Visual Thinking

Visual Thinking brings the science of perception to the art of design. Designers increasingly need to present information in ways that aid their audience’s thinking process. Fortunately, results from the relatively new science of human visual perception provide valuable guidance.

In this book, Colin Ware takes what we now know about perception, cognition, and attention and transforms it into concrete advice that designers can directly apply. He demonstrates how designs can be considered as tools for cognition – extensions of the viewer’s brain in much the same way that a hammer is an extension of the user’s hand. The book includes hundreds of examples, many in the form of integrated text and full-color diagrams.

Experienced professional designers and students alike will learn how to maximize the power of the information tools they design for the people who use them.

• Presents visual thinking as a complex process that can be supported in every stage using specific design techniques
• Provides practical, task-oriented information for designers and software developers charged with design responsibilities
• Includes hundreds of examples, many in the form of integrated text and full-color diagrams
• Steeped in the principles of “active vision,” which views graphic designs as cognitive tools

Designers of all kinds, including professionals and students in information design, industrial design, interaction design, web design, and users of information visualization, who need practical guidance in visual and cognitive science in order to excel at their jobs—or future jobs.

VISUAL QUERIES The Apparatus and Process of Seeing The Act of Perception Bottom-Up Top-Down Implications for Design Nested Loops Distributed Cognition Conclusion

WHAT WE CAN EASILY SEE The Machinery of Low-Level Feature Analysis What Stands Out = What We Can Bias for Visual Search Strategies and Skills Using Multiscale Structure to Design for Search Conclusion

STRUCTURING TWO DIMENSIONAL SPACE 2.5D Space The Pattern-Processing Machinery The Binding Problem: Features to Contours The Generalized Contour Texture Regions Interference and Selective Tuning Patterns, Channels, and Attention Intermediate Patterns Pattern Learning Visual Pattern Queries and the Apprehendable Chunk Spatial Layout Horizontal and Vertical Pattern for Design Examples of Pattern Queries with Common Graphical Artifacts Semantic Pattern Mappings

COLOR The Color-Processing Machinery Opponent Process Theory Channel Properties Principles for Design Color-Coding Information Emphasis and Highlighting Color Sequences Color on Shaded Surfaces Semantics of Color Conclusion

GETTING THE INFORMATION: VISUAL SPACE AND TIME Depth Perception and Cue Theory 2.5D DESIGN Affordances The Where Pathway Artificial Interactive Spaces Space Traversal and Cognitive Costs Conclusion

VISUAL OBJECTS, WORDS, AND MEANING The Inferotemporal Cortex and the What Channel Generalized Views from Patterns Structured Objects Gist and Scene Perception Visual and Verbal Working Memory Thinking in Action: Receiving a Cup of Coffee Elaborations and Implications for Design Novelty Images as Symbols Meaning and Emotion Imagery and Desire Conclusion

VISUAL AND VERBAL NARRATIVE Visual Thinking Versus Language-Based Thinking Comparing and Contrasting the Verbal and Written Modes Linking Words and Images Through Diexis PowerPoint Presentations and Pointing Mirror Neurons: Copycat Cells Visual Narrative: Capturing the Cognitive Thread Cartoons and Narrative Diagrams Conclusion

CREATIVE META SEEING Mental Imagery The Magic of the Scribble Diagrams are Ideas Made Concrete Requirements and Early Design The Creative Design Loop Visual Skill Development Conclusion

THE DANCE OF MEANING Review Implications Design to Support Pattern Finding Optimizing the Cognitive Process Learning and the Economics of Cognition Attention and the Cognitive Thread What’s Next?