Infographics BALT 3318

 The last thing a reader/viewer wants to see is an infographic that is cluttered with paragraphs and statistics. Simplicity helps the message become clearer because the focus can be narrowed to sections rather than having "too much going on". Simplicity is how effectively the infographic is portrayed to the audience. My infographic using Hubspots template was a little too hectic with all sorts of data disorganized. I removed unnecessary labels and decided to keep only essential information/pictures.  This time, there is more writing than I truly want at the top half, but it is necessary for explanation. I think it now looks better due to the scope and focal points are more attractive. Also, I looked into venngage.com as an alternative source for creating infographics, and I think that this is the superior option. The interface is easy to use and it has some better features overall (ex. icon insertions/image lookup). Adding charts in Venngage is dramatically easier than Hubspo...

 When using data heavy infographics, it is essential to create charts or graphs to help the readers better visualize the message. Hubspot is a website that allows you to download templates for free to practice your skills. I decided to create an infographic in regards to plate discipline for Major League Baseball. Also, organization of your infographic is important to notice. Below you can see that I broke down major statistics, related them to teams with examples and revisited the statistics to emphasize my purpose. I decided to maintain a color scheme similar to the MLB logo with ideal stats in blue and poor stats in red sections. I would recommend practicing with a few of the free templates while trying to apply some key techniques in your infographic. Just like professional baseball players, repetition of skills is what will make your infographics progress in quality. 

Infographics are focused on the presentation of the necessary data/message. It is important to keep away from irrelevant statistics or unrelated topics of the focal point. This technique is called dashboarding. Each  piece of data used in the infographic should pertain to an objective. For example, wearing a mask may decrease person to person spread up to 75% which explains the need for that safety precaution.  There are three main kinds of dashboards starting with strategic, operational and analytical. Among the three, analytical is the most prominent due to the support of comparing data. Strategic and operational dashboards are highly functional, but have a main goal of monitoring trends.  One of the most interesting techniques I discovered was the use of color in your infographics. The more colors that you use may make the data more confusing to process for the audience. The best practice used for displaying key metrics in an infographic is by highlighting. Clearly est...

 Creating infographics does not necessarily require you to have knowledge and skills in design. Many companies hire someone to fulfill these needs in marketing/branding. Although, infographics can be used in a variety of different scenarios. Using infographics in your resume would certainly make it more unique and allows you to keep it as professional as possible with a little flare. Also, presenting data/research to colleagues and classmates is a great way to incorporate creative infographics.  I decided to test my own designing capabilities on canvas.com where I created an informal infographic about myself. Canva is a great tool because they have pre-existing templates to choose from so that you can assess which layout is most appropriate for your task. After you have a template, you can customize the content to exactly your liking whether it is color scheme or picture layout.  Below is my creation which summarizes my career to this point. I included some of my best acc...