: Critique: How can I make this flat design more exciting? I'm designing an planner (agenda) book for my school. I'm doing flat design, but it seems a bit boring to me. What can I do to spice

@Berumen635

Without getting rid of the flattness, which I find is a plus in this design, you could try - instead of shadows as some have suggested - using a few subtle gradients. The background burgundy for example could have a gradient where it's slightly darker at the top right. Maybe the light grey of the helmet could use a slight gradient too. Just don't overdo it and make the gradients too strong or everywhere.

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@Annie732

Try adding depth to the knight's head by adding shadows to it and keeping it alight at 90 degrees instead of tilted.

Change the background colour too, it merges with the logo colour and the feather on the knight's head. A blue might give good contrast and sooth the palette.

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@BetL875

If you remove "Las Lomas" (which is redundant: you already have the badge and everyone will immediately recognize the colors) and enlarge the badge so it almost fills the cover, or even bleeds off the edge, you can make "2014-2015" and "Student Planner tiny-but-visible. The contrast of huge and small will add pizzazz to the design and make it look much more modern and designed.

Just keep in mind that the badge has to be HUGE, and it doesn't have to all fit on the page. Take a look at this video from John McWade, which will give you the idea.

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@Reiling762

I think something you could work a little more on is the consistency of your text and perhaps the spacing.

Consistency in this case means two things for me: Fonts, and font 'styles'. I wouldn't mind if your "Las Lomas" and "Student Planner" use completely different fonts, but "Las Lomas" has a thick black stroke and "Student Planner" is thin and clean, no strokes, no effects of any kind. I'd like to see a "Las Lomas" in solid color (white maybe, or a very light orange), perhaps bigger.

The second thing I'd try is moving the background letters (LL) and the knight down, so the text on the top part of your design has no background. Something like this (please excuse my terrible choice of font, had to pick one in a hurry):

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@Sherry646

OK . you should removed the stroke about the title and search for another color . the background on the top is shocked . after that the yellow shadow is not good ..try it please

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