Russell Warner — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 23:50:12 GMT

@Paul, Rebekah,

Don’t forget that there is no one single asthetic for all comics. Visual explanations are not in and of themselves “creative” or “juvenille”—they’ve been around longer than language! The real trick is ensuring that the visual aesthetic that you choose is one that matches your client’s business culture. The more hip companies can deal with comics that really look like comics, but anyone at even IBM or ChaseMorgan will appreciate elegant visual explanations. Just compare the visual style of Xplane [http://www.xplane.com/#/publications/] with Tufte [http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/fineart] and you’ll see what I mean.

Visual explanations (including comics) work because they are not as linear as language and don’t need as much processing. More dimensions of information can be made available to the viewer simultaneously and that can often mean the difference between an immediate understanding and more rounds of explanation. I actually at one time won a systems contract with a single piece of paper [http://www.troped.com/design/MBL002/index.html]. Simplicity is elegance.

Boxes and Arrows: Comments by Russell Warner