Desinging To Learn

The new assignment in INTE 6710 "Creative Designs," is Pecha Kucha. I never heard of it until I took this course. It's essentially 20 slides and 20 seconds of speaking per slide. No fancy animations, moving text, or retro transitions. I haven't quite figured out how I'm going to pull this off without being boring in the process, thus, boring the audience. However I know images and inspiration is a good place to start. It would be nice if I had the time to create 20 beautiful slides, be that photography or graphic design, it's not realistic. In the typical work place there would be creative design and writing departments who could pour hours into this sort of content. Fortunately at this time in digital history there are massive libraries of photos and graphics that are available for use given the correct attribution and license such as creative commons. I don't often look for content like this and I do prefer to make my own images but thanks to some resou...

A photo exercise in telling a story with only 5 photos. What's the story? (c) Kirk Lunsford 2016

This week in INTE 6710 "Creative Designs," our class dove into understanding CARP, or contrast, alignment, repetition, and proximity. There are many other deeply embedded meanings in simple graphics that evoke responses in the viewer, even if subconscious or subliminal. There's color, gestalt, symmetry, asymmetry, texture, scale, etc. All these things we pretty much take for granted in the modern era where we are bombarded with imagery, mostly well done thanks to capitalism. Embedded in the psyche of each person living in the modern world is the "taste" or ability to discern what looks good or what looks bad. Just like listening to music, there are rules to be followed and we all know it when we hear a good tune versus a bad one. We may not be able to describe why the music, or the image or design is out tune, but we know a bad design when we see one. 17 Ways To Make Graphic Designers Cringe   In order to describe visual design to make what works and wh...

INTE 6710 Journal Entry 3 Figure 1 For this journal entry, I wanted to look at an example of a successful info-graphic, somewhat related to the subject matter I chose to explore for an info-graphic of my own. I discovered an info-graphic on Pinterest to create awareness and "call to action" World Backup Day 2012. The Pinterest link can be found here and the website link for the original showing of the info-graphic found here.  I applied the CARP principles, or contrast, alignment, repetition, and proximity. I "marked up" the info-graphic to indicate where we can see CARP. I then broke the info-graphic out into segments to call attention to how each principle was applied. Fig 1: At the top of the info-graphic we can see alignment and proximity work together to create a text title unit for the info-graphic. This is the largest text on the graphic. Interestingly, in the top corner a logo breaks the alignment and expands off the page. This creates interest ...

INTE 6710 Journal Entry 2 After the "SUCCES" exercise this week, inspired by The "SUCCES" checklist, by Chip & Dan Heath, or "Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, and Story,  I was able to narrow down the catch phrase for the infographic to be "Keep calm and save on (the right way!)," or "Save like a boss avoid data loss." The first phrase, "Keep calm..." seems somewhat trending in social media. Interestingly, the term originated from British propaganda during the beginning of the second world war (hence the crown) often seen. The original phrase was "Keep calm and carry on." The wikipedia entry and original poster can be seen here: KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON . To get some idea of how this propaganda phrase has exploded in social media, just check out this Pinterest search on the phrase . The second phrase, "Save like a boss avoid data loss," is catchy, leet, and rhythmic. There are some ...

So I need to make an info-graphic for a graduate class assignment. I'm also an instructor of CAD and design and I'm shocked at the poor work and saving habits of most students in the labs or classrooms. I'm sure I'm not the only instructor who has had students drop due to "losing data" or computer files. To help remedy this, why not make an info-graphic to post in the labs and classrooms to remind students about the best ways to save and back up their data? After reading week one reading assignments, I was really engaged in the process and analysis of ways to make ideas "stick." The "SUCCES" checklist, by Chip & Dan Heath, or "Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, and Story was a great way to help me think through some "one liners" or catch phrases to introduce the info-graphic to my audience. I used the checklist to create an ideation exercise for myself to present ten different catch phrases and info-g...