SIX PERSPECTIVES OF ANALYZING AN IMAGE
Images are visual illustrations that transfer the set of information through visual communication. Analysis of the transferred information is pertinent to understand the message that is conveyed. The images can be understood by strong analysis of the six perspectives (Chen, 1999). The same image might reflect different ideas for different people. This is because people apply different perspectives, when they observe images.
Personal Perspective
Personal perspective of analyzing images occurs when the viewer perceives the image by incurring his personal thoughts or opinions. It is challenging to transform someone’s opinion or perspective about the image. The personal though about the image is developed through the personal preferences, norms, or cultural values.
Historical Perspective
When the viewer analyzes an image, he also analyzes that how old the picture source is. The historical background of an image also develops strong thoughts about it. For instance, a piece of art that was made during the time of Christ will have a different historical value than an image made a decade ago. The historical background is also elucidated by the artist who created the image. An image created by Leonardo Da Vinci will have great value in comparison with an image created by a relatively unknown artist.
Technical Perspective
The technical aspects utilized can have a great effect on the way we perceive images. Various technical tools like media, lighting, image presentation, and other tools enhance the way we see images. An image of location, which is captured through a hi-tech camera, will have a different perspective than an average camera used.
Ethical Perspective
Another significant factor of analyzing image is the ethical perspective. After seeing the image, numerous conflicting views appear in our mind. One of such views is that whether this image is right or wrong. It is pertinent that the creator the image, the viewer, and the ethical and moral responsibilities of the image should be of accepted standards. This perspective is elucidated by six distinct categories including categorical imperative, utilitarianism, hedonism, golden rule, golden mean, and the veil of ignorance.
Cultural Perspective
In this perspective, immense significance is given to the symbols used. Different cultures have different definitions to the symbols. These symbols in connection with the image gives a new meaning to the entire portrayal that is significant to understand its core meaning.
Critical Perspective
Schema
Schema is a concept or a cognitive framework through which we understand and interpret things around us. Schema allows us to take shortcuts that are required to interpret and decipher information (Barry, 1997). It allows us to understand things based on our pre-existed set of knowledge. For instance, a kid develops his schema about a horse as a living thing that has four legs, long hairs, and a tail. After some days, he sees a cow that has the same features like four legs, long hairs, and a tail. He may mistakenly name it as horse rather than cow, but when he is told by his parents that it is a cow, he develops a new schema. After sometimes, he sees a horse with comparatively very short height and the kid perceives it as a dog, but when he is told that it is a horse, he develops a new schema. This causes the development of schema or framework in his mind that some horses are large, and some are short. Through such encounters, the new schemas are modified, and new information is learned. Brain processes the information receives in the mind and disregards the information, which is not relevant. It may sometimes create a situation that we see the things based on our previous experiences and try to ignore things that we are observing for the first time. Sometimes, our existing schema restricts us to learn new things, and we try to find new explanations to support our existing schema. Culture plays an important role in the development of schema in our minds. The cultural objects and the artifacts are some of the tools that mould our thinking framework and thus it generates new schemas. Culture moulds the schema in a way that develops our thinking framework about the things around us.
Memory
Memory is the primary centre, where the storage and interpretation of the information take places that result in the development of its meaning. The way we acquire information and the way we interpret, it results how we perceive information or new signals. The memory can be bifurcated into two types (Bel, 2010). One is long-term memory and other is working memory. Working memory synthesizes and analyzes the information. It is the centre, where the information is manipulated and received to develop an outcome. On the contrary, some information takes too long to get it processed. This kind of memory is called long-term memory. When information takes long to get it processed, it is stored in the long-term memory. Long-term memory can also be further divided into three types: Episodic memory, semantic memory, and procedural memory. Semantic memory refers to the things that takes place around us, but takes it long to process it. On the contrary, episodic memory refers to the experiences and events that associate our memory with certain emotional thoughts. These emotional events might have happened in our past that takes long to process. For instance, being tortured and abused by the parents in childhood. This event although takes place in our childhood, but its effects can be witnessed throughout the life. Another kind of long-term memory is procedural memory. This memory stores procedural information about different things that can be done to accomplish a certain set of tasks.
Myriad disorders associated with the memory are common in the world that results in a situation where the memory is unable to perform its basic functions. Visual Agnosia and Anterograde Amnesia are the two examples of it. Patients, who suffer from Anterograde Amnesia, are unable to acquire new information, and they could not even process the information already stored in the memory. In the case of Agnosia, people are not able to elucidate that what they actually see. Although, they are able to see color, shapes, or texture, but they cannot expound what these objects mean.
Processing of Information
The information is expressed and received in three primary levels that are abstract, symbolic, and representational. Symbolic level can further be divided into three levels that include pictograms, which is the actual representation of the things that it signifies. Another level is ideograms, which is the picture that elucidates an idea or a concept. The third aspect is logograms, which are the symbolic representation of the world and the things around us. Communication is typically a process of transferring information from the sender to a receiver through a medium. When we look towards this perspective in a broader term, it highlights myriad other aspects that are normally overshadowed.
