Making Sense - blog

Retail packaging for a new healthcare product

2012-12-14T14:36:00.004+00:00

We’ve been working with Leeds-based Advaskin, developing branding and packaging for a new pharmaceutical product, Sedigel.

Sedigel is a new scalp preparation that helps to reduce irritation and itching - our brief was to develop packaging that would allow it to share shelf space with other products in the retail healthcare sector.

The first part of our development process was to find out what was already on the market. We spent time visiting supermarkets and chemists examining and photographing similar products and getting a feel for their branding and packaging.

Positioning the design of a retail package is a tightrope act - trying to make it recognisable and distinct, whilst also placing it within a recognisable sector of products. To exactly mimic a competitor would just be to rip it off; to produce something radically different from the rest of the sector would risk confusing customers and damaging sales.

So is our Sedigel packaging just copycat design? I don't think so - our design gives visual reinforcement that Sedigel is a clinical product, and also provides a recognisable identity that can be implemented as necessary.

Touch-screen interfaces

2012-12-14T14:12:00.000+00:00

We’ve been doing some interesting work with digital information specialists Savience, developing new visual interfaces for their clinic management systems.

The first system we looked at was a touch-screen self-service check in system designed for hospital clinics.

Key to this project was breaking down the content into manageable chunks so users weren’t faced with too much information at any one time. Screens needed to follow in a logical order with clear navigation. The right information in the right place at the right time.

To test our designs out we used an iPad with the different screens set up as active Keynote pages - a relatively quick and simple way of seeing how users behaved.

The finalised interface has now gone live in hospitals across the country, with impressive results. In one location the use by patients increased more than doubled in a three month period.

Instructions for Use

2012-10-14T15:11:00.000+01:00

Anyone who has ever been to IKEA will have an opinion about Instructions for Use. Some are better than others.

We’ve seen a steady growth in the number of Instructions for Use ‘IFU’ documents we’ve been asked to produce for medical devices. We like IFUs - they give us chance to flex our illustrative muscles, and they fit perfectly with our expertise in making information clear.

There’s lots of interesting psychology in instructional design - certainly enough for a PhD or two - but what we’re interested in is presenting the right information at the right time. Not too much, not too little - illustration decisions are as much about what to leave out as what to include.

It’s for this reason that we prefer to use illustrations rather than photographs because it give us scope to take out anything that's not relevant - we want readers to be able to concentrate on what they're trying to do. Also we get to have fun adding arrows, speech bubbles, pull-outs, cut-outs and all those other tools in the designer’s box of tricks.

All our IFU work goes through formal user-testing, because however pleased we might be with our designs, the measure of their success is whether people can actually use them to carry out tasks.

Testing the QRD Template for patient information leaflets

2011-05-11T17:01:00.001+01:00

All pharmaceutical patient information leaflets in the EU have to undergo formal user testing, underpinned by the Quality Review of Documents (QRD) template - ironically, this document has never undergone user testing itself.

Last year Mark Gibson of the Gibson Research Consultancy put the template through formal testing - he has just released his report here. [PDF]

Taiwan in paper form

2011-05-10T10:47:00.003+01:00

Beautiful paper-folded infographics from Taiwanese designer Tien Min Liao [Anna]

Corporate Diversity

2011-05-09T14:31:00.001+01:00

Another beautiful book just arrived from Amazon - Corporate Diversity - Swiss graphic design by Geigy 1940-1970. Lovely stuff. [Brian]

Folding Techniques for Designers: From Sheet to Form

2011-05-06T11:33:00.007+01:00

My lovely new book, Folding Techniques for Designers: From Sheet to Form by Paul Jackson, has just arrived fresh off the press! Very much looking forward to doing some folding... [Anna]

ISOTYPE at the V&A

2011-03-16T09:35:00.001+00:00

I spent a couple of days in London last week and took the opportunity to visit the V&A, which is currently hosting an exhibition about ISOTYPE.
The International System of TYpographic Picture Education was developed in the 1930s as a way of visualising information and can be seen as the forerunner of the information graphics we're used to seeing today.
One of the most interesting graphics for me was a 1950 diagram of the organisation of the NHS - it shows a surprising number of health services under the control of local borough councils, including what might be regarded as public health. Plus ça change. B

Florence Nightingale, datajournalist

2010-08-14T21:35:00.000+01:00

Nice piece in the Guardian yesterday about one of my information design heroes - Florence Nightingale - information has always been beautiful

New work on makingsense.co.uk

2010-08-12T13:56:00.005+01:00

To coincide with our move to the Workstation, we've updated our website and added new work to the portfolio pages. View the new projects at:
http://www.makingsense.co.uk/portfolio

iStockphoto.com revamped

2010-08-12T13:33:00.003+01:00

I like what they've done with the new iStock Photo website - the site feels a lot more professional, with a much nicer search and navigation layout.

2010-08-12T12:44:00.007+01:00

Today we've been putting books into boxes - getting ready for the big move...

Sentence spacing - Wikipedia

2010-08-04T09:32:00.000+01:00

Wikipedia's page of the day today is about sentence spacing, which appeals to the typographic geek in me. Loads of references to look at, but one quote caught my eye:

Hallahan 2009. "During times when many disciplines that recommend the APA's Publication Manual [6th ed., 2009] are advocating evidence-based decisions, it's noteworthy, we think, that these discussions of the rationale for using two spaces at the end of sentences (and after colons) do not appear to be based on scientific examination of the hypothesis that two spaces makes manuscripts more readable."

