Blog week 9:
Visual media and visualisation in general differ to other forms of media in the way that they communicate their messages to the public. Visual media is used to communicate information that other forms of media may not be able to communicate. For instance, in this week’s readings, the topic of climate change has been discussed, in both a positive and a negative light (Anon, 2009). One recurring theme in the readings is of visual media, in particular graphs, that are used to represent otherwise complex data strands that would be listed on a page or written in an essay. Here we can clearly see that the graphs show us valuable information in a visibly simplistic way (Anon, 2009). We are able to gain an understanding of the serious effects (or hoax if you are a skeptic) of climate change over the long history of the globe, to the present day (Anon, 2009). By visually expressing this data, a great deal of archived information is communicated to the public, often in exciting and colourful, yet easier to understand ways (Mosher, 2012). This has effectively opened up communication levels as far more people can become involved in the debate and bring forth their own ideas, all through the power of visual media.
Visual media also differs from other forms of media in terms of construction, in that visual media initially consists of a series of codes of data before being presented in a clear way. Where audio and textual media can be informing and cover a diverse range of topics, it can also be a long process that serves to confuse viewers in comparison to a block of information that is put in front of viewers.
Halls encoding/ decoding Model.
This hard to distinguish and poorly photographed graph is based on Halls encoding/ decoding model, in which there are 3 readings; dominant, negotiated and oppositional, to each text. The first is labelled dominant, the second negotiated and the third oppositional. The vertical axis is the number of people who looked at the text (Hall, 1980).
This is just an example of visual media, which tells us that most people would take the dominant reading from a text. Instead of a lengthy essay or audio commentary, the graph is a simplistic way of showing information, although it does require considerable explaining to properly explore Hall's theory (again I stress it is a rough example!) (Hall, 1980).
Bibliography:
Anon.
(2009) ‘The Global Warming Skeptics versus the Scientific Consensus’, Information
is Beautiful,
<http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/02/science-visualizations-2011/>Hall, S 1980,
“Encoding/decoding”, in S Hall (ed), Culture, Media, Language: Working
Papers in Cultural Studies,1972-79, Hutchinson, London in association with
the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, University of Birmingham,
pp.107-116.
Mosher, David, 2012, Email Author, <http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/02/science-visualizations-2011/>
Mosher, David, 2012, Email Author, <http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/02/science-visualizations-2011/>
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