233 TIPS ON GRAPHICS AND VISUAL DESIGN Finding photos that suggest the mood you want to convey can help you decide on color schemes. Here, the soothing tones of the forest are contrasted with the intense energy of a volcano. If you are not bound by company branding standards, deciding on a color scheme can be challenging. A great way to take the guesswork out of choosing colors is to find a photo that expresses the mood you want to convey in your project. Forest and lake scenes have color palettes that are good for supporting calmness and stability, while firefighting scenes, explosions, or erupting volcanoes can provide colors that convey action, urgency, or danger. Pick only one or two dominant colors from the photo, combine them with a few neutral grays, browns, or blacks, and you should have a palette that supports your message. How do you match those colors? Most illustration, presentation, and eLearning development software includes a color picker, usually represented by an eyedropper icon. Another good option is stand-alone freeware color pickers. My favorite is Pixie by Nattyware, which will display the RGB or other values for customization of colors in whatever software you are using for development. Bob Joyce, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center Ask lots of questions about the desired goals and the experience of the desired outcome, and design to accomplish those in the fewest steps possible without compromising quality. Doug Belding, SweetRush Check your color scheme. How many colors are you using? You can use a tool like Adobe Kuler to create your color scheme before you begin working, and the tool helps you pick colors based on types of combinations (analogous, monochromatic, etc.). But if you still don’t love your color choices after using Kuler, pare it down even more and aim for three colors—a dark, a light, and an accent or highlight color. This will help your design look more cohesive. Breana Hidalgo, Pasco-Hernando State College Be careful in using SVG graphics with mobile devices. While the files are smaller in size, they require more processing power to render. The mobile processor is not as fast as a desktop. Phil Cowcill, Canada Department of National Defence 20 www.eLearningGuild.com