Audience / Purpose:
My primary audience for this infographic are parent's who have children. Perhaps their children have been begging them to get a pet, but feel that they are too big a responsibility in their busy lives. Considering the bundles of energy that is a kitten or puppy, this is an understandable sentiment. However, this situation offers a unique opportunity to support the adoption of an older cat, who are often overlooked and eventually euthanized. Many people do not realize the extent of animal euthanasia, which is especially prominent for cats since there exists many strays. So, my purpose is to inform this audience why senior cat adoption is a suitable option for their circumstance while simultaneously spreading awareness of euthanasia.
Image:
I've created an infographic in order to convey the benefits of adopting a senior cat. The graphic has 3 main sections which all note some advantage of older cats. Each relating point is grouped in a similar section so that the information is provided in a sensible way. Provided in each section is some imagery which corresponds to each section. The first of which depicts a cat behind some metal bars, which is trying to invoke a feeling of pity. This particular image features an older cat to align with my purpose. For the section about independence and maturity, I placed some cat paw prints in a path. This is meant to show that cats generally "walk their own path", that is, they are capable on their own. Lastly, in the same style as the first, I have a silly older cat laying with its stomach exposed and paws up, which I think is a very cute position, especially seeing from an older cat. This is meant to show the quirky and harmless personalities that most cats have, even if they are older.
Process:
As a foundation for the infographic, I used the shape builder tool to create a rectangle to act as its own background. Next, I knew I wanted a few different sections, so I used the pen tool to draw straight lines. Then, I chose a font that I thought looked easy to read and placed large bold titles to outline each section. To make the first image, I image-traced the cat picture with the 16-color option, adjusted the prominent colors, then finally masked it with a circle object I drew over it. This same procedure was done with the last image as well. I thought the circle masking would be better than having a rectangular image since the infographic already had many sharp edges. Lastly, I found paw prints online, vectorized them, then placed them in a line, altering their orientation to add variety.
Learning: I found that illustrator was a very interesting but frustrating program to learn. It felt like tools would be locked for no reason, although I know this is just from my lack of understanding of some of the tools. Despite this, illustrator still could be very flexible at times. In terms of myself, I actually did some research on euthanasia statistics for cats, and was actually unaware myself of the high rates.
Next:
I plan on thinking of my idea for the project early. Although I said this for my last project, the pacing of this project was much quicker and I didn't anticipate it. I need to focus more about ideas itself and worry about how the program works later, since I waited to long to feel out illustrator this time around.