The Visual Communication Guy

If you have ever visited Riverfront Park in Spokane, Washington, you undoubtedly had an experience with the “garbage goat,” a copper and brass artistic sculpture famous for its internal vacuum mechanism. Perhaps more successful than any garbage can ever created, this goat sculpture actually encourages children and adults alike to

As you design information with the idiosyncrasies of human brains in mind, you become an architect that constructs messages in ways that best appeal to people. Industrial designer Dieter Rams famously articulated the Ten Principles of Good Design. While his brilliant declaration was about physical objects, the same principles should

World renown cognitive scientist Donald Norman—author of Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things—once made a profound argument: “The emotional side of design may be more critical to a product’s success than it’s practical elements” (5). Basically, how people feel about what they are using may be more

Most designs include text and, therefore, all text should be designed. If you haven’t thought about it much before, realize it now: every font, every capital letter, every point size, every line length you insert into a document is a design choice. As an information architect, it’s your responsibility to

Our eyes are powerful. Designing your communications to tap into that power can make your message far more impactful. John Medina, author of Brain Rules, suggested that vision significantly trumps all senses and that the majority of our brain’s processing power is spent on what we see. “Visual processing doesn’t

While design can sometimes feel complicated because you’re always trying to adapt to the nuances of your particular audience’s personalities, values, motivators, personal tastes, and so forth, most human beings have a few similar qualities in regards to how they actually process information. This is good news for you! The