Semiotics to images and text

Semiotics to images and text

 

Semiotics are the study of signs and symbols, it is a way of understanding the literal and the possible meanings of images and words e.g. The colour red is described as danger or love, passion when really it’s just the colour red. These are called denotations and connotations.

Connotations are the suggested meanings of the image or text. What people stereotypically label straight away.

Denotations are the literal or obvious meaning of the image or text. It is what you actually see.

For example: when people see an image of Lindsay Lohan. They think of drugs, alcoholic or even disgusting.  They label her for what she’s done wrong. This is the connotation of the image. But really it’s just a picture of Lindsay Lohan drinking. This is the denotation of the image.

People will take into account on the camera angle of the shot. Is it close up? Focused on one thing to single out exactly the image is showing e.g. the amount of glasses in Ms Lohan’s area subconsciously makes you thing that she’s an alcoholic. Even the clothes she’s wearing in the picture. Is it revealing? Is it trendy? Has the person lost touch in style? It raise’s too many questions by focusing on the clothes as people will judge other people on their appearance. If you catch a person blinking it could make them seem drunk in the picture. Ms Lohan has her eyes closed and a distorted smile which people would describe her as drunk. But she may just of blinked or sneezing in the shot but even when they don’t know people will still stereotype the picture.

For my school magazine, I will use images that match the schools house colours. This shows that the school is structured and matching as the magazine will only use say 3 or 4 colours. I will place the school logo in the corner of the cover as people will instantly recognise it as their students’ magazine without even reading it. This will draw parents’ attention instantly and encourage them to read on. Also I will put a mini contents on the front to show the main stories of the magazine without people having to read much and if they are interested the will read on. This will persuade parents to read as they’ve seen an interesting story on the cover.

Semiotics for text is the same, just labelling text for its size, shape or even the femininity of the word itself e.g. ‘bliss’ isn’t going to be a car magazine for over 40’s. People will connotations for text to. Magazine titles should make sense to the aim of the publication. It should make sense to the reader but also give them an idea about the magazines aspirations.

Over and out.