Website Organization
a well-organized website can improve navigation, user experience, search engine optimization, and clarity of information, all of which can lead to more engagement, higher conversions, and better overall performance for the website.
Chunking Content
The article I chose to look at in regards to chunking was That's Not My Burnout by Donna Bungard. Although I didn’t read much of the article it was apparent to me how much chunking affected the article in terms of layout. Before reading this I knew about chunking and breaks, but I didn’t know they were this significant and should be critical when working on a project on the web or when using type in general. In web design it is important to consider how breaks and chunking for grouping different elements of text or images can go a long way. Presentation is one of the most important elements of design and chunking affects the presentation of almost any project.
In the article I was reading titled How Chunking Helps Content Processing by Kate Moran it mentions the many ways chunking can be effective. One of the ways mentioned was chunking content into 7 groups whether it be text or other image like content. This is because it is easier for the viewer to remember and retain the information. If you have information just thrown at the viewer in large unorganized blocks they won’t remember anything. That is why it is important to be organized and chunk your content accordingly. Sometimes the less information you have in a single chunk the better. Organization is one of the most important things in design and leaving white space allows for it. White space and chunking allows you to separate your content in terms of topic and importance, as well as give the viewer's eye a rest between reading or looking at images.
In the article I chose it explained that chunking was not only used to separate images as well as paragraphs, but it was also used with lists unordered and ordered. Chunking with lists can be extremely important in terms of presenting the viewer with important and memorable information. When organizing a list it is important to break with paragraphs at the top and bottom of the list also indenting can help with the appearance. Organization of a list revolves around chunking, but also not overwhelming the viewer with an abundance of bullet points.
Overall it is clear how something simple like chunking can affect how much a viewer remembers from looking at your writing piece or project. When a project is properly chunked and well organized there is a better chance the viewer stays focused on the content you are trying to get across to them. In the past I feel that I haven’t been the best at chunking in some of my projects. So in the future I think I will focus more on chunking and how it can affect my projects in design. Whether I am working on a design poster or website, I will need to allow for a larger amount of white space so I can better organize my projects.
Consistency is extremely important in responsive design as it allows for an appealing website to look at. This means staying consistent with layout as well as shapes sizes and fonts throughout the entirety of the website.
Compatibility is important when visiting a website on different devices or using different screen sizes. You want to make sure your website looks appropriate on tablets, computers, and phones and does not look nice on one and clunky on others
White Space is critical for allowing viewers to rest their eyes after looking at some of your important content. This means not overwhelming the viewer with large blocks of information. Keep your website chunked properly.
Image Optimization is important so your website does not take too long to load. Large images on a webpage can take time that is why it is important to plan out and optimize your images properly
Functioning Menus and Navigation are the key to a fluent and well functioning website. This will allow your user to access all of your content effectively. Accessibility is one of the most important factors on the web and in design.
This week I looked into images as well as how they can be implemented into a website when different screen sizes are being used. To start off it is important to know the screen sizes you could be dealing with. Most of the time you will have one layout for a computer or tablet and another for a phone. When doing this it is important to choose images that are not too large so that the mobile view is not overwhelming or parts of the image are cut off. A solution to this is to resize and crop an image in photoshop to fit the size of your screen. Screensets are also another solution to this problem like I mentioned before where you can have two or even three different layouts of your website to fit what you want to accomplish for each different screen size. Overall these are important concepts to consider when coding your website and using responsive images. The last thing you want is a website that is not compatible on many different devices due to screen size.
After looking at flexbox and looking at some of the different things you can do with a flexbox site I can say that one of the abilities I will most definitely use in projects in the future will be justify content. With images I think justify content allows not only for the proper alignment based on what you are trying to accomplish, but it also allows for some extra space which can be critical in web design. After reading the assigned article I learned about some of the code you can implement into your site as well as some of the outcomes or visual elements of that code. With justified content you can align left, right, or center and even apply proper spacing from image to image so that there is white space and so your site looks even. Overall this is an important quality or tool to know so that you can create a site that is eye appealing on all devices and so that images are not too overwhelming.
After reading the article on the history of web design and some web design tools I found it very interesting. One thing I learned in particular that stood out to me was how much of an influence grids have had on layouts over the years and how CSS started from numeric logs to having line names with much more complex templates. I think it is truly amazing how much technology and ways of thinking have evolved and become so much more complex. With CSS it is amazing to see how much more you can do with web design in general. Overall with grids it is interesting to see how developers started with single grid systems and then moved to more complex systems with subgrids to develop CSS even further. Lastly it was an interesting point they mentioned earlier in the article on how much grid systems are used outside of CSS. Oftentimes we forget how grids are used all the time since the industrial revolution with maps and other forms of planning.