Cultural Color Infographic
The Cultural Color Study examines the relationship between color perception and cultural experience through the analysis of existing research and new user research.
Role: Product Designer
Duration: January 2018 - April 2018
Team: 1 Product Designer
Client: Rochester Institute of Technology
OVERVIEW
I began cultural color theory research for my thesis, gathering information to learn more about cultural impacts of color perceptions. This infographic takes initial research for my thesis and manifests itself as a piece of informational marketing to gather more user research on the subject.
PROBLEM
As a design student, I used multiple online color palette pickers to decide how I was going to approach color in my projects. But I wasn't sure how specific user groups viewed color. The problem was, I could only find color palette generators that were based on color theory or accessibility.
Designers don't have an application in place to help them easily identify the perception of colors from a holistic perspective- theoretically, accessibility, and culturally/psychologically.
TARGET USERS
This infographic was made to find my target users for the color application that I wanted to make. The target infographic was presented at IMAGINE RIT to a group of users 7-65 years old, with a diverse background of socioeconomic statuses and demographics, all with an underlying interest in technology and creativity. This user group also had a large percentage of artists and designers- people whose creations are impacted by cultural color theory.
GOAL
My goal with the creation of this infographic was to educate users and designers about cultural color perceptions, along with influencing them to take the survey I created. This survey would give me information to identify user groups to study for creating my cultural color application.
STRATEGY
My strategy was to create something captivating by revealing unexpected knowledge and using engaging visual design. I used conversation to draw users in. I spoke about how color changes how we internalize our environments and designs, then presented the proof with my infographic. After an explanation, with a length of conversation that fit each user, I proctored the survey and guided them through it depending on their questions or need for assistance. This would ensure user education along with engagement in the survey.
RESEARCH ANALYSIS
SURVEY QUESTIONS
CONCEPT
The concept I developed for people to take interest in participating in the survey, was to create an infographic that captured their attention with surprising information and captivating visuals. I sorted through my research on cultural color and found a study that perfectly summarized the impact of cultural color perception to both designers and those interested in design/technology/creativity (my target user group at IMAGINE RIT). This study showed that not only non-designers but designers were biased towards colors depending on their personal experiences, even when they attended the same design school. Teaching people color theory doesn't mean that they can erase their personal experiences with color.
INFORMATION DESIGN
I chose to take a storybook approach to organize the information in the most digestible way possible. I used short sentences and phrases, made it easy to understand with the imagery, and had a beginning, climax, and end. And then I gave the user an opportunity to take action. The flow between the information was linear, fluid, and intuitive, up to down, left to right. Information that was closely connected were close in proximity or together in a miniature diagram to digest as one entity. Only information that was necessary was included visually or through text, there was nothing extraneous or without purpose.
CHALLENGES
INSIGHTS
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