Visual Hierarchy
Communication Mini — Project 2
The event I was assigned, Five Evenings hosted by Pittsburgh Arts and Lectures, described a virtual lecture series surrounding five established authors and their books.
Knowing little to no context behind the event, we began to annotate and decipher the information we were given on the sheet. I grouped chunks of information I thought went together. Looking critically, we noticed that the venue of the location was irrelevant as the event was online and caught any spelling or grammatical errors we could find.
Our assignment was to look at this chunk of information and slowly go about exploring how small and selective changes like font-weight and spacing can alter the hierarchy of information.
1. Stroke Weight:
Here, I started with the obvious and decided to increase the stroke weight of Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures, along with the dates and website URL. This is what I would want to know if I was attending the event. However, I then shifted my focus to how I would draw someone to attend the event rather than present them with the most obvious information they needed. I played around with focusing my attention on the name of the event and the authors, the dates receded and the people came forward.
2. Line Spacing:
Like with the previous set, I began with the obvious and separated information in their respective groups. I tried a couple of different options, i.e. keeping the date of the lecture separate or the book title separate, however, I felt that spacing by itself was not an appropriate method of establishing hierarchy within the date/author/book chunk of information. Clubbing them together felt like the best way to move forward.
3. Horizontal Shift, Two Left Margins:
This exercise involved the pushing and pulling of certain pieces of information to create a hierarchy. Starting with the most apparent pieces I wanted to emphasize, the three attempts allowed me to discover a balance of where the tabbing method can be distracting vs. when it can aid the viewer.
4. Horizontal Shift, Three Left Margins:
I appreciated the staggered organicness of the information created through this exercise. I began thinking about the use of white space, especially in the second exercise where the staggering brought a level of intrigue. When the information was organized in a way that was obvious, I found it became boring and redundant.
5. Line Spacing, Two Different Stroke Weights:
Combining the two exercises took the hierarchy a step further. I found that the subtle use of both techniques would be an effective way to create hierarchy. The boldness allows the viewer to skim through the text easily and the line spacing creates proximity that tells the viewer what information is clubbed and separate.
6. Horizontal Shift, Two Different Stroke Weights:
Overall Reflection
- Repeating these exercises I realized what information in my given text I wanted to be first noticed by the reader — what was the most important piece that would draw someone in.
- I understood how to best organize information in a way that isn’t distracting or overwhelming.
- I appreciated white space and intentional disorder to create intrigue. I would like to incorporate this more in my final poster.
7. Scale
I then began exploring scale and hierarchy, at first, I became frustrated with the limitation of cutting and pasting the information as there were immediately things I wanted to change and imperfections with the alignment I wanted to alter. But I think the exercise helped me take the first step, and just like Andrew said, not be afraid to start with really bad designs and improve from there.
8. Color
From the discussions and feedback we had in class I realized that vertical text might not be the way to go, it really blocked the movement of the eye through the poster. In terms of my final crit iterations, I really enjoyed the first one with the quotes and the use of white space. Vicki mentioned that in terms of drawing the viewer's eye with hierarchy, it works against you if everything is bold or big. Instead, if one element was intentionally highlighted one thing is much more effective.
With color, I tried a bunch of different palettes and I think by the end of it, I realized I was really drawn to more primary and complementary color schemes i.e. purples and yellows, reds and greens and oranges and blues. I knew I wanted to use color intentionally to direct how the poster is read.
9. Images and Illustrations
Stock Images I thought had a nice dynamism:
My personal illustrations and iterations:
The last illustration I thought was an interesting exploration point because it was a good middle ground between abstraction and being recognizable. Making the colors more muted and shifting the gradients while adding a watercolor-like texture achieved in Procreate added a layer of depth to an otherwise flat image. It also reflected human form which made the picture more relatable.
A few people in the studio noticed that they didn’t immediately recognize the image to be two faces and as they went further away, realized what it really was. I feel like that adds an element of surprise and ambiguity to the poster.
Yoshi did mention that it could be a little biased as it only reflected the cover of the Vanishing Half, however, I think that it was a vague enough representation that I think it could work well with the overall message of the event.
Speaking of the overall message, I think the image also spoke to the converging of ideas that is the focal point of this and most literary events that host authors and discussions.
10. Bringing it all together:
I started out by combining the text and images, thinking about what we had learned with the previous exercises. I wanted to create intrigue and keep it simple. I think I received positive feedback on my first illustration but some of the critiques I received was:
- Fix the kerning of the text in the center
- The “L” is getting lost in the white space, try to pull them closer together
- Experiment with different tones of the same colors and see how that affects the poster
- Definitely need to organize the body text better — more attention to hierarchy and proximity, they are all blending together.
- Vicki mentioned trying to make the arrangement of the body text more organic to reflect the illustration. Since it was an odd number of events, it might also make more sense to try to rework it in a different way.
Working with some of the feedback I received, I arrived at a place I was pretty satisfied with. However, once I began to print my poster, I found the gradient didn’t translate at all through the printer.
I tried multiple times to make the gradient softer, add more transition shades, change the printer settings, I even tried to remake the gradients in illustrator from scratch, but it seemed to be getting worse. Talking to Andrew, I realized this was just a limitation I couldn’t overcome and I would just have to accept the outcome as it was.
11. Final Touches
My last crit I thought went pretty well, and I think I was close to finalizing the design for the poster. A few people mentioned they felt there could be something more to the open space in the top right corner to help draw the eye across the page and make the poster feel better balanced. I tried a bunch of things including lines and curves, but ultimately, I decided to add another graphical element that hinted at the logo of Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures — the quotation mark. I thought the “pair of two” motif reflected the two faces well and I received positive responses from my peers. I also more precisely aligned the body text with a grid to tie everything up.
Reflection
I thought it was interesting how posters can really be a mixed form of art and design, where there is a lot of subjectivity and personal opinion that can make someone drawn to or dislike a poster. I enjoyed thinking about hierarchy and learning when to strike the right balance between too much and too little. Working with everyone in the studio was a great way to see how others worked and interpreted the project, especially those who had the same event as me ended up with very different versions of communicating the same ideas.
