ITAP 2 Week 1 Narrative

Manga has given the opportunity for more violent scenes when it comes to illustrating the story compared to comics such as Spiderman and Batman. With Manga there seems to be no real limit to what you can do when it comes to how graphic the violence is, all the way to graphic torture scenes and also pornography drawn in the book. An example of this is Devilman, which was written and drawn by Go Nagai, which ran from 11^th June 1972 to 24^th June 1973 in Shonen Magazine. Below is a page from the series, which shows the level of violence and nudity that can be seen. 

Another example is Hellsing, which is a series about an organisation called Hellsing who defend England against supernatural undead with the help of a Vampire. They end up having to stop a Nazi group called Millennium from creating an army of the undead. Below is a spread from the series, which shows the violent scenes that can be seen.

These two examples of manga show the use of off the limit subjects, ultra violence and pornography. Because of this some people tend to stay away from Manga books and not even try reading them. But, Manga has a wide target audience ranging from children to adults and this is because there are a wide range of different styles and story subjects. So for younger people there are less graphic and less off the wall subjects with toned down violence, compared to an older audience the more these aspects are increased. This shows that not all manga is violent and erotic and that a lot is light hearted and easy going like western comic books.

Some people say that the origins of this Japanese style of drawing come from Hokusai Katsushika because it is the term he used to call a collection of his less serious work. When in actual fact there are drawings found before him in a similar style, but there is dispute whether or not they are drawn in a style that resembles that of manga. However what we do know is that the images were produced using woodblock technology.

 

Above are two examples of early manga produced from using the woodblock technique. In the first one we can see that even a few hundred years ago there was still a section of prints used to make pornography. Why this is acceptable in their culture and still is today I do not know, but it appears to be deep rooted rather than a modern phenomenon. The second is a more recent piece from late 1800s to the early 1900s and you can see that it more closely resembles the style of what is being produced and sold worldwide today.  

ITAP Week 9 Image and Text

The meaning of an image can be affected my what context the image is shown such as the series of four photographs by John Hilliard called ‘Cause of Death?’ These four photographs show the same person lying down in the same place but, by John Hilliard altering the image by cropping it down in four different ways and by him then adding text to the pictures simply saying the cause of death, in this case he used burned, crushed, drowned and fell, he is able to change the meaning and narrative of the photographs. Another example of how adding text to a photograph can change the meaning of the image is the work that Gillian Wearing does with her photography. In her work she gets people to write down what they are feeling or thinking at the time and then pose with it while she takes a picture. For example she has taken a photo of a policeman holding a sign saying ‘help’ and what appears to be a businessman holding a sign saying ‘I’m desperate.’ By having these signs in the photographs of what the person is thinking written down on them changes the meaning and the story of the image, such as what does the policeman need help with? and why is the businessman desperate? This creates a contrast between what the person is thinking to how the public sees them by the way they act and dress. Jim Goldberg is another photographer that uses what the people he photographs thinks and feels in his work. Particularly in his series called ‘Rich and Poor’ where he takes photos of both the rich and poor then gets them to write down what they either think of the people around them or the place they are in etc. This has similar results as Gillian Wearing work, but demonstrates how linking an image with text as well as the way it is laid out can change the meaning of the piece.

ITAP Week 8 Production Of Visual Communication

The top 10 milestones in the history of production in my opinion are:

• Sumerians use cuneiform alphabet on clay tablets– 3500bc
• Paper invented in China by Ts’ai lun – AD 105
• Johannes Gutenberg printed first book in Europe – 1445
• Papermaking machine invented by Nicolas-Louis Robert – 1798
• Negative/positive photography invented by Fox Talbot – 1839
• First colour separation process invented – 1890
• Adobe systems founded – 1982
• CD- ROM invented, Parke Lightbown builds a computer application that runs from a computer based version of the compact disk – 1984
• Email invented by Ray Tomlinson – 1971

I believe these points are the top 10 because they are all things that are still used in the world today and have influenced some other ways of making and producing work, such as books have given people different ideas of laying out work and how to display things.

Johannes Gutenberg made the first book in Europe in 1445. He produced the book by using an invention that later led to him inventing the printing pres a few years after. The book he printed was the bible, it was a revelation of its time because of the neat and easy to read lettering without the need of glasses. 

