-Cola's Qoo, which is positioned as a children's juice drink, has a 15% share of the fruit juice beverage market in 2003, thanks to its big blue light-colored cartoon “Que” in orange juice drinks with little difference in taste. The pale blue cartoon appeal and consumers need to change the psychological needs of warm orange juice packaging. Through the simple blue virtual characters, Q00 queer is not only an idol in the minds of children, but also a friend of all ages. It is fascinated.

3) The unity of traditional color culture and market color

The traditional Chinese colors are based on the humanities. The works of art pay attention to the inner feelings that convey the charm of the spirit and admire the artistic conception of dullness and simplicity. Humanized packaging demonstrates the complementarity of local traditional colors and market colors. The reason why Hong Kong's famous designer barely succeeds is not only because he has first-rate modern design consciousness and mind, but also because he has added many localized Chinese content such as ink culture and Confucian culture to the design. With an ethereal, indifferent Eastern ink and artistic conception.

4) Unity of designer thinking and consumer psychology

“Design is an activity for others.” To design products that make consumers more satisfied, on the one hand, designers communicate with consumers and feedback on consumer information. On the other hand, designers themselves are consumers who strive to consume. The psychological perspective of the person guides design thinking and achieves the coordination of design objects and consumer objects.

3 humanized packaging color expression method

3.1 Visual Expression Technique

Intuitive performance means focusing on the color of the product itself.

(1) Use skylights and transparent materials to directly represent goods

The most intuitive way of expression, consumers can directly obtain product color feeling, the most common are biscuits, plum and other leisure foods.

(2) Photography pictures

Close-up shots are usually used to express the product, to express the whole part locally, so that the subject's color is more concentrated. The selected part is generally based on the image color of the product to emphasize visual perception.

(3) The form of painting

Due to the influence of painting, there are various manifestations. Modern packaging and painting is more of a pursuit of a highly visual effect, not rigidly adhered to natural and realistic techniques, and more emphasis on the publicity of color, to simplify and clarify the way through the set of colors, contrast, induction, and exaggeration. Its unique creativity and boldness of the colors cannot be transmitted by photography.

3.2 Indirect performance techniques

Indirect performance is a more intrinsic means of expression. Products do not appear on the screen, and the attributes of the product, such as meaning and culture, are represented by the borrowed material. Some perfumes, bath and washing products that cannot be represented by direct methods need to be handled indirectly. Many other packages also use indirect methods to pursue novel and unique color visual effects. Indirect performance techniques mainly include the following:

(1) Metaphor: The word "metaphor" comes from the Greek metaphora, meaning "change of meaning." The metaphor of color in packaging design is not a metaphor in the sense of rhetoric, but is based on product information. It usually reflects high-level information such as cultural connotation, imagery, psychological perception, and value orientation.

(2) Lenovo: As a result of the accumulation of life experience, our reaction to color will subconsciously consider related things. This is the association of color. Lenovo occupies an important position in color design. Accurate color combinations can cause designers and consumers as well as spectators to exchange and react on ideas and emotions. The packaging that can express the color of the product can easily make people think of the characteristics and performance of the product.

(3) Symbolism: Colors contain the beauty of artistic conception in the beauty of the form. For example, the yellow walls and blue tiles of ancient Chinese architecture represent a solemn, sacred, and sublime artistic conception. The core of the artistic conception of beauty is the symbolic meaning, from "a heavenly flower in a flower, a grain of sand in the world." The symbol of color often has a collective view. It is the psychological structure of a nation’s historical and cultural accumulation over a long period of time. It is linked to religious consciousness and beliefs.

“Red, green and green, and auspicious”, the Chinese nation is an optimistic nation. It is good at expressing the complete, complete, festive, and harmonious cultural features with red, yellow, green, and gold, and presents vivid, lively, warm and relaxed visual effects. "China Red" is the most representative national color, and the rustic colors such as ceramic glaze, bronze and wood are also very characteristic of cultural characteristics, symbolizing the ancient charm and cultural position.

4 Positioning of packaging color design

The positioning of packaging colors can be expanded from the following:

1) Communication of corporate image

As part of the brand, color covers almost any medium of corporate VIS. The standard applications of logos, mascots, standard colors, and auxiliary colors in the VIS system play a role in propaganda, advertising, and sales. The colors must be consistent with the relationship between the company's marketing strategy and be designed under the guidance of the enterprise VIS. Some packaging creates an atmosphere that focuses on trademarks or brand names, while others use corporate colors as the primary color to create a cognitive connection between color and the enterprise: if we see green, we will remember Simbak, mentioning Red thinks of Coca Cola and yellow thinks of Kodak.

2) Appeal for product color information

Product image color allows consumers to understand the content of the product information. Image color does not refer to the standard color in VIS, but refers to the symbolic color of the product. It is the color that best conveys the characteristics of the product, that is, warm color symbolizes appetite and cold color symbolizes color psychology such as reason. Often the image color of a commodity is often listed as a "priority use" color. For example, food packaging, because it will be associated with the sense of taste, smell and other psychological feeling, so the color of its packaging and the inherent color of the commodity is very close, many food packaging directly using physical photography pictures, to represent the color characteristics of goods.

3) Positioning of Consumers

Organize colors from the level of consumer objects and their psychological factors. The color psychology of consumer groups is also a sensitive appeal point for packaging colors. “Where is my packaging sold to?” With this problem, we can analyze the color psychological expectations of the consumers and win consumers' recognition.

4) Recognition of market colors

After the investigation of similar products in the market, the design is different from the colors of other crystal plates and is easily identifiable in the market. The market survey is based on the product color is different from other similar products, but some color combinations are easy to identify, attractive, but can not guarantee that it must be suitable for product, brand characteristics, so we need to consider all four aspects factor.

Regional characteristics of color

The color of packaging must study the color preferences of objects in the area of ​​consumption. In general, ethnic minorities or people in remote mountainous areas love some very bright colors such as Dahong Da Lu, especially in rural areas in the north, due to excessive wind and sand, lack of indoor lighting, and climate In the cold, farmers generally prefer bright colors, and colors should be "sufficient" and "transparent." Urban residents have enough room for daylight, but the area is small. Coupled with the fast-paced life and noise, it is easy to have a strong sense of fatigue caused by strong colors. Therefore, preference is given to elegant, fresh, crisp and comfortable colors.

Products entering the international market must fully consider the differences in color love between different countries and ethnic groups, and ensure that the colors of products are consistent with local ethnic customs and religious beliefs, so as to win the favor of consumers.

"Design is a discipline closely linked to people's needs." The humanized design of packaging colors brings material spiritual satisfaction and pleasing to the consumer. They feel the high quality of life that comes from color design. This is the packaging. The humanity of the ultimate purpose of color design is human pursuit of idealization, and it is the never-ending design realm of the art lifestyle. This extremely time-based design visual language requires every designer to create a more human-oriented concept. For comfortable and beautiful products, it is also the eternal goal.