Visual Literacy

Within today's Context Of Practice lecture we focused primarily on visual literacy, and how as humans we have the ability to make meaning from visual componants, such as images, symbols and colours. I found this highly influencing as I wasn't consiously aware of how often I create subconcious conclusions towards design. I also resived information surrounding a global awareness for certain signs and symbols, this enabled me to discover that the only componant necessary for any language to exist is an agreement amongst a group of people globally.

We also looked in detail at visual syntax, refering to the pictorial structure and visual organisation of elements. This educated me on how not only the image itself is viewed but how surrounding images can also influence it's appearance and meaning. An example of this is shown below:

 The above symbol can be viewed in multiple ways, this includes a plus symbol, an crucafix and also health.

Whereas when a colective group of symbols are present you are much more likely to describe the symbol as a plus sign. This is due to the meaning of the other symbols embeding it's meaning.

I also discovered the meaning behind an visual synecdoche, and how one symbol for example Big Ben can represent the whole of London. When creating design for a wider audience, it is important to create common ground, therefore I found this information highly intresting and will try to use it within future projects where the target audience is universal. I belive this is why when large companys such as Mcdonalds and Coca-cola rebrand, their logos tend to follow the same format and colour pallete as previously. This is due to the large association towards their brand and personal identity.