ITAP Week 7 Production and Outcomes (Influences and Reactions)

Here are two interpretations of Spiderman. The first one is the original cartoon drawing from 1967 and the second is the new redrawn version called ultimate Spiderman, which was released in 2000. These are both interpretations of what Stan Lee envisioned to be Spiderman when he came up with the idea. Both drawings fit in well with the period they were released and this is made obvious because the original drawing is simple and uses block colour with little detail and no shading or tone, which if you look at other cartoons that were been on at the same time you would see it fits in well. Compared to the Ultimate Spiderman drawing, which is more realistic in a sense that shadow and the feeling of movement have been included in the image making the drawing come to life more like you get with modern comics. However the main concept of what the costume looks like has stayed the same showing that they have stayed true to the original and main ideas of how Spiderman looks and this is the same for every reincarnation of Spiderman be it cartoon, comic, film, toy or console game.

My own working methodology design process is to first go and make mind maps about any initial ideas I have about the brief that I've been given, then research and collect relevant information about my ideas through books, photography and things I observe. I will then develop any good ideas further by experimenting with different media and materials, be it either digital, print making or hand drawn to see what effects and textures I can get to make an image more interesting and relevant to the brief that I have been given. Then by getting feed back on my work I continuously keep going back to it developing it further until I’m happy with it to put forward into production for the final piece, before sitting down to evaluate the work and what I’ve learnt from the process.  

ITAP Week 6 Narrative

A story is the basic form of telling a linked series of events, either true or fiction that is usually a description of a journey that characters make. Stories can come from a many number of places such as the news that you have either watched on T.V or read in a newspaper, from the history of recorded events in the past also, from legend, which is a story pasted down for generations which people believe to based around real historical facts but can not be proved. In visual communication you tell a story through your work by thinking about who the target audience is, because nothing can appeal to all ages. Something that appeals to an adult won’t interest a child. Also, though the images you try to get across your message for example if you were advertising a Ford Fiesta you would want an image that would show how practical it is compared to a Lamborghini Murcielago where you’d want to show how powerful and fast it is.

Developing a narrative is taking the idea of original story or theme and developing it further. For example when you explore deeper into the meaning behind the ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ story you get a number of different interpretations such as rebirth, natural cycles (day and night, changing of the season) and sexual. An example of this is Tex Avery’s version of ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, which was released in 1943 called ‘Red Hot Riding Hood’. In this version of the story, Red Riding Hood is performer at a nightclub and the wolf is portrayed as someone who follows her and is obsessed with her. This gives a completely different angle from the way the traditional story is told, but keeping the same elements to make it a ‘Red Riding Hood’ story. Using alternatives to what people normally associate with things is very useful as a visual communicator because it can put an interesting twist on the obvious or modernise it so it is more relevant to the current time period such as, the latest version of Sherlock Holmes, on BBC one, is set in modern day London but the traditional, core elements of the story are the same as Sir Arthur Cannon Doyle wrote in his books. 

ITAP Week 5 Visual Communication

The tone of voice in this image advertising the visual communication student’s art exhibition called Lost and Found. I think this is a good example of where the correct tone of voice has been used because they have used a luggage label to print onto which symbolizes lost luggage and then the text they have used a clear font which is easy to read and left the O out of lost and included it in found but by using two colours for both words suggests the O was lost from lost and then found in found. This makes the way they have used typography in the advertisement correctly giving it the right tone of voice so the people it is aimed at know what it is about. 

This is another example of where the tone of voice of the advert has been done correctly. I think this because the slogan “elevate your business” has been put next to an elevator and then the colours that have been used for the type are tones from the photo such as the slogan colour is from the arrow pointing up above the elevator. Also, the type of font that has been used is simple and business like for its target audience. 

This is an example of good use of visual hierarchy. I think this because the red and blue contrast each other well making the text saying what it is and where it is stand out first and then the details afterwards. It has worked well like this because most people have a quick glance at an advert and in that short time you have to catch their attention with something. When I first looked at this I saw student takeover, which stands out more been white text on the blue background, I’m a student so I’d carry on looking and see Highcross Leicester then the information on the red background. This works well because the visual hierarchy is in the correct order with your eye been attracted to the most important part first and so on.

This is a poster I have in my room and I thought it showed a good visual hierarchy because simply the background of the image is blurred and the person in the foreground isn’t making him stand out because he is the main focus of the poster.