Linear Model of Communication
Linear model of communication is a kind of communication that is one way. The message in this case gets transfer from the sender to receiver in one direction. During the olden days, this kind of communication was a major medium through which the message was transferred in a single direction. Great thinkers and scholars of that time used it through debate and lectures in a one directional way. Even after various effective modes of communication developed by time like printed and written text, but still it remained a major communication method. With the introduction of radio and television, the method of communication developed into telecommunication. In comparison with the verbal method of communication, this medium was quite effective, and people started to reassess their means of communication with the launch of radio and television. The evolution of communication started from spoken words to written words and later into printed text. Industrial Revolution was a period during which the printed texts were introduced, which later introduced telecommunication.
A multitude of studies has been done to understand the process of communication in a detailed and comprehensive manner. All of these researches have open new paradigm to the way we perceive communication. A major landmark in the communication studies was made by Weaver and Shannon, who elucidated the communication process by highlighting the concept of noise. He explained it in the linear communication and expounded it as a failed communication. Noise refers to any hindrance in the communication from the moment it is generated from the sender and the moment it is received by the receiver. Thus, noise can refer to a number of factors including the attitude of receiver or sender; biases; attention of the receiver or sender; or how the information relates to the receiver and sender. However, Turner (2006) classified noise into two distinct groups including physiological noise and physical noise. Physiological noise can be defined as hearing impairment or articulation problems that are the biological influences of the message receptors. It also includes the semantic problem, which refers to sender and recipient deciphering the same message in a distinct way. On the contrary, physical noise refers to the physical factors like high sound in the background that hampers the sender to send a message and listener to understand the message.
Structural Model of Communications
Some communication scholars have introduced the concept of structural models of communication. The first one to come up with this concept was Berlo. He broke down the communication process into different stages and highlighted all the factors that affect the process of communication. His model was quite complex to be understood by public. It introduced the notion that understanding the process of communication is a very challenging task that can cause spending millions of dollars. Gross in 1980, came up with a new structural model that expounded this process through a cyclical manner. Subsequently, Schramm introduced the concept of overlapping communication field between receiver and sender through diagrammatic representation. Petterson, in the year 1982, came up with another model that considered every possible factor set to define the communication process. His model had major loopholes that highlighted its problems in implementation.
Communication in its simple words can be defined as a process of sending and receiving information. Three basic conditions must be met to understand the process of communication. It includes the receiver, sender, and the message. Receiver is the recipient of the information and sender is the generator of the information. Sender encodes the message, which is then decoded by the receiver. After the receipt of the message, receiver generates a feedback of the communication. The message flows in a channel.
Cultural Theory & Communication
The cultural theory reduces the hindrances caused in the communication by noise. Cultural aspect of the messages assists the communication to become simply by associating it to the cultural factors. People in different societies have developed their own version of the schema based on their unique culture. These elements of the culture can be used to enhance the message. Various global brands exploit the cultural theory to create their message more effective for the target market. Previously, the global marketing efforts were restricted to systematically modifying the aspects of the product and its market. This strategy is becoming vague as the markets of different regions are becoming multicultural. It makes the business conditions for the organizations very stiff in comparison with the conditions of few decades ago. Marketers must only use the elements of culture that are shared by the major chunk of the market. The strategy must be built on it.
Communication through Objects
Objects have the feature of communicating ideas and thoughts. The objects can be used in a multitude of ways to represent a message. It is normally done through shapes, lines, tone, direction, texture, movement, and color. Lines are the basic thing that also represents a message. It gives the message of motion as compared to dotted lines that show directors or visual paths for the purpose of navigation. Vertical lines symbolize height of something, while horizontal lines represent calmness and peace. Curved lines symbolize softer flow, while diagonal lines portray tension.
Shapes can be created by lines that show us the directions. Horizontal lines and vertical lines give the image of a square. A circle and diagonal lines give the image of a triangular shape. Shapes itself represent different ideas. For instance, the shape of the triangle represents conflict and tension. The shape of the square portrays the straightness and honesty. On the other hand, the shape of a circle represents endless warmth and continuity. Briefly, there are three directions. Vertical and horizontal lines reflect stability; diagonal lines are against stability while curved lines portray continuity and repetition.
Tone refers to the fact that how dark or light an image looks. Tone allows us to do a number of things to enhance the image. It allows us to see the dimension or depth and see the moment in it. When it is associated with perspective, it becomes a reality illusion. Color in an image enhances the emotional aspect of it. The color can be coexisted by the tone. It becomes difficult to communicate the texture of the object. It can only be achieved if high detail is there in the object. The relationship of environment and object can establish the scale of the image.
