Every day we are drenched with information. Bits, bytes,
chunks—it comes flying at us from all directions. We have to
take it in, create something with it, and communicate through
it. But information is not enough. Thatʼs not all that people
want. . . .
We’re in the Meaning business--taking these slices
of information and creating meaning with them.
People are hungry to hear a story with
meaning. . . .
They want the whole orange!

Welcome to Creating Clarity: How to Design Great
Visual Communication. Today we’re going to look
at three things: basic principles of visual
communication; building a visual presentation; and
designing effective slides. We’ll also look at
communicating with numbers and cutting through
the noise.
Research shows that we learn better from words
and pictures together than from either words or
picture alone. Visual and verbal information are
processed in different parts of the brain—so they
don’t compete with each other. [Cook, M. P. “Visual
Representations in Science Education: The Influence of Prior Knowledge and Cognitive
Load Theory on Instructional Design Principles.” Science Education, 90(6) 1073-1091,
2006.].
Our visual systems and our brains
instinctively process and act upon
images. . . But here is where our
differences are so interesting.

For some, more visual learners, the image gives
rise to the thought. For others, those with a more
verbal learning style. . .
—the creative spark might jump from thought to
image.
However we learn, the goal is to move from idea to
story. . .

So. . . . what’s your story?
We’ll look at three steps to designing a
presentation. . .
Imagining the story, which can involve
brainstorming (whether in a group or by yourself),
building the presentation (researching, outlining),
and designing your slides (arranging text and
images on the slide).
But first, a couple of facts about visual perception.
Our perception is selective; our attention is drawn
to contrasts.

Second, we are drawn to familiar patterns. We look
for what we know and expect to find. In fact, we
are pattern-making creatures.
Let’s try a little experiment. I’m going to show you
the next slide for three seconds. I want you to draw
from memory as many of the shapes as you can.
You can use the back sides of your handout.
Random shapes confuse the eye. . .

Now let’s try it again. I’ll show you the next slide
for three seconds and you draw as many shapes
from memory as you can. Ready. . . .?

I bet you did better this time. The only difference
between the two slides is the arrangement. We clustered
them together in a pattern of shapes. That is sometimes
called “chunking,” and it is a graphic phenomenon that
can help us learn. We attempt to find order and patterns
in a visual scene—and if there isn’t an apparent one we’ll
create one. [Smith, Robin M. (2008). Conquering the Content: A Step-by-Step
Guide to Online Course Design. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, pp. 67-68.]
With selective perception and pattern recognition in
mind, let’s turn to the process of building a
presentation.
The first step is to set your imagination free,
brainstorming, gathering in ideas, massaging
them, digging down to find images, metaphors,
associations you can sort through. . . You know
best the places where you are most creative and
relaxed.

Think it through during your commute. . .
Take some time by yourself. . .
Take flight in your imagination. . .

Work from the inside out. . .
Discover the heart of the story, the essential idea
you want to get across.
Work the idea down to its simplest, clearest form.

Then sit down and begin researching your
presentation. Work from your central idea. Develop
the steps toward your goal. Get coffee.
One way to work in this stage is with Sticky Notes.
Sticky notes have several advantages: they’re
bright, they’re small, and they can be moved easily.
If you can’t get one idea on a note it’s probably too
complicated.
Keep it simple at this stage. Using Sticky-Notes is
quicker, more versatile, and more tactile than
trying to work in PowerPoint. And it’s more tactile
—you can touch your ideas and move them around.

Then begin to work in KeyNote or PowerPoint.
Follow your outline and draw together the words
and images. And that leads us to the third stage—
designing the slides.
In any visual communication there are three
elements: the message, the delivery, and the form.
We’re focusing today on form—slides on the
screen. We’ll begin with two general principles of
design. . . .
The first is simplicity. . . a good principle for visual
design, for teaching and learning, and for life in
general. We process images more directly and
more efficiently than we do text. So when we
combine text and images, less is more. We want
clarity, grace, and balance.

One way to create simplicity is through the Signal-
to-Noise Ratio (SNR). The goal is to have the
highest signal-to-noise ratio possible. The better
the signal the less noise; the less noise the clearer
the signal. Cut out the non-essentials from the
background.
Here’s an example of fairly high noise, low signal.
One problem is that we lose some of the letters
against the yellow of the strap.
Another version: the opacity of the photograph has
been scaled back to 40% and the text size has been
expanded. It’s not ideal but it’s an improvement.

By contrast here is a typical death-by-PowerPoint
slide, jammed full of information that mostly just
confuses people. Noise is anything in
communication that interferes with understanding
the message. It could be the color of the headline,
the background (what does the Golden Gate Bridge
have to do with this?), or the columns of text that
we have to read through. The goal is to have the
highest signal-to-noise ratio possible in your
Another example of screaming noise on a slide.
Here’s a chart with all the bells and whistles—full
3-D images, a grid of numbers, shadows,
reflections, a fancy piece of work.
And potentially confusing.
Lots of noise, not much signal.

We’ve simplified it by using 2-D bars, dropping the grid,
highlighting the title and bringing out the numbers. A lot more
signal, a lot less noise. . . But there’s still something confusing
about this slide. What is it? There’s no discernible order. It
doesn’t descend from greater to lesser nor is it alphabetical by
country. We try to find a pattern that makes sense and we can’t.
And that introduces subtle noise into the slide.
Here is more clarity, more signal, less noise. We
want to highlight Japan’s low rate of obesity: why
not descend from greater to lesser and bring the
low rate to our attention by using color and
shading to distinguish between the best and the
others? High signal, lower noise. . .

