Representation:

1
Representation

• History, Theory and Context

2
Introduction

• History
• Theory Semiotics
• David Chandler's "Semiotics for Beginners
• Context specific points about screen based design
  of graphics

3
In the Begining

• Man Makes Meaning
• Prehistoric
• Notched sticks
• Upper Paleolithic
• animals on cave walls 37,000 years ago
• Neolithic
• Geometric patterns appear

4
First Problem

• Early representations cannot be interpreted as we
  have no idea of the cultural context they come
  from
• " ...any comparison based entirely on the outward
  appearance of individual signs chosen at random
  from two entirely different forms of information
  storage and communication is more or less
  meaningless. Sassoon, R and Gaur, A (1997)
  Signs, Symbols and Icons Pre-History to the
  Computer Age

5
Sausser

• Ferdinand de Sausser
• Signified - an idea of a thing
• Signifier a transmissible symbolic
  representation (word spoken or written)

6
Peirce

• Charles Sanders Peirce (sic, pronounced 'purse')
• Representamen
• Interpretant
• Object
• 3 modes Symbolic, Iconic and Indexical

7
Pictures to Words
Symbolic Mode
Iconic Mode
8
Pursuit of the Real

• Forms of Iconic Mode
• Photorealistic visual representation is a
  culturally informed idea that did not exist
  before the introduction of Perspective in the
  15th century in Western Culture.
• Egyptians size of a depicted object is related
  to its importance in real life
• Chinese artists used long scrolls to depict
  depth. Absence of single-point- perspective
• Medieval Times many vantage points at the same
  time, no directed view
• Renaissance the spectator defines the center of
  an image

9
The Idea of Perspective

• Albertis Window (1435) A mathematical method
  in order to translate a 3-dimensional space onto
  a 2-dimensional pane.

10
myth of photographic truth

• What is true? Is photorealism the appropriate
  method to represent reality?
• "A photograph is often perceived to be an
  unmediated copy of the real world, a trace of
  reality skimmed off the very surface of life. We
  refer to this concept as the myth of photographic
  truth. Sturken and Cartwright, Practices of
  Looking
• Digital technology has eroded the notion of
  photography as a true medium

11
Digital Graphics

• Digital graphics begin appearing in the early
  1980s.
• Digitalisation converting analogue material into
  a digital code of numerical representation
  (Manovich, Language of New Media)
• A digital graphic is a formal/mathematical
  representation.
• All manipulations of the digital graphic are
  algorithmic manipulations

12
Indexical Mode

• Supposedly stands for, suggests or is directly
  linked to the object
• Examples are footprints, smoke, measuring
  instruments
• There is some argument that photographs could
  inhabit this mode as well as the iconic mode but
  only if unedited

13
Context
What does this mean? Is there enough information
to tell?
14
Context

• It could be the final frame of a comic

15
Context

• Conventions in art, design and writing
• Conventions are often unexplained but followed by
  everyone in a particular creative
  community/industry
• Conventions are often unconsciously read

16
Composition

• The Golden Ratio
• Rectangles and Spirals
• Central Peripheral
• Background Foreground

17
Symbolism

• Cultural Context
• Objects in a picture that stand in for other
  things or imply something
• Provides a short hand but sometimes need to be
  explained

18
Colour

• Symbolism of Colour
• Blue
• Europe Virgin Mary
• China Spring and the Wood Element
• Islam Elemental Earth, the 6th Prophet Jesus,
  Planet Mercury
• Psychology of Colour
• Blue calming colour, physical and mental
  relaxation

19
Summary

• From Logos to Photographs an image is constructed
  to tell you something (signs and signifier)
• Images are constructed, posed or chosen to convey
  an idea or ideas
• Conventions of shape, symbolism, composition,
  colour, etc.
• Spend some time looking at how a screen image is
  constructed and what information is being
  provided by different elements of the image.