Visual+Literacy

Visual Literacy Assignment

1) Interpretation This visual is trying to portray that our society eats entirely too much protein. Chicken seems to be their main point and they want to bring our attention to this since they chose to include how many chickens are raised for food each year. However, they place this in the middle of telling us how many of certain foods we eat, ie. Big Macs, chicken and hotdogs. This visual is not bad and I believe it includes some of the PAT concepts we have discussed.

2) Overall design (PAT) Perception – It doesn’t appear that hierarchy played a role in creating this visual but they did include figures that corresponded to the text. Gestalt was used in certain areas. Although, I don’t think they portrayed the whole adequately. They have parts of the whole such as burgers, chicken and hotdogs but how does that relate to our whole diet? Similarity and proximity were shown by the table being horizontal and each looking the same and the figures or clip art was placed next to the corresponding text describing the fact. Actions – Contrast appears by having a black background and colored tables/columns to display each separate fact. As stated in the discussion repetition are items being displayed in the same format or area, which in this case they have tried to do only difference being what is being stated. They have aligned the information in a horizontal table and have tried to place art in proximity to the text. Tools – They have used different sized fonts for the text and the numbers that correlate to them. Color was used to show changes and information to stand out. Clip art was created so people could identify with visual images like a hotdog, Big Mac or chicken. I do like how they were able to place the art outside of the table to show some depth to the image.

3) Improvements If there were to be one improvement I would make is that the information doesn’t represent a whole? I would rather see the percentage of protein consumed within our entire diet; maybe a chart that showed diet as 100% then what percentage is protein, fruits, carbs, etc. I believe it is difficult for people to grasp how much 600 million is or 8 billion that seems like such a huge amount that if you were to put in terms of percentage it would stand out more. Displaying it in this manner may give you more of a hierarchy approach to the visual. Also, why show how many chickens are raised for food each year and not beef? Seems to be thrown in their inadvertently. Some smaller improvements would be downsize the art and place it more evenly along the image and not scattered up and down. Lastly, change the heading to stand out more and better explain what you are trying to relay to people.

Reflection: The Visual Literacy assignment was beneficial in assisting me in preparing understandable and educational lessons. PowerPoint makes creating presentations easy but one must be able to present material in a manner that viewers will understand. Learning about color, text, perception, actions and objects helped me to prepare a better lesson for my students. I believe that the clearer our lessons are the more information a student will come away with.