Analysing Wayfinding Boards

Board 1

Audiences: An easy way to approach this would be to lay both the wayfinding boards into comparison, at least when it comes to the audiences, thus, who has this bridge being made for? The unique thing to point out in relation to the other board is that this wayfinding pole has finger-like parts pointing/aligned in the direction of the location the finger/nameplate has been labelled with. What the direction alignment feature helps to do really well is to briskly provide the user with the right direction, as soon as they can find the name of their location on it, thus, it is for people who need just one thing, the right direction, and nothing more. Age-wise, taking what the material the pole was crafted from, and the design of the pole into consideration, it was made a while back, therefore, for a much older audience who most likely did not and probably still do not traverse the area with the aid of a GPS-enabled smartphone.

Colour: Albeit difficult to see now as this has been recently painted over, I believe the original colour of this wayfinding pole was black with gold highlightings - on the text bits, and lined around the nameplates. These are two contrasting colours, such that either day (with sunlight) or night (with fire lamps presumably and not street lights) should any user need the information provided by the pole, especially at night when there won't be anyone to ask around, and a quick need for information is optimal, the first thing that comes into their view would be the text linings telling the name of the locations, and the plate linings pointing out clearly which direction to go to, whilst the rest of it blends into the darkness, causing no difficulty to reading.

Typography: The image directly above has been enlarged for easy reference and as can be seen, the names have been written in the standard capital to small letter format, a format which has been claimed to be easier for people to read. As regards, leading, whilst still good, I'd argue it could use a bit more centimetres to create enough space for the other names on the same nameplate not to overlap into the focus of the viewer but it seems it was a choice between reduced leading and bigger text sizes or vice versa.

Special Consideration: There doesn't seem to be much consideration for persons with special needs incorporated into the design of this pole, at least none for the disabilities - blind or short-sighted, dyslexic and wheelchair-abled individuals. The sign is out of necessity quite high up with relatively small text that gets smaller to see with each inch increment in height. This would render it almost unreadable for the short-sighted, and because of the height difference of the wheelchair enabled, the texts become immediately drastically smaller, thus, almost unreadable too. There is no braille incorporated into the design as well to help the blind.

Sign Position: The situation of this pole I believe was factored into the design as the whole design structure relied on the nameplates being capable of pointing in the right directions clearly, without obstructions. The location is also more of an intersection of several directions, which means it has to be within that confined radius, making it perfect for the situation of a multidirectional wayfinding pole, as opposed to the other wayfinding board below which would work at a much larger radius.

Board 2

Audiences: There is a stark difference between this board and the one above in area covered, material, content and general design. This board has been designed primarily to act as an information hub and less as a way finder; way finding is a secondary attribute in the design of this piece. This basically means the user this was intended for wouldn't necessarily feel lost or helpless should they not have a good understanding of the directions given by this board. 

This is a board made recently, in the information age, for users who rely more on their GPS-enabled smartphones to locate places, all in one app (a what3words current location information can be found on the board), therefore, directional wayfinding boards are relatively redundant in this context.

Colour: Unlike the two colours world of the directional board above, this board has a lot more consideration for form and aesthetics and whilst still maintaining contrast, the selected colours were matched more to the information on each side of the board (green for animals - nature, and magenta for a lady), and less to improve the wayfinding characteristic.

Typography: Just like any large information-bearing media, the typography of the board has been laid out to ease the reader through the hierarchy of the structure (magazine-esque) - using a larger text size for the titles and subtitles, and reducing the contrast of the titles as well so they do not fight for attention should the reader decide to delve into the wealth of the main article-like bit of the board.

Special Consideration: Whilst it still doesn't cater for the blind or dyslexic, this board is alternately lower and closer to the eye level of most if not all, making it easier for almost anyone to access the information on it.

Sign Position: The situation of this board, being one to inform the audience and less to give directions, would work best where a lot of people can see it, and calmly view it, without getting in the ways of others which defines the current location of this board.