This week: 1st March 2012
Non verbal communication: The political and social power of film.
We will listen to a lecture by film producer Sir David Puttman and discuss movies of social and political importance
Tutorial: on the concept of visual communication and why we study it.
Tutorial: The many ways we communicate non-verbally.
Tutorial: An introduction to communication studies – methods of communication and communication theories.
Lesson Content
Visual Culture:
(As opposed to verbal culture)
The things that make us human and not animals are our needs:
Dreaming, imagining, questioning, wonder, thinking, puzzling and finding answers.
Part of the answer to our puzzling is Art. Therefore images are language.
Art making comes in three categories, which form a hierarchy:
1: The most valued is Fine Art
2: less valued is Commercial art of which Graphic Design is one form
3: popular culture: Clothes, T shirts with slogans and logos especially cars symbols TV, movies, video games etc This is mass media.
These operate as codes that need to be interpreted, which is easy when you live in that culture. Aside from mass media we have within our culture we have subcultures and special interest groups like drag racing, fashion design, etc. We learn throughout our life how to decode visual culture and because culture changes from year to year we never stop learning to interpret new codes. No one way is sufficient
Semiotics is the study of meaning.
Semiotics unpacked. (Interpretation)The ways of interpreting are many but here are four:
• Material culture. Each culture has different materials available to it. The artist or designer chooses from them. For example the material (also read technology) for an Ipod was not available in the culture of your grandparents.
• Formalism: we look at the formal elements: line colour, form/shape composition etc.
• Content. We read the representation both through what does thiis work represent
1. Denotation
2. Connotation combined gives us the meaning of the work.
Another mode of reading images is Cultural Critique:
Social conditions and issues are demonstrated in works of art and visual culture
Which we learn to see and understand. These include gender, economics,, race, ethnicity and nationalism.
The many ways we communicate non verbally
Personally:
The way we wear our hair and the clothes we wear distinguish us as belonging to a subculture or particular class, country or occupation to name a few.
The car we drive may say something about our income, class or attitude to life
The way we arrange the things we have chosen for our house or room
Facial expressions and body language
Tattoos or makeup
Where our trousers start and finish or the amount of flesh we reveal
The gifts we give family and loved ones
Greeting cards
And much more.
The culture we live in:
Television
Magazines
Films including special effects and animation
Photography
Advertising billboards and TV included
Road and traffic signage
Merchandising in stores and store windows
Music videos
Internet
Computer games, animation
All the things you as graphic designers will be responsible for creating.
Sir David Puttman interview on ABC Radio National Feb 3 2011
Non verbal communication: The political and social power of film.
We will listen to a lecture by film producer Sir David Puttman and discuss movies of social and political importance
The Killing Fields is a romanticized adaptation of an eyewitness magazine story by New York Times correspondent Sidney Schanberg. Covering the U.S. pullout from Vietnam in 1975, Schanberg (Sam Waterston) relies on his Cambodian friend and translator Dith Pran (Haing S. Ngor) for inside information. Schanberg has an opportunity to rescue Dith Pran when the U.S. army evacuates all Cambodian citizens; instead, the reporter coerces his friend to remain behind to continue sending him news flashes. Although his family is helicoptered out of Saigon (a recreation of the famous TV news clip), Dith Pran stays with Schanberg on the ground. Racked with guilt, Schanberg does his best to arrange for Dith Pran's escape, but the Cambodian is captured by the dreaded Khmer Rouge. Accepting his Pulitzer Prize on behalf of Dith Pran, Schanberg vows to do right by his friend and extricate him from Cambodia. The rest of the film details Dith Pran's harrowing experiences at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, and his attempt to escape on his own. The Killing Fields won Academy Awards for Hang S. Ngor (a Cambodian doctor who lived through many of the horrific events depicted herein), cinematographer Chris Menges, and editor Jim Clark; an Oscar nomination went to Roland Joffe, who made his directorial debut with this film.
http://classicwarmovies.com/killing.html
http://classicwarmovies.com/killing.html
1990 – 2005
Tutorial: on the concept of visual communication and why we study it.
Tutorial: The many ways we communicate non-verbally.
Tutorial: An introduction to communication studies – methods of communication and communication theories.
Lesson Content
Visual Culture:
(As opposed to verbal culture)
The things that make us human and not animals are our needs:
Dreaming, imagining, questioning, wonder, thinking, puzzling and finding answers.
Part of the answer to our puzzling is Art. Therefore images are language.
Art making comes in three categories, which form a hierarchy:
1: The most valued is Fine Art
2: less valued is Commercial art of which Graphic Design is one form
3: popular culture: Clothes, T shirts with slogans and logos especially cars symbols TV, movies, video games etc This is mass media.
These operate as codes that need to be interpreted, which is easy when you live in that culture. Aside from mass media we have within our culture we have subcultures and special interest groups like drag racing, fashion design, etc. We learn throughout our life how to decode visual culture and because culture changes from year to year we never stop learning to interpret new codes. No one way is sufficient
Semiotics is the study of meaning.
Semiotics unpacked. (Interpretation)The ways of interpreting are many but here are four:
• Material culture. Each culture has different materials available to it. The artist or designer chooses from them. For example the material (also read technology) for an Ipod was not available in the culture of your grandparents.
• Formalism: we look at the formal elements: line colour, form/shape composition etc.
• Content. We read the representation both through what does thiis work represent
1. Denotation
2. Connotation combined gives us the meaning of the work.
Another mode of reading images is Cultural Critique:
Social conditions and issues are demonstrated in works of art and visual culture
Which we learn to see and understand. These include gender, economics,, race, ethnicity and nationalism.
The many ways we communicate non verbally
Personally:
The way we wear our hair and the clothes we wear distinguish us as belonging to a subculture or particular class, country or occupation to name a few.
The car we drive may say something about our income, class or attitude to life
The way we arrange the things we have chosen for our house or room
Facial expressions and body language
Tattoos or makeup
Where our trousers start and finish or the amount of flesh we reveal
The gifts we give family and loved ones
Greeting cards
And much more.
The culture we live in:
Television
Magazines
Films including special effects and animation
Photography
Advertising billboards and TV included
Road and traffic signage
Merchandising in stores and store windows
Music videos
Internet
Computer games, animation
All the things you as graphic designers will be responsible for creating.
Sir David Puttman interview on ABC Radio National Feb 3 2011
http://visualcomm-bamford.blogspot.com/
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