Starting from the observation that the use of space, color and typography in text and images as can be seen on the web, on TV, in videotex (in Europe), at conference presentations, and in printed matter often is far from optimal, the course aims at giving writers and editors of such material sufficient knowledge to avoid large errors that will impede legibility and visibility on these text and image-rendering media. Moreover, three different causes for these errors will be uncovered.
The course will focus on giving and explaining rules for:
(1) the legibility of text as a function of characteristics including font type and size, foreground and background luminance and color, the role and value of luminance and color contrast, and layout factors;
(2) legibility and meaning of icons/ symbols/ pictograms as a function of size and internal structure;
(3) the role of text color in association with parts of text with the same color by perceptual grouping, accentuation of small parts of the text with a color differing from that of the surrounding text, categorization of parts of the text by coding them with differing colors, and facilitation or inhibition of reading through the generated impression of orderliness or chaos by the amount and distribution of different colors on the display;
(4) planned and unforeseen special effects of color, such as color stereoscopy;
(5) interaction of spatial, typographical and color effects whereby one or more of the just described effects may be counteracted; and
(6) the 'bipolarity' of utility and attractiveness in a number of cases, such as color in reading; structured vs. 'plain' backgrounds for text; matte vs. glossy display screens and -bezels; and transparency vs. 'prettiness' of screen- and magazine pages.
Examples of these cases will be given, featuring 'good' and 'bad' ones.