The dimension in the image can be created by the effective use of high contrast tones and perspective. Through advance dimensional visualization, three dimensions can be created for the image. It is created by the complex emphasizes on shade and light. If these visual images are used in motion fashion, it enhances the visual experience of the object. This visual effect is used normally in movies, where different images are used, and they are played at an appropriate motion. These images then coordinate to form a visual representation that is also called fluid motion.
It is quite common for a human mind to seek harmony to resolve confusion, reduce tension, and seek meaning. However, if everything were to be as the human mind wanted, a scenario of absolute resolution would come about. A state where the mind gets everything it wanted leads to contrast that causes unbalances and shocks. Contrast is a very powerful tool for getting attention, meaning, powerful expression and simplification of information. Object enhances its quality through these tools and represents an image, which the viewer can understand by using the six types of perspectives mentioned previously. These perspectives give a balanced idea about the concept and thought which is intended to be transferred from the sender to the receiver.
The rule of thirds is commonly used in capturing the images. It involves the virtual division of the image into nine equal squares. The horizon of the image sits at the horizontal line of the image that bifurcates the image’s lower third to upper two-thirds. The main object of focus remains at the lines of intersection, which is also called crash point or power point. This technique is widely used to represent the enhanced quality of the image.
Art & Culture
Since ancient times, people have stored significant information through basic tools of arts. Using symbols to record their important cultural elements is a pertinent notion. These symbols are made, and its legacy is passed to transfer the important elements and information about that society (Hill, 2007). For instance, the ancient Egyptians used the art of the symbol making to represent their beliefs about their gods, the world, and the things around them. As they moved into different parts of the world during their kingdom, they transferred the same knowledge to other parts of the word. The art of statue making, drawing of sacred objects, and art of symbolizing are pertinent artistic tools they used to communicate their cultural values. These symbols were used in the form of pictograms and ideograms that communicated the information. These symbols also provided a way to communicate their values, music, gods, and other features.
Communication is the primary medium through which culture is transferred. Communication is although a medium, but it also becomes a part of the culture. Culture refers to beliefs, values, attitudes shared by a specific group of people that affects their perception and behavior. As we know that the culture is not genetically transferred, but rather it is a product of the learning and development of the cultural environment. It can be understood by the Australia Indigenous society and its cultural aspect of lives. They used their artistic works to preserve their culture by using symbols to represent sacred sites, waterholes, and animal habits. Communication is a basic tool through which the culture of the society is preserved and passed on. They also developed a unique type of cultural design called, “Awelye” that has still preserved their cultural arena. The behavior, custom, and language of the society must be studied and analyzed critically to understand its culture.
Culture can be acquired by numerous means. Amongst the few ways, learning is a significant tool through which the culture can be acquired. The art of learning the culture of other communities is called “Acculturation” and the art of learning own culture is called “Enculturation”. Culture is not developed and practiced by a single person, but it is shared with the community in which that individual lives with a group of people. Thus, the common practice or belief becomes the basis for the culture, which is followed by an appropriate number of people in a community.
The way people think, interact, and live identify the specific behavior and pattern that combines to make up the culture of a society. The process of learning the culture is a complex multi-dimensional process, and it takes a long period of time. The pay people interact in a social setting is a major influence to culture. This interaction allows people to come closer to each other and develop common behaviors and practices that synergize to develop the culture of a society.
Symbols and the symbolic meanings play a significant role in elucidating the culture. Since many centuries, this has been a common practice for societies willing to highlight their culture. All the societies and communities have their unique symbols through which they differentiate from each other. Man made forces also create different aspects of culture in the societies. For instance, in myriad societies beauty is a pertinent aspect of the culture, while other base it on external factors as they are inspired from nature. One important aspect of the culture is the fact that it is dynamic. Culture changes its practice, its implementation, and it outlook as the time passes. Through the passage of time, new ideas and practices take place, which was previously practiced by culture. Changes in technology, value, influence of other culture, migration are few reasons due to which culture of a society transforms. These factors may change the existing culture partly or wholly or may result in an overall collapse of the entire culture of a society.
The culture is linked to communication in numerous ways, as it is based on how people feel, behave, and identify them. Culture is the driving force through which people are able to see, hear, interpret, and think things differently. Culture helps individuals and societies to shape their behavior and perceptional about the things around them. Culture may be represented by various fabricated things or artifacts that are shared amongst the members of the society.
The usage of images to instill a desired culture can also be possible. If the images are based on fear and punishment then this will impart the same kind of culture in the society. On the other hand, if these images are based on peace then it will instill a similar kind of culture in that society. For instance, during the Nazi regime in Germany, Hitler controlled the major things that synergized to form a unique German culture. They had complete control over the music, art, and literature. Hitler even created a ministry of propaganda that used different cultural tools to mould the minds of people and the way people perceive things around them. It clearly showed that how culture can be used to drive people towards a desired goal. These efforts were only one way that passed the desired things to the people, without any room for feedback. They introduced music, art, and literature that supported their racