1. Introduction
This report describes the personal experience of drawing a front house view based on a house plan. It also compares the drawing and the original picture. After that, it discusses the importance for visual learning of the concept of pictorial genres, instructional pros and cons of using realism in visual representation, problems that specialised visual representations can pose for students, factors influencing the pathways that learners use to explore a complex picture and picture interpretation as a constructive, knowledge-driven process that is related to this drawing exercise.
2. Summary of the personal experience during the drawing activity
When I first looked at the plan, the first thing that came to my mind was how I could draw the front house view with a plan. The reason is the plan is a flat 2D view from the top of the house rather than from the front of the house. It shows not all the illustrations are the same even they represent the same subject matter.
Due to the level of viewing, I started to look at the plan from the left to the right which can be entirely different when someone else looked at the same plan. However, not all the parts of the plan caught the same amount of the attention. The reason is the exercise is to draw the front view of the house. As a result, I spent a lot more time on the rooms and areas in the front. In contrast, I spent very little time on those areas like kitchen, alfresco etc in the rear as I did not believe they were required for this exercise.
During the process of understanding the plan, I was constructing the relationships of all the graphic objects in my mind. For example, I was focus on the number of the rooms in the front, their orientation on the plan, the number of windows in each one of them, the front entrance and the verandah. It is a step by step process and take times and effort to complete.
Once I had the overall idea of the house, I started to draw my front view of the house. I started from the left to the right with “Bath”, adding one room after another until it got to the “Grand Room”. Then, I started to draw the side of the house a bit to show there was a garage.
In my opinion, the house plan is a specialised illustration which requires some special knowledge to interpret it correctly.

3. Comparison of my own drawing and the actual picture from the newspaper

My own drawing is pretty much outlined the front view of the house compared with the actual picture from the newspaper. However, there are a number of things are missing in my own drawing
• The colour of the house
• All the trees and the surrounding of the house
• The look and style of the front door
• The texture of the house like whether it is brick or weatherboard
• The feature on the roof
All these are not in my own drawing because they are not on the plan where I can gather those information. Unless I use my imagination, it is almost impossible to draw those features. Even with the imagination, the final drawing is likely completely different from the actual picture as everyone might have different opinions due to their past experience/exposure to the subject matter.
This exercise shows it might be possible to draw a front view of a house by using only a plan. However, the result can be different from the actual picture and many important features of the picture are going to be missed out.

4. Discussion of the following five dot-point issues related to the house drawing exercise
4.1The importance for visual learning of the concept of pictorial genres
Different types of pictorial genres give the viewers a distinctive way on the subject matter. For example, the picture of the front view of the house is a photograph while the plan of the house is a diagram. By looking at the photograph of the house, the viewer can easily see the shape, the colour and the texture (whether it is brick or weatherboard) of the house. However, the viewer cannot see the details of the house like the number of bedrooms, the number of bathrooms, the location of kitchen etc. The photograph of the front house view does not give the internal layout of the house. It shows the outside appearance of the house only.
On the other hand, the diagram of the house plan gives a very clear idea of the house internal layout. The viewer can easily see the location and relationship of all the rooms and areas. By looking at the plan, the viewer however cannot see the shape, the colour and the texture of the house.

This shows sometimes there is a need of using more than one type of pictorial genres for the viewers to build up the knowledge of the subject matter as different type of pictorial genres gives the viewers the subject knowledge in a different way. They can complement each other to achieve the effectiveness of the illustration learning.
4.2 Instructional pros and cons of using realism in visual representation
The advantages of using realism in visual representation in the house example are
• The viewers can see the house without being physically being in front of the house.
• The viewers can have good idea in terms of what the house looks like from the outside
The disadvantages of using realism in visual representations
• If the front house view photograph is chosen for the instructive purpose of showing the internal of the house, it is going to fail as it does not show any hidden details of the house like the number of rooms and the other fixtures inside the house
• The realism might bring the affective aspect of the illustration from the viewers but not necessary the cognitive aspect of the illustration. It does not necessary trigger the learners to think about what is behind the front view of the house

