Homework #2
A couple of things stood out to me from this week's reading:
Chapter 2 - 'Reading the Signs' by R. Salkeld: In talking about connotation and denotation, the author asks us to consider perfume advertisements and how to represent an invisible commodity. This reminded me of a Twitter thread I had recently come across, detailing something very similar - Why are perfume ads so weird? The author of the tweet reflects on how the 'moneyshot' for perfume ads is heavy eyelids, blinking, scenes with a certain 'heavyness' to them. (Ref to first image). She also goes on to mention some unconventional advertisements which break the genre stereotypes and make the transition from regal -> quirky (Ref to second image)
Chapter 2 - 'Reading the Signs' by R. Salkeld: The book includes an endearing photo of two old men, which can be easily construed as them being friends – yet the caption reveals something very different. This immediately made me think of how social media is absolutely inundated with images of people posing in groups and social settings, only to not have any significant connections. We as viewers get to see the highlight reel of everyone else's life, and despite knowing this, fall into the trap of comparing it to our 'behind the scenes' (Ref to third image)
3. George Eastman House Photographic Process series: A last really short but significant takeaway I had was when the series mentioned how Talbot and Daguerre had announced competing photographic discoveries at the same time, even though both had been working independently. It led me to think of, and then read the article on Multiple Discovery.