Hi guys. So I've got a pharmacist friend that is headed to Afghanistan as part of a team that will be providing medical services for some of the more remote villages. She will be prescribing drugs to people that don't speak a lick of english. The United States Pharmacopeia has provided pictograms they can provide people along with their prescribed drugs. I've attached the pictogram they will be using.

The trouble is, my friend and I feel that the pictograms aren't clear enough. The problem is, it might be difficult for some people to distinguish the different times of the day based solely on the position of the sun on an uncolored background. The whole pictogram was in black and white -- I colored in the sun and the land. I need to choose background colors for the first three panels so that the times of the day are more easily recognizable. Morning, noon and sunset.

I tried different shades of blue, but it didnt seem to me like it helped. I thought maybe some of the more artsy types here could give me some suggestions for colors to use.

Thanks!

Maybe a reddish sun for afternoon? What about a written title in pashtun too?

my 2 minute attempt.

Jesus... who got paid to come up with this crap. The first and third panels are identical. Give me a break.

Thx for tryin. I didn't think about changing the color of the sun.

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Jesus... who got paid to come up with this crap. The first and third panels are identical.

Exactly! I also hate the fact that the sun in the third panel doesn't connect all the way around.

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What about a written title in pashtun too?

She is leaving on Thursday and I don't think I could get pashtun text on their (nicely) by then. Also, she might use these in areas where Pashto is not the dominant language.

This is potentially wildly obscure, but assuming that all the people there will be at least very familiar with Islam, maybe showing a person praying would indicate direction and therefore where the sun is on the horizon. Or just some sort of Mecca icon in the appropriate direction.

Surely there's something in their culture that would distinguish morning from afternoon.

Ok, here's a version of it. Sun rising, sun up, sun setting / moon rising, moon up. When I was half done, I realized that the sun rises in the East (right?), so having it rise on the left is a little dyslexic. If you feel this gets the point across, I'll re-Photoshop it to mirror panes 1 and 3.

And here's the same thing with some morning and evening shading. Notice the 3rd panel's shiney moon and fadey sun. Wow, I'm tired.....

I went with FireFox's approach and changed the position of the sun. Mine are backwards, as well (West to East), but it looked better in the frame than the opposite. I think that the Afghanis will get the idea. I also added some background colors to clarify between morning and evening.

As long as they don't think that the medication must be administered using a large pair of tongs...

I'm not artists so I won't try this, but you could try showing "empty" suns behind the "real" sun to show the path of where the sun had been during the day . . .

Not a bad idea Jeff, I'd been thinking arrows or something.

Actually I had thought about adding a dashed line with an arrow indicating the direction of the sun, but I felt like even the village idiot would be able to figure out the path of the sun from morning to night, especially considering the shades of the sky. Of course, I'm a bit biased.

epwc, yes, it is Ramadan so everyone should be fasting. I can't see how that would keep anyone from taking medication. Even if they didn't take meds during Ramadan, they could keep them to take in about 15 days or so. And like you, I don't know of any symbols for morning, evening, or night (other than the 'universal' ones on the card).

WOW! Firefox, epwc, Cybjorg thanks so much for the help. I really hadn't thought of any of the things you guys tried. Firefox's idea of moving the sun -- brilliant! And then Cybjorg's colored the panels pretty much perfectly. I'm going to go with Cybjorg's as the final version.

Thanks a lot guys! She will really appreciate this.

- Hamid

I didn't even see Cybjorg's ones, excellent, don't think you could mistake those.

Glad to help.

Will these print in color? I hope so, because that gradient shading is quite nice.