The Ways We Present Ourselves

https://blog.verisign.com/getting-online/4-myths-about-using-a-branded-email-for-business/

In Roman times it was delivered more in the way of lectures and speeches while now most is delivered through written word which is why their ways of delivery could be considered lost. As the author compares it to a job interview, everything from the clothes one wears to the way that they stand is part of the delivery. A person would want to be dressed up or down to the right amount for what they were speaking on as well as use the proper movements and gestures to get across their credibility. Porter is arguing that today this can be done by the way that we build and represent ourselves online from game characters, to profiles, to personal websites. Porter uses the example of two different lawyers and the ways that they not only presented their physical picture but the words and the designs of their websites. This connects to the way that we have discussed as appropriate fonts and designs for particular appearances for everything we design.

A way that I have had to consider this in writing or in work is emails. There are many different places in which you have to make decisions about identity and body but I find one that I have to make most often is how I want others to perceive my emails when I am sending them for work. If I am sending a message to my boss or even my bosses boss, I want to send the message that I am professional and a good worker so I will use different wording and refrain from using anything like emoticons. When I am sending a message to a patron I try and keep the tone simple and straightforward while choosing words that may be interpreted as kind and helpful, I want the patron to feel as though they can ask the questions that they need to and get the resources they require. One way I do this is by increasing my use of exclamation points, I want the patron to feel as though I am excited and ready to assist them in finding their articles or whatever it may be.

Do you have a certain way that you talk or email customers to better establish your credibility and willingness to help?

Same But Different

https://www.york.ac.uk/news-and-events/news/2018/research/no-evidence-to-link-violence-and-video-games/

In all of the mentioned formats, you want the audience to interact or connect to the game/story so that they are entertained and finish the game/story. Depending on what type of game/story you are talking about changes the amount of interaction needed. For a novel you need the audience to interact with the world in their head and imagination, they are not able to interact with the actual characters in real life. For something like a regular video game, you want the audience to interact with the world in the game setting, there is already a world in front of them they just need to process the story line by interacting with their environment.  Virtual reality takes this a step farther by letting the audience be in the world itself and not have to interact through the liaison of a character, they are able to “feel” and “walk” in to world on their own. A text-based interactive game combines the interaction with the audience’s imagination with the interaction through the character as a liaison, they are able to both imagine the scene and see how what they imagine plays out within the story. While these different engagements are all towards the same purpose they go about achieving that purpose differently depending on what they have to achieve that medium. The techniques from harvesting fiction can be transferred to other media just as the speaker was talking about the connection between the story in text-based games to that in video games. An example of this is a game called “When the Past Was Around”. This game has no dialogue but simply allows the player to progress the story by interacting with the items in the room. This is an example of this because the whole point of the game is to tell the story of a couple but it uses what the audience assumes and interacts with to tell that story without words.

Learning Games

I played the first 5 or so games from the list and most of them seemed to focus on noticing the differences between fonts or interfaces. With I shot the serif, you are needed to discern which one is in serif font and what is not. I did fine at the game, they were not terribly difficult because they were pretty forgiving with what they counted correct, especially the one where you try and get the spacing between the letters. The games are definitely fun and interesting, but I would not say they were super educational. I think that the repetitive nature was good to try and learn some of the basics but all in all they did not teach a ton of stuff. The Serif game for instance, taught me how to identify some of them but did not really teach me much of the difference or why that difference was important. I think that they could be good to show students, but I do not think that they should be expected to learn too much from them. You can not gain the knowledge from the games alone, but they could be good practice for some of the things that are learned in class.

This was Surprisingly Fun to Make

This was quite fun to make. It reminded me of making PowerPoints in elementary school. I tried to break as many rules as I could but it was surprisingly hard to break every rule on one flyer; I don’t think that I was able to break sins 8, 10, 12, and 13. The problems with the design are more perceptual then cultural because of it being hard to read and unorganized as well as other problems like the overly bright background color. The main part of the design that I would say is a cultural problem is the sin of centering everything. While it can mess with the flow depending on the rest of the design, it is mainly a sin because of its lack of visual stimulation; in other words, centering everything can look boring. This is more cultural in my opinion because other cultures may not find it as boring or find it necessary for certain designs. The main two sins that I think might could change in the future are centering everything and stairstepping. I think that these might cease to be a sin simply because of them being more mundane than the other sins. These two are not sins that in my opinion look as bad as bad bullets or multiple fonts. Since they would be the least offensive, I think that they could eventually be considered not a sin.

What sin do you think would be the most offensive or worse one out of them all? I think that bad bullets and busy background could be two of the potential worse ones due to them compromising the ability to read the information. All of the sins are sins for a reason and can bother people in different ways. What sin bothers you the most?

Make One Exercise

When creating this book cover, I wanted to make it easy to read and to be mostly clear of clutter. To do this I kept the space between the different parts of the title, subtitle, and byline fairly large. I also chose a darker text to go on the lighter background to increase contract and readability. I wanted the teacup to be the focal point, so I made it have the greatest contrast. The eyes then travel to the New York Times bestseller which helps lead back up to the title. The eyes do not go well to the byline. I used the teacup photo which I cut out of a free photo from upsplash to connect back to the title and provide a focal point.

The main question I had was what size page we should start out on in MS Publisher. I used 8.5 x 11 because we were going to be uploading it but I was not sure what we are supposed to use in actuality. Another question would be how the background color effects the overall feel of the book cover?

Good Graphic Design and Good Writing

A quote that stood out to me in “White Space is Not Your Enemy” is, “Good graphic design does four things: It captures attention, controls the eye’s movement across the screen or page, conveys information and evokes emotion” (pg 6). This statement can apply to writing as well as graphic design because good writing is trying to achieve a similar goal. When writing a story, you will want a title that capture people’s attention so that they are enticed to pick up your book to begin with. This fits directly in with the first aspect of good graphic design because the visual aspects are trying to capture attention in the same way a title tries to capture attention.

Brian Bilston https://twitter.com/brian_bilston/status/938678896899354624

The second aspect of good graphic design is a little harder to place with writing considering that in every language there is a certain way that we read, such as with English we read from left to right, but it can be compared to the way that comics and poetry sometimes break the traditional way of reading with placing words and pictures in an order that people are not accustomed to for effect. When an author does decide to change the way that they want something to be read then they have to be clear and make sure to control where the reader is reading next so that the reader will not become confused. This could also be looked at as paragraphs and chapters forcing readers to stop and move forward to avoid walls of text.

The third aspect is what writing tries to do generally. The information it is conveying differs greatly by subject and purpose, but it is always trying to convey something whether it is a warning label or a novel.

Lastly, the fourth aspect of good design, evoking emotion, can be seen in novels everywhere. When reading a good novel it is normal for people to feel bad when something bad happens or the be happy when something good happens it plays on the emotion just as the colors of graphic design might cause one to feel calm or excited. Writing and design are similar in their intentions and it makes them work well together.

I believe what they were saying had to do with the accessibility of graphic design for everyone and I would agree that computers have done the same for writing. There are tons of sites where people can have their own blog or share their own stories, getting your work out there has become easier for most people and has allowed it to become more readily available.

With writing becoming easier to get out there, it means that there is an overflow of both good and bad writing. What would you think some good and bad aspects of the democratized of both writing and graphic design are?