4.3 Problems that specialised visual representations can pose for students.
In this house drawing exercise, the plan is a kind of specialised visual representations. Unlike the photograph of the front house view where the viewer can easily recognise the house, it requires some subject knowledge to interpret the plan properly. For the viewers who have never view a house plan before, it can represent problems if he/she is asked to draw the front house view based on the plan.
There are a number of problems that specialised visual representation that can pose for the students
1. Where to start
The students with no exposure to house plan might have no idea where to start on the plan. However, this can apply to any type of illustration as there is no fix rule where to start (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 4-4). The domain specific knowledge might help where to start but this is not available to a domain novice.
2. What to look for
There are a number of objects on the plan but not necessary are important to the front house view drawing exercise. Some of the objects like the fixtures might actually disrupt the learners as they might waste the learners’ cognitive processing power on something that is irrelevant to the objective of the exercise. As the human visual system has limitation in terms of information processing, we have to consider the idea of cognitive load and its potential effects on learning from illustration. (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 24-25)
3. The meaning of the symbols on the plan
For example, we cannot assume someone who never read a house plan must know the symbol that represents the window in each room. Even though, most of the symbols for the fixtures are quite obvious but it can be dangerous to make the assumption that the learners must be able to interpret them correctly as the intention of the instructor.
4. Not “Instructional” on how to draw the front house view from the plan
In the plan, there are no intended instructions in terms of teaching the learners on how to construct front house view with it. Without the previous knowledge and experience, the learners are probably not able to complete this exercise. “Rather than assuming the picture representations are self-explanatory, the characteristics of each illustration used also needed to be considered in terms of the way they are likely to be processed by learners”. (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 2-27)
4.4 Factors influencing the pathways that learners use to explore a complex picture

“There is no generally agreed single location in pictures where the learner is expected to start the interpretation process.” (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 4-4).
1. Domain specific knowledge
Most of the times, the learners have very limited or none on the subject knowledge. As a result, they tend to relies on the perceptual effects by the illustration and their interpretation may be largely bottom-up. (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 4-5). For a novice learner who has never seen a house plan before, s/he relies heavily on the shape, orientation of the objects on the plan and the interpretation is likely based on those as no previous knowledge can be used.
2. The ability to distinguish the graphic entities in a picture
The learners need to distinguish the individual component entities and assign a meaning to each of them in a picture. “Distinguishing individual entities can become much more difficult when the subject matter is unfamiliar or when it is depicted in an unusual way”. (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 4-8).

The learners need to be able to identify all the individual components on the plan which I think it is not very difficult. However, to understand the meaning of some of the symbols might not necessary be straightforward.
3. The grouping of the graphic entities
“In many domains, understanding is based upon an appreciation of relationships for which there is not always any obvious, direct visual or spatial evidence.” (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 4-12). The entities can be grouped either designer-imposed (natural or artificial) or viewer-initiated (perceptually-driven or knowledge-driven). (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 4-13).
The grouping of the graphic entities can draw the learners to a different focus which can be critical for instructional purpose. The house plan consists of many fixtures within a one big graphics entity. For the drawing exercise, most of the fixtures are not important but might have got the learners for the wrong attention.
4.5 Picture interpretation as a constructive, knowledge-driven process When I first looked at the plan, my first response is the perceptual characteristics of the diagram like the size, the shape and the number of rooms etc. It is more than just a glance as it took some time and effort to read the plan. Then, the next stage is the mental representation which I was trying to build up the relationships among those objects on the plan.
The process of understanding the plan used both top-down and bottom-up processing. (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 3-14) I used the plan to figure out the details of the house but at the same time I was tried to think about the houses that I have seen before. The reason is the exercise is to draw the front view of the house based on the plan. The plan itself is a flat 2D view which does not give any insight what the front of the house looks like. As a result, I needed to draw from my long term memory about the other houses I have seen before and tried to extract what I knew and applied to this exercise. It can be very individualistic as everyone has different experience on the same subject matter.
When I was drawing the front view of the house, I kept referring to the plan due to the level of viewing (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 3-16) and the short term memory (Lowe, R. K. 2007, p 3-18). I added bit by bit on the drawing until I had the complete picture. The process is definitely progressive, constructive and knowledge-driven process.
5. Conclusion
This exercise proves not all the illustrations are the same even they represent the same subject matter. The domain specific knowledge and the limitation of our eyes and information processing power have the impact on how we interpret a picture. Without a proper instructional design, an illustration might create barriers for the learners and the interpretation might not be the intent of the instructor.