Visual Design - Week 3A
Week 3 already! Even though I wasn't able to attend Session 3, I went through all the slides and as you can see, I'm here writing my post now. From what I studied, I can see that we got into plenty of theories and there was a lot of practice, so let's get started.
Starting with Ferdinand de Saussure, the person behind semiology and semiotics. Semiology is the theory of signs and symbols that deals with their function in linguistics. If we open the TV now, or any other media site, we will notice that literally everything is based on semiotics. The impact of this theory has shaped digital creation, particularly in the advertising area, because the actual goal of it is to have a good and approachable image and I believe this is what de Saussure wanted to bring out.
Getting more into the details, after Saussure's theory, the difference between Denotation and Connotation is explained which is the key to semiotics. Denotation means the literal and dictionary definition, while connotation represents the various social, cultural or emotional implications associated with a sign. At first, this really confused me, but what really untangled my brain was the connotations and denotations of an apple:
Denotation:
- Food
Connotation:
These terms are some that I had never heard of before, and it gave me the idea that many psychological factors, research and experimenting are involved because, the results of each application of the theories are actually extremely effective. I'm not going to lie, this is why I fell in love with the process of creating media; there are so many layers to it and also research that stimulates one's creativity.
Going back to the theories, we see Roland Barthes' theory which is based on Saussure's theory. Before we get into more details, it is important to understand what a sign is.
Sign=Signifier Signified
Signifier = things that give meaning - word/image
Signified = what is evoked in the mind - mental concept
Sign = anything that conveys meaning
Now that these are explained, it is easier to understand what Barthes suggested, that there will be more than one of five codes that describe the meaning of a text. The texts may be 'open' or 'closed'. Open texts are those that are open to interpretation and can have many different subjective meanings that depend on the audience, whereas closed texts are those that are produced with a single, definitive meaning in mind. Even if the text is open or closed, it uses different signs to communicate their meaning so whether it is something that can be seen or heard on a screen or on a paper is a sign. A sign is a discreet unit of meaning and, as mentioned above, can be images, gestures, sounds and anything that can be communicated in a media context.
From reading all these, what I realize is that Barthe's theory is thoroughly based on Saussure's and I see it, in a way, as a complete copy. It might be more explained but it made the first theory more complicated and complex for me, in some parts, such us with the signifier/signified.
Before moving to the final theory, it is important to reflect on all the information mentioned above. What I understood from studying all these, is the fact that creating an aesthetically pleasing image to the eye is the key to successful advertising and selling of a product. Whether the product is a service, a movie or an actual item, it needs serious consideration before being presented to the audience: the words that are being used, the font, the colours and the structure of the image are the most important factors. Thus, the target audience to which the advertisement is going to be distributed to is really important to be considered.
I feel like all the aforementioned theories need more studying and I'm sure there are much more theories that explore the same topic. I hope in the next sessions, we have the chance to study them a bit more but either way, I'm certainly motivated to read more about them by myself.
Starting with Ferdinand de Saussure, the person behind semiology and semiotics. Semiology is the theory of signs and symbols that deals with their function in linguistics. If we open the TV now, or any other media site, we will notice that literally everything is based on semiotics. The impact of this theory has shaped digital creation, particularly in the advertising area, because the actual goal of it is to have a good and approachable image and I believe this is what de Saussure wanted to bring out.
Getting more into the details, after Saussure's theory, the difference between Denotation and Connotation is explained which is the key to semiotics. Denotation means the literal and dictionary definition, while connotation represents the various social, cultural or emotional implications associated with a sign. At first, this really confused me, but what really untangled my brain was the connotations and denotations of an apple:
Denotation:
- Food
Connotation:
- Sin (Adam & Eve)
- Snowwhite
- Apple company
- Health/Doctor (one apple per day, keeps the doctor away)
These terms are some that I had never heard of before, and it gave me the idea that many psychological factors, research and experimenting are involved because, the results of each application of the theories are actually extremely effective. I'm not going to lie, this is why I fell in love with the process of creating media; there are so many layers to it and also research that stimulates one's creativity.
Going back to the theories, we see Roland Barthes' theory which is based on Saussure's theory. Before we get into more details, it is important to understand what a sign is.
Sign=Signifier Signified
Signifier = things that give meaning - word/image
Signified = what is evoked in the mind - mental concept
Sign = anything that conveys meaning
Now that these are explained, it is easier to understand what Barthes suggested, that there will be more than one of five codes that describe the meaning of a text. The texts may be 'open' or 'closed'. Open texts are those that are open to interpretation and can have many different subjective meanings that depend on the audience, whereas closed texts are those that are produced with a single, definitive meaning in mind. Even if the text is open or closed, it uses different signs to communicate their meaning so whether it is something that can be seen or heard on a screen or on a paper is a sign. A sign is a discreet unit of meaning and, as mentioned above, can be images, gestures, sounds and anything that can be communicated in a media context.
From reading all these, what I realize is that Barthe's theory is thoroughly based on Saussure's and I see it, in a way, as a complete copy. It might be more explained but it made the first theory more complicated and complex for me, in some parts, such us with the signifier/signified.
Persuasion
Persuasion is the process of trying to influence or convince a person's mind towards a particular set of ideas. Advertising, basically, is a way to persuade the audience and the consumers to buy the product(s) shown. In order for that to happen, you need to get the attention of the target audience. What contributes to that apart from all the aforementioned (semiotics), it also colours and typography. Typography is the technique of arranging type to make written text look appealing and aesthetically pleasing to the eye. As far as it concerns the colours, each colour has multiple meanings as seen below:
I feel like all the aforementioned theories need more studying and I'm sure there are much more theories that explore the same topic. I hope in the next sessions, we have the chance to study them a bit more but either way, I'm certainly motivated to read more about them by myself.
Gestalt Theory
According to Gestalt's theory or alternatively, the Law of Simplicity, all objects and scenes can be observed in their simplest forms and it also suggests that the whole is greater than the sums of its parts. The key elements of this theory are:
- similarity
- continuation
- closure
- proximity
- figure/ground
- symmetry & order
I find this theory the most coherent, practical and it is really well explained in comparison with the other two. From what I have realized from the previous workshops is that visual examples are the ones that make the theories more understandable and much easier to remember. It might be because most of the times I'm able to remember images or that I can connect the images with the text and remember all of them together. Nevertheless, whatever the case is, I found this session to be extremely educational and by far the most important out of all.
This post includes a lot of theory, but I found it important to mention them because it was a really crucial lesson.
I want to note done that what I got from all the aforementioned is that, in order for us media students to actually produce quality media content, it's important to comprehend all these theories. What I believe is, that many creators create content without having in mind these theories, rather they use them subliminally sometimes without even studying them. That is something fascinating because it shows how brilliantly human brains function. Sometimes people create the most meaningful content without even realizing it! However, for each and every one of us, each artwork has a different meaning because what makes something special is our experiences, our memories, our culture and also the people we surround ourselves with because all these factors are the ones that shape our personality.
In the next, I'm going to talk about the structure of the poster we were asked to do based on these theories and how I ended up with that design.
Thank you for reading. :)
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