The second general principle is the use of empty
space, also called negative space or white space.
The urge to fill all the space on a slide with
information may be overwhelming—but resist!
Empty space in a design is not “nothing.” It’s a
“something” that gives your slides elegance and
power. Think of it as your conscious canvas for the
imagination.

An example of the use of white space and contrast through
color. This fact is taken from Harper’s Index, Harpers Magazine.
February, 2009, 13.

In any presentation there are three essential
elements—the slides, your notes, and the
handouts. The notes are there to support you when
you need them and using handouts means you
don’t have to load your slides up with text—and
your audience can relax and pay more attention to
the combination of words and pictures.
So with our two general principles in mind—
simplicity and the use of empty space. . .
—I want to talk about designing effective slides.
I’m going to give you five elements you can use to
design your presentations.

Contrast, alignment, flow, proximity, and hierarchy
—each have something to add to our slides. I’ll be
flipping fairly quickly through examples of each to
give you some idea of how they can be used.
Contrast simply means difference. And we notice
differences, even the smallest ones. Contrast is one
of the most powerful design elements because
almost anything can be contrasted with something
else.
So . . . here are some ways we can draw contrast in
our slides.

An example of contrast using size and shade.
Another example of contrast using color, size, and
shade.

Another example of using contrast. I reduced the opacity of the
image so the text would have more prominence. Taken from
Cox-Foster, Diana and vanEngelsdorp, Dennis. “Saving the
Honeybee.” Scientific American, April, 2009, p. 44.
A second tool is alignment—connecting elements
on a slide. Nothing should look like it was dropped
or placed there randomly. The eye tries to make
the connections and quickly sees things that are
out of line.
One way to ensure good alignment is through the
use of grids, a practice that is fundamental in good
design. A common pattern is a three-column grid,
although four-column and even five-column grids
can be used.

As Nancy Duarte says, “A grid system provides a
flexible way to organize content.” After you sketch
it out on paper a few times you can learn to eyeball
it on the slide surface.
The “rule of thirds” is derived from photography
and is used to compose and frame shots.
Viewfinders often have a built-in grid which allows
the photographer to place the subject off-center
but in relation to other objects within the shot.
Grids give you more options for placement while
achieving balance and creating a clear flow and
point of focus.
Since the figure dominates we can build the slide
by adjusting the text blocks in relation to the
figure. And a simple 3-column grid allows us to
play around with the text until we get the flow and
balance we want.

Grids also give us some constraints to work within.
Pushing the 30/5 up the slide, for example, creates
a natural triangle between that block, the leaper,
and the text block at the bottom. Without the grid
that placement might be much more random and
more confusing.
Flow is about arranging the information on a slide
in the order that you want it to be processed. In the
West we generally read from left to right, top to
bottom. You can direct the eye to process the
information by the way that you organize the
elements on the slide.

Normally, we read in the Z pattern we see here.
Like this. . . . But if our eyes are drawn by
contrasting shapes, sizes, light sources and so on,
we may break out of this pattern. If you want your
audience to break the pattern then arrange the
elements so that it’s clearly a feature and not a
mistake.
So by placement and contrast you can reverse the
usual flow. . . .

Like this.
Another guideline in the concept of flow is that you
don’t position someone walking out of a slide or
away from the text. It’s a way of focusing and
intensifying the impact of the message.
But occasionally it’s good to break the rules.
Normally, we’d expect the man to be walking into
the frame.

—like this.
But here the relationship of the text to the image
of the man suggests something else—a subtext to
the words of the title. We can suggest through
positioning that audiences must be persuaded,
their attention must be captured and kept.
The principle of proximity says that we group
related objects together so they’ll be perceived as a
group and not as unrelated elements. I’m going to
combine this principle with our final one,
Hierarchy, to show how this works in designing a
slide.

Hierarchy defines the relationship of the elements.
Proximity pulls them together: hierarchy defines
how they get along. A useful metaphor here is that
of parent to child. Every element in a hierarchy is
the child of the element above it or the parent of
the one below it.
The parent dominates. . . .
Everyone is equal. . .

Or there are differences. . . .
We can see this clearly when we look at a title slide.
There’s not much here to catch the eye nor to tell
us which is the most important information. We’re
seeing four elements that seem to have no clear
relation to each other. Let’s see how the principles
of Hierarchy and Proximity can clarify the message.
Here there is a separation between the elements;
now they’re clustered in three blocks, two text
blocks and the logo, and there is contrast of size
and shade.

More changes. . . . The text blocks are aligned to
the right instead of centered to give it movement
and asymmetry. We’ve created some interest by
increasing the size of the headline and using
shading to distinguish one word—clarity.
The final version: a deep contrast between the
background fill and the text. Again, we’ve used
asymmetry, shading, and one touch of color in the
bottom right—the exit point for the eye flow. This
is a more interesting and effective slide; the use of
proximity and hierarchy has made it easy to
comprehend.
So those are the elements in composing a slide. A
quick review of the principles and the elements . . .

I want to acknowledge and recommend the work of
four authors and their books. All of these books
are beautifully designed, well-written, and should
be in the library of anyone who creates visual
presentations.
These are two places online that have slide illustrations. You
pay a fee per slide at iStockphoto.com but slides from
Morguefile.com are free. There are many other sites for slides
but these are two that I’ve had good experience with.
So those are some of the ways you can create
clarity in your presentations. Think visually. . .
show us your story!