Our homework assignment to present on Wednesday morning was to choose a a simple image, and come up with ten words or short phrases that would change the meaning or the story of the image. We were to present our image on presentation board and have our ten words put into a clear pocket so that our words could be read easily. When class started on Wednesday morning, our assignment was presented to everyone in class. We gathered around each image and went over all ten words. Some words really did fit with the image, others did not. Fellow students also brought in new ideas of what words could fit the image. Some assignments were really well done, others were not. But it was a learning experience. To be able to see how words and images play and work with each other. On Tuesday night, when I started on this project, I didn’t know what words to choose. I found a really awesome image in a magazine for Dr. Pepper’s Cherry Cola. In the advertisement, it already had the slogan, “Amazingly Smooth”. So I steered away from that and tried my best to pick out good words. The dictionary was very handy when working on this assignment. When it was time to look at my image in class, a lot of different ideas came up. My favorite was when Professor Moss said, “Edward’s Choice of Drink” and “Twilight Number Four” since I am a fan of the Twilight Saga books. I was even sorry I didn’t originally come up with those ideas. Another cool part was that when the image was flipped vertically, the story of the image changed again. It looked like a Volcano or possibly red smoke.
The best image out of the group I would have to say was the gold fish in the glass tank which had a large shark fin strapped to it. Whoever chose that image came up with good words and short phrases. One phrase I can remember was “Rebel without a Cause”. There were many ways to spin around the story by playing with multiple words and phrases, even thought was just one image.
After we finished going over our class work, Professor Moss brought in a series of advertisements that were similar to our assignment. They were advertisements that chose images and phrases that really made you think. The words and images really caught your attention and some were even humorous. But there was one image that Professor Moss singled out and pinned up on the wall. It was obviously an advertisement for Band-Aid. When I first looked at it, I automatically thought it was the hand of the Incredible Hulk. I related the image to that because in the advertisement, there is an image of a huge green hand with thick veins. On the index finger, there a band-aid wrapped around it. We spent a lot of time on this image, trying to dissect it and what it really meant. I thought of it as a representational image because we all know it’s an image of a hand, even though the hand is a green color. But we couldn’t figure out if the image was computer generated, real with make-up on, or a cartoon image by just looking at it. Just by observing the image, a classmate mentioned that to him, the hand was in a pose often used in the classical age, like the famous sculptures made by the Greeks and Romans. Another student pointed out that it looked like it was in the same position like the statue of David by Michelangelo. This conversation was really starting to build up. More people were starting to participate in the conversation. Then there was a revelation, someone said that the hand reminded her of Michelangelo’s painting in the Sistine Chapel. In the image, the green hand resembled the hand of God. That is what the company Band-Aid wanted to convey. That this flexible Band-Aid is so strong, it is strong enough for the hand of God. (And even the hand of the Incredible Hulk.) These two beings are thought of as being invincible, unable to be injured, sending its viewers a very powerful message indeed. I learned a lot from this one image. I don’t believe any normal person would really take the time to dissect the image. They would probably just assume it’s the hand of the Incredible Hulk because that is an image they can easily identify with. But sometimes it can be really fun and interesting to find out what direction the designer was going towards. That everything is creatively thought out and made for a reason.
No comments:
Post a Comment