PICTURE WORTH 1000 WORDS

This wrongly translated Chinese proverb produces eyerolls from many who believe it to be a gross exaggeration. They counter by saying that a picture is really worth only a picture. Well, a thousand words are a lot of words, and ten thousand words, which was the actual number in the proverb's literal translation, are a lot more. It’s pretty hard for a single picture to hold up under all that pressure. Still, there is no denying how an image can captivate. Certainly, images add dimension and powerful meaning to text. Illustrations, icons, charts, graphs—the visual world is rich with examples of how these elements summarize or elaborate upon co-existing text, sometimes even replacing the text entirely.

If you look at the toolbar on your computer screen, you’ll see any number of icons that replace words, and most of us (at least those who are computer literate) have no problem comprehending their meaning. Because they are widely understood, icons can be used to great effect in advertising. On the Windows homepage, for example, Microsoft skillfully uses four of their common icons to introduce Windows Vista.

Graphs and charts are frequently used to provide financial data, usually supplementing and clarifying the figures contained on balance sheets and such. But here, on the website of a Philadelphia-based non-profit organization, we find posted a 2005 annual report that uses only pie charts to show revenue and expenses—perfectly appropriate for an audience that may not be interested in scrutinizing all the little financial details. (You’ll find the charts on page 6 of the pdf).

In advertising and for other purposes, illustrations are often used in conjunction with or in lieu of actual photographs of products. Why use a photo of dish soap when an illustration might offer a more interesting visual representation of a common household item? The Skippy website, for example, uses illustrations as well as sound to create a feeling of child-like fun and exuberance. Images such as those on their Trail Mix page would be impossible to create as photos, and they would probably not be as entertaining. Throughout Skippy's website, we have many crayon-like illustrations and also photos and games, all geared for kids (but great for adults, too)! The only pages without images are the more serious ones, i.e., the allergy information and FAQ pages. (There are just a few peanuts on the latter)!

In a world where people are mainly scanning documents or websites for what they need or want, words alone may often be overlooked. Add a great illustration, and you may at least catch their attention and possibly even say a lot more, if not 1000 words. Let’s not get carried away!

HELLO "NEW" WORLD!

In his skillful video, The Machine is Us/ing Us, Michael Wesch, Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University, uses Web 2.0 technology to illustrate the potential that Web 2.0 offers. This proves to be an extraordinarily effective technique. The Machine is Us/ing Us was released on YouTube on January 31, 2007, and it quickly went viral, becoming the most popular video in the blogosphere and the #1 video on YouTube on February 7th.



Wesch’s success is not surprising. His video is visually interesting, compelling, thought-provoking, even moving. Though younger viewers may differ with me on this, his choice of music (There’s Nothing Impossible by Deus) was superb, and it imbued the video with emotion, a crescendo of connection and possibility that leads the viewer to consider a number of undeniably important issues. As XML (Extensible Markup Language) ushers in Web 2.0, Wesch posits that we will have to rethink a few things such as copyright, governance, privacy, authorship, rhetorics(?), even family, love and ourselves. (I hate to be picky, but the use of the plural “rhetorics” hints that a little spell-check might be needed)!

From a design perspective, the Wesch video is successful at leading the viewer in precise and gripping fashion from one visual element to the next. The rhythm of the piece, the speedy movement of text on the screen, and the typographical changes that occur are amazingly complex. Some of the feedback on Wesch’s video suggests that different interfaces and desktops environments be represented in the forthcoming final version. Perhaps this is so, though most viewers will find The Machine is Us/ing Us to be effective and memorable just as it is.

TYPOGRAPHY AND THE WEB

Typography is part and parcel of our visual world, allowing us to distinguish CNN from NBC or Taco Bell from McDonald’s. Yet, most people tend to ignore it. The only time people really notice typography is when a composition doesn’t work or they can’t read the type. Technology is changing our relationship to type rather quickly. Anyone who has the right software package can design a typeface and create a layout, though probably not very well.

There are any number of guidelines and standards on typography for print materials, which made me wonder how the rules differ when designing for the Web. It seems there are significant differences, and these are created and complicated by the fact that each line of text, each font and typestyle is recreated by the user’s Web browser, server and computer operating system. Two resources on the Web offer a logical presentation of issues to consider when designing for the Web: Access by Design and Webstyle Guide. Here are a few basics that relate specifically to typography:

• Typefaces are rendered at lower resolution on the Web, and this affects legibility. Times New Roman, considered the most legible typeface for print materials, does not translate well to the screen. Better choices would be Georgia, Verdana, and Trebuchet, all of which come with most operating systems. However, dense text passages are likely to be printed out by the user. If a website builder suspects that users will print out the text, then Times New Roman remains a good choice.
• Left justification of text is safest to reproduce and easiest to read on the Web. Technological issues make it hard to control for excess space and other problems that may arise with full justification, and right justification is simply hard to read. As for headlines, when type is left justified, they should be, too.
• On most Websites, line lengths are too long for easy reading. While restricting line length is complicated by technological issues, a line length of fifty to seventy characters per line remains the ideal.
• As with print materials, the standard combination of upper and lower case characters enhances readability.
• Italics, bold, and underlined and colored text are variations that make it easier for goal-oriented Web users to scan for information. The use of all capitals for this purpose is, not surprisingly, less effective.

Obviously, I’ve just scratched the surface of this issue. There are a tremendous number of resources with variations on the theme. While researching this subject, I came across two interesting tidbits with which I will close this discussion...

Who knew? Helvetica typeface is celebrating its 50th birthday this year with an independent documentary film by Gary Hustwit. The film examines the proliferation of Helvetica in our visual world as part of a larger conversation of our global visual culture and how type affects our lives.

Check out Mark Simonson’s humorous piece, Let’s Talk Type, which he wrote in 1977, but contains a few eternal truths!