March 2012 Archives

Another reminder that next week, our class will meet on Thursday afternoon (not Wednesday) at the IonE Building on the St. Paul campus at 1:30PM on April 5. The website for Paul's photography is www.paulnicklen.com. His presentation at TED, which was recorded last year, is available here. It's been viewed by more than three hundred thousand people. We'll have about an hour to talk with Paul about his career with National Geographic and his approach to communicating complex issues to a broad audience. Please come prepared with one or two questions to get the conversation started.

Links related to our conversation on fonts
The scourge of Arial
When you should use Comic Sans
Why you hate Comic Sans
Fonts common to all versions of Windows and Mac
Video: "Helvetica, period!"

April 11
For our class meeting on April 11, please read this article by Michael Alley and Katheryn Neely arguing in favor of adding 'sentence headlines' to visual aids.

Also, please prepare two slides that use text to communicate (1) a concept and (2) a quotation related to the main theme of your Pecha Kucha presentation. I've included the two examples I showed in class yesterday below (click to enlarge).

"If you want me to give you a two-hour presentation, I am ready today. If you want only a five-minute speech, it will take me two weeks to prepare."
- Mark Twain

Pecha Kutcha is a style of presentation that uses strict constraints to foster creativity and force speakers to be thoughtful about the way they spend their (very limited) time. I've posted the links from today's discussion, along with a PDF version of the slide template for your storyboarding exercise.

Link: Lessons from the art of storyboarding

Remember: Due to Spring Break and an off-week following, our next class will meet on March 28. Be ready with your storyboards for paired discussion!

Line: What, if anything, is Big Bird?

Video: Engage through story

Exercise: Structure your talk using the slide template [PDF]

Hi folks,

As promised, here are a few links to topics discussed in last classes' lectures, plus an article that describes the cost of visual complexity.

Reading
Bergen et al. (2005), How attention partitions itself during simultaneous message presentations

Links
Get those logos off the screen!

The TED Commandments

Bill Gates and visual complexity

Gates, Jobs and the zen aesthetic

The visual transformation of Bill Gates the presenter

Next week
For next week, please bring (or email me) two photographs of billboards or posters that catch your attention using simple design. And remember, take your own photos (rather than use Google)!