Visual Literacy Guidelines

Uses for Color Assist in legibility Emphasize points Signal similarities and differences

Assist in Legibility Is this legible?

Rule Use Contrasting Colors for Backgrounds and Lettering.

Emphasize Points, Even in Visuals

Signal Similarities and Differences The cat ran home. Charlie smiled at Marlene.

Lettering Use san serif fonts: l Font has no horizontal lines added to end of nearly all vertical lines l Good for small blocks of text and reading from screen

Lettering Size For multimedia, try to have no text smaller than 24 points, unless there is justification for doing so. Headings, of course, should be in a larger font size.

Space Do not be afraid of “open” or “dead” space. Too many times, designers feel they must use every available open space. Do not crowd lots of information onto a screen/card.

PowerPoint Amount of Information per Slide Rule of thumb: Six or fewer words per line of text. Six or fewer lines of text. No more than 36 words per screen.

Images Make sure that images or graphics direct the eye of the viewer/learner to important information.

Images In this example, the graphic helps to direct the eye of the viewer/learner back towards the text.

Images In this example, the graphic helps to direct the eye of the viewer/learner away from the text.

Now you know the visual literacy guidelines!