Marcia Lausen Lecture

Marcia Lausen came to Towson University to talk to us about election design and what she's doing to change it. I learned so much from listening to her speak. What struck me as the most interesting part of her lecture was in the beginning where she talked about text and how making small changes to it can make a huge difference in how something is read. For example, she showed us a ballot she redesigned with lower case letters which were more legible than the older example with all caps which formed hard to read rectangular shapes.

Another example she gave was how center type is being eliminated because it is too decorative. We read left to right and usually when we are creating something we want the reader to be able to decipher quickly what is written. So the redesign that Marcia made was to change text from center to flush left.

A third example I found to be interesting was that she said to keep font size, weight and any other variations to a minimum. I would have thought that lots of variation would be more exciting, but when she showed an example of complicated versus simple, the simple was much clearer.

I was surprised to hear that the most important information on a design needs to be black. My first instinct tells me to put important information in red or a bright color to catch the viewer's attention. However, she showed us how black is the most legible and pops off the page unlike any other color.

I am in the process of designing business cards for myself right now and this lecture came at a perfect time. The information I learned from Marcia has helped to completely change and improve my design.