So perhaps the decision to use two spaces rather than one is based on subjective preference rather than an objective improvement in legibility. I admit to using two spaces occasionally in emails to help break up the text.

Making Sense are moving!

2010-08-02T13:49:00.005+01:00

After six successful years in our studio, Making Sense is making the exciting leap to new premises in the centre of Sheffield.

As from Tuesday 17th August 2010, we will be based at the Workstation - home to many of Sheffield's creative companies. We're extremely excited about the new start and look forward to being involved in all that the area offers.

View Larger Map

The Sign Painter Movie

2010-07-28T19:40:00.000+01:00

The Sign Painter movie is currently in Production as of March 2010. This documentary is about sign painters in America. Those who were and still are walking the streets and using their talent to get a message across. You see their work daily on windows, sandwich-boards, boats, cars, billboards, in businesses, playgrounds, farmers markets and even theme parks to name a handful of spots.

A New Subway Map for New York

2010-06-20T23:53:00.003+01:00

Back in 2004 I pointed to an article about the design of New York's subway map. Interesting to see that the map has just undergone a few changes and a bit of a clean up - there a nice piece in the New York Times with some great before-and after comparisons, including Vignelli's Beck-like diagrammatic interpretation.

Hand-drawn maps

2010-05-05T13:47:00.000+01:00

Maps have always held a great fascination for me. I love the idea that from from a few marks on a piece of paper we can gain so much knowledge about a place.

The really interesting part is when we start to mess around with the objective representation of a scene in order to hightlight the information we're trying to impart.

There are some great hand drawn maps here showing how people have whittled away unnecessary information, stretched and squeezed scales, added error checking information, all in order to produce maps tailored to specific tasks.

Health Information Design - David Sless

2010-02-23T08:48:00.011+00:00

Coventry University run a number of guest lectures as part of the of their MA Health Communication Design course.

Here we see David Sless speaking about his work with the Communication Research Institute, and about how his research impacts on the development of effective health communications.

I can certainly see the value of David's design process - scoping - benchmarking - prototyping - testing - refining - implementing - monitoring - I just need to persuade a client to pay for it.

A new visual language for the BBC

2010-02-21T10:08:00.003+00:00

In the 12 years or so that the BBC has had a web presence, their online identity has seen quite a few changes. There's a fascinating article on the BBC blog about the ongoing development of its next iteration.

Particularly appealing to me is the braver use of typography - big, bold and clear - taking the most accessible parts of print design and taking them online. Clean, clear, modern, accessible, beautiful. Love it. I feel quite inspired.

NHS design for real improvements

2010-02-17T10:39:00.001+00:00

There's a nice piece on the Guardian website today about design in the NHS.

A new breed of designers have realised they can do more than the glossy consumer-brand work that might have otherwise filled their portfolios. They are bolstering their optimism, creativity and visualisation skills with a whole host of human-centred techniques unique to public sector design.

And a reminder that design needs to be able to demonstrate real-world improvements in outcomes.

For designers to succeed in the NHS, they need to be numbers-savvy or to work with others who are. They also need to balance the benefits of patient experience against the goals of better clinical care at a reduced cost to the taxpayer.

Our overriding ethos here at Making Sense is definitely in line with this - producing effective, cost-effective work that really makes a difference. All of our pharma work and much of our NHS material goes through user-testing before being released so we can be confident that people can actually read our documents and find and understand the information they want.

Margaret Calvert on Top Gear

2010-01-06T11:53:00.002+00:00

Two of the greatest heroes of modern day information design must surely be Jock Kinnear and Margaret Calvert, who designed the system of road signs we see everyday.

Margaret featured in Top Gear this week (catch it on BBC iPlayer while it lasts - 44 minutes in).

There's a better radio interview from the Today programme at 8.48 here

Using design to get readers reading

2009-12-14T08:55:00.003+00:00

Of all the design books on my shelf, the most well-thumbed is Karen Schriver's Dynamics in Document Design, which covers a huge range of issues relating to producing readable documents.

Karen is interviewed in this podcast on Health Literacy Out Loud. Well worth a listen.

We've signed up to 10:10

2009-11-06T16:04:00.015+00:00

Making Sense has signed up to 10:10 which means we've pledged to cut our emissions by 3%... starting by turning off that light, putting less water in the kettle and using Sheffield's lovely public transport whenever possible.

We're trying to spread the word so please have a look at www.1010uk.org. It's worth it if only for the very nice website.

Readability testing of information

2009-10-28T18:22:00.005+00:00

Performance-based readability testing of participant information for a Phase 3 IVF trial

Peter Knapp¹ , DK Raynor¹ , Jonathan Silcock¹ and Brian Parkinson²
1 School of Healthcare, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
2 Making Sense Design, Sheffield, UK

Research project looking at how the performance of an information sheet can be improved by rewriting and redesigning.

Conclusion

User Testing can allow information to be evaluated in a structured way. When it is combined with expertise in writing for patients and information design, it may result in a greater proportion of patients being able to understand what will happen within a trial.

Not only would this impact on the extent to which valid consent is given, but it may also impact on the smooth running of the trial, with participants knowing where and when to take medicines, return for tests, etc. Increasingly potential participants have been involved in the development of trial materials, often resulting in the materials being altered substantively. The great strength of performance-based testing is that it allows confirmation (or otherwise) that such changes will be of benefit to participants.

Particularly pleasing (and a great relief) to see my redesign performing so much better than the original.

Man in Pink

2009-09-26T19:01:00.000+01:00

Proof that I'm a warm human being. Caught on a heat imaging camera at the National Media Museum in Bradford.