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Health Sciences Multimedia

Steps to Using Visual Resources

Check to see whether the resource can be used for your purposes (Licensing, Citation) 

  • Usually in the description on the research guide page, stated clearly on the resource website itself, in the FAQ, in a section about license, or in the terms and conditions section of the resource 

  • If you have further questions about the legality of using a resource, contact: qcopy@queensu.ca  

Double check the terms and conditions 

Determine how to cite resources 

  • Usually, websites will offer guidance on how to cite images from them 

  • If not see the Queen's Library Citing and Citation Managers research guide 

Use Titles, Labels, and Legends  

  • Make it clear what each part of your image represents 

  • It may be good to have the same information in a written form somewhere else 

  • Sense of scale (or acknowledgement that something is not to scale) is important 

  • What is obvious to you is not obvious to outside viewers 

Aim for Accessibility 

  • Try to choose/create images with colour shades/patterns/contrasts so that people with colour blindness can still easily differentiate text from background and perceive other information

  • One way to test your images is to temporarily turn on colour filters on your computer:

Windows:

  1. Press Windows and I key (or go to settings) 
  2. Go to Ease of Access 
  3. Turn on colour filters 
  4. Try viewing your image while using different settings based on different forms of colour blindness and grayscale 

Mac:

  1. Go to the menu 
  2. Go to System Preferences 
  3. Go to Accessibility 
  4. Go to Display 
  5. Enable Colour Filters 
  6. Add labels to differentiate parts of an image 
  7. Make image descriptions/alt text for images you show 
    • Some programs will automatically generate image descriptions, but check these for accuracy 

  8. More information on accessibility can be found here: Design and Develop Overview | Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) | W3C 

 

Better: Color with Additional Cues, Two donut graphs with the same information but one is coloured to simulate normal vision and the other to simulate deuteranopia, a type of colour blindness. In both of these images, slices of each graph are labelled with one of the following labels: shopping; health; auto; food; bills; home. There are also small white spaces between each slice so it is easy to see where each slice ends.

(Crux Collaborative, n.d.) 

References

Crux Collaborative (n.d.) Better Cart Design Example [Inforgraphic] Crux Collaborative. https://cruxcollaborative.com/insights/understanding-color-blindness-guide-to-accessible-design