The "F" Shape Format

After having the work shop of IPD, I fully start recognizing and knowing the theories of "Readability" from the professor.

In a study, it shows how people will read through a web page. That is called the “F-shape” pattern (Nielsen, 2006). The shape of structure is normally like a letter "F". Firstly, most of readers read in horizontal tendency across the top part of article. Secondly, the readers jump and move down the page and read across in a second horizontal tendency. thirdly, the readers scan or read the content on left side in a vertical tendecny.

By my personal experience, I quickly scan the headline of an article firstly. Capturing pictures is my second step of my reading. If the headline and pictures are totally insterested, I would like to keep reading until the end.

Referemce:

Nielsen, J 2006, 'F-Shaped Pattern for Reading Web Content', Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox, April 17, <http://www.useit.com/alertbox/reading_pattern.html>, viewed 15 July 2008

Is this an successful design?

Today, I just pass by and get this election advertisement of one of the candidates of 2008 Legilative Council Elction of HKSAR.

Front

Back

From this election advetisement, or i should say it is a flyer, we can see that the design is quite different fromt some tradtional one. As more and more young eletors are concerning about their society, candidates now will need to pay more attention to this group of young people.

Let's look at the front of this flyer. The image is simple and outstanding. The candidiate picture is being shown at the middle of the flyer. On the other hand, the slogan is very eye-catching at the bottom. The color contrast of red and white can get people attention and highlighting the important message - the candidate name on the right and the fire (the energy) that the candidate shows.

At the back, it uses the main color - red as the background color with reverse white text. The information is clearly presented with headings and subheadings. According to Walsh (2006), "An important aspect of reading is prediction and both these headings invite the reader to predict, guess, imagine or question aspects".

Thus, I think this flyer is quite successful on the design and catching people's attention to read through it.