While it’s easy to jump towards the idea that there is a big difference when it comes to print based documents and web based documents, they are far more alike than different. In general, when it comes to designing a document, there are a few major ideas that the writer should adhere to. Park mentions a few including an intuitive reading process, emphasis on the most important areas, consistency, and focus. For both digital and print texts, the design of the paper can play just as large of a role as the material within it. This seems like a backwards policy, but it’s very similar to the idea of politics. If a president running for office was always well put together, and spoke in a way that that captured and held the listeners attention, one would be much more willing to look past some flaws in the candidate’s ideals than if the candidate did the opposite. The same goes for digital and printed texts. When I open a website or a book looking for information, if the design is boring or hard to read I will often try another site or, in the case of a printed text, I would just google it. While they may differ on specific things because of their general functionality, digital and printed texts need to be aware of the same general design guidelines.
The idea of accessibility, while it may be very similar to proper design, has a few aspects that make it a standalone issue that every writer needs to address. For most writing, these concepts go hand in hand. A properly designed text, for example, should be easily accessible for all readers. This is because one of the major ideas within design is an “intuitive” reading process. Therefore, accessibility should be a consequence of design. It should not, however, be the other way around. If a writer writes the paper to be solely accessible, they can easily make major design flaws that hinder the documents effectiveness. For example, if a company put out an ad for their indoor trampoline park, but only focused on the organization of the material, the ad would become boring. While it would be easy for the parents to find the information they need, it would be lacking when it comes to grabbing their attention. If the company were to focus on design first and made it fun and exciting, they could then adjust it later to also be easily accessible.
When it comes to overall design and accessibility, the idea of color playing a large part in the texts success seems a little weird. When it comes down to it, however, the choice in color can have an immense effect on how the piece is received. One of the major challenges with this that isn’t found with other aspects of design is that color can change heavily depending on its source. For example, when color is used on a digit document, a certain color combination may work perfectly on the screen its being created on but, once it is opened on a different screen, it may clash heavily. Because of this, a writer needs to be careful with their use of color throughout the document to ensure that it is accessible to anyone regardless of the platform its being viewed on.
When it comes to creating the final document, there are numerous things the writer needs to be cognizant of in order to produce a graphically successful piece. Each piece needs to work together to ensure a good reception for the document because if anything is off, even if a color scheme is slightly clashing, it could ruin the document in the readers mind.
I would like to build off of when you started to discuss the weirdness of color playing a large role. I would like to heavily disagree, because when I think about looking at something (document, presentation, ad, pamphlet, etcetera) color is always what catches my eye first. I fine that color can craft and manipulate viewer’s feelings to different types of media. For example the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), whenever I see one of their commercials the color scheme they use is always soft and inviting because they want to invite you in and present all these horrible things that happen to animals every day in this world. Their goal is to bring you in delicately to really make you connect to the animals, which with a loud flashy color approach would not be as effective. On the other side of things, whenever I get a flyer for some club, party, or bar they come out bold and flashy because their goal of the flyer to get in your face and draw you in through the sense of excitement. However, if they took a softer approach to promoting a loud, fun, party-filled environment the effectiveness would suffer. Concluding, I really do think color and design of a media piece can debatably be considering more important than what is actually written or the message that is trying to get across. If the design docent bring in viewers, that makes the accessibility much lower, and in turn will not get the information across.
I could not agree more with your points when it comes to designing a document. Especially when you say, “For both digital and print texts, the design of the paper can play just as large of a role as the material within it.” Anytime I am looking for information online, if it is difficult to follow the authors layout, I will search for a different site. I think Park has a good example of this in the advertising section. The original airfare shows a dark photo of a plane which is not very attractive, but the redesign shows a better photo with easier readable text. I would be more intrigued to look at the redesign advertisement.
Your trampoline example brings up good points. A company first needs to rely on the information they are putting out to the public, and can then focus on how to make that information accessible and easy to follow. This can be down by some of the tips and tools from the NCDAE website.
I agree with you on your view about colors clashing. Some websites or even brochures that add to many color schemes together make it hard to read or even give me a headache.