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Module 5: Visual Media

Why It Matters: Visual Media

Our prehistoric ancestors struggled, rock in hand, to carve just the right picture into the wall of the cave, hoping that someone would come along and understand the story being told. They may have drawn stick figures with spears, or a woolly mammoth in the distance about to become dinner. In the next series of drawings, the mammoth has been struck, the stick figure looming over him. In a third series, a gathering of stick figures at a fire, presented with a feast.

There is beauty and clarity in the simplicity of the prehistoric man’s drawings. You understand his hunting victory even though he’s used no words. Prehistoric man was on to something with this approach.

Fast forward to today where studies have been done on the impact of visual aids:

Only 70 percent of people reading labels on medicine containers understand the instructions when they are written in text form, but that understanding increases to 95 percent when the text is accompanied by images.[1]

People follow written directions 323 percent better when the images accompany the instructions.[2]

From this, we know that visual media can make your communication easier to understand. But does it help you make a point or sell an idea? When listening to an oral presentation, 50 percent of an audience will be persuaded by the speech alone, but that number increases to 67 percent when the speech features visual aids.[3]

Because of this, we know that visual media can make your communication more convincing. In an age in which we humans are asked to process more information than we have ever processed before, let’s look at today’s trends:

People are 80 percent more likely to engage with content when it features color visuals.[4]

Facebook audiences are 651 percent more likely to engage with a post if it includes an image, compared with posts that don’t.[5]

This shows us that visuals attract attention and draw our audiences in. Visuals make our communication noticeable.

Communications are more memorable, persuasive and easily understood when visual media is involved. Like prehistoric man, we can use visual media to more effectively deliver a message. In this module, we’re going to talk about the uses of various visual media—charts, graphs, images, and even video—and how communicators can leverage them to connect with their colleagues and other professionals.

Module 6: Reports

Why It Matters: Reports

Why learn to write business reports?

decorative imageYou’ve just come home from your day at work as a produce manager at a local grocery store. As you sort through your mail (bills to pay, items to read later, and junk to recycle now), you come across postcards from two different meal kit services, where they send a box of ingredients with recipes to homes. The home cooks then follow a recipe for a unique meal with a few special ingredients that the company ships to their residence. The home cook doesn’t have to go to the store for anything.

When you go to work the next day, you plan to ask the grocery store owner about these services. How hard would it be to create something similar at your store?

The owner of the store thinks your idea has some merit, but isn’t sure how many customers might try it, what they would be willing to pay, or how much it might cost for a small town grocery store. He asks you to put together information that summarizes these answers. He wants to review it with a couple of business friends in his network where they share new ideas and brainstorm business strategies.

This is your first time creating a business report in a real-life business circumstance, and you’re excited because it’s not just a school assignment. You start with what you were trained to do by thinking about this report as an internal proposal. The first step is to set up the exact item or problem statement to research. With that focus in mind, you can do the research needed to answer the questions and determine how to share your results in an orderly fashion.

Discussion

Everyday we encounter hundreds to thousands of visual images, but why do some images stick in our minds while others just get glossed over? Color, positioning, patterns, and repetition are all features that can can be engineered to convey a message within an image. Images play an important role in persuading an audience of a particular message, but a downside to this is that images can be interpreted in various ways based on people’s history and experiences.

Breaking down the design components of an image is also a helpful when you need to design or create an image or logo to convey a message for your own business needs.

For this week's discussion, design a logo or image that represents your own personal brand or a company's brand. You may use your name/initials or a company name. The logo must visually communicate something about you or that company represents. Ask yourself: What do I want to communicate about me? What shapes, forms, fonts, etc. will help to visually communicate my ‘brand’? You can use any digital design tool or hand draw your logo.

Along with your image please provide a short summary describing your process of completing this project and to analyze the choices you made in the final version. You will discuss why you chose a particular logo shape, use of colors, and the reasons for any revisions.

Replies to two of your classmates should analyze their logo. Please provide thoughtful feedback on ideas for improvement or questions about the design choices.

Essential Activities:

Reading Module 5 will assist you in writing this discussion forum.

Reply 1

The brand I'm going to create is a healthy salad brand. When thinking about designing a logo, my mind went straight to a circular form. I was really inspired by some of the small food chain businesses in the city that they print their logo in the form of stickers and then place on to go boxes, bags, or just give aways for cute swags. As a result, I strategically designed my logo in this particular shape in order to attract customers.

I also want this logo to be eye catching. As a result, instead of one single circle, I used several ones, stacking on top of each other to create this nice outline for visual interests. Due to the characteristics of salads, or eating healthy in general, I used the color of green to represent the ethos of the brand, adding two leaves as catching points to the design so at a glance people would have a rough idea of what business I am doing. I also used two different shades of green to put more emphasis on the brand name as well as the outline of the logo to better catch people's attention.

I did also put some thoughts in terms of the font that I choose. I want this brand to be casual, something that is easily to get. As a result, I used a serif font instead of sans serif, and added curved details to the letters.

Overall, all the decisions were made based on the type of business and what kind of feeling and first impression I want to give to people when they saw the logo.

Reply 2

Logos are truly a brand’s identity and speaks volume in just colors and fonts about the brand. It is very interesting how the play of colors and shapes can invoke complex views about a product. Consumers subconsciously read into a logo whenever they review a product and tend to develop a preconceived notion off a logo based on past experiences. This is the leading cause for company’s having to makeover their logos just to create a sense of revision and improvement of the product.

For this week’s logo design exercise, I have chosen to design a brand logo for a hypothetical automotive workshop. The workshop is called “Shark lab,” which give it a strong and predatory image which helps convey performance and power which is a popular reason why customers choose to bring their vehicle into workshops and modify them. The word “Lab” provides a sense of sophistication and helps build an image of the workshop being more than just a well-equipped garage. A laboratory is associated with modern complicated research and intellect. This will give prospective customers a sense of trust in the quality and a hope of finding high end parts and professionals that can perform a through job. Labs also provide a sense of bespoke components and the ability to improvise and design something to your expectation, which is what Shark labs is all about, providing the expertise and guidance to help customers create their own bespoke machine, that they are proud of creating.

The logo itself is Green in color with a sharp bold font and the gear image is a very recognizable symbol yet prominent and simple. An easy to remember logo leaves a lasting impression and makes it convenient for the customer to bear in mind. The green and bold font conveys a modern environmentally conscious brand that is motivated to improve vehicle performance but also by adopting more eco friendly technologies to achieve it. The tag line “crafting automotive excellence” helps to convey a wide variety of expertise and a creative inclination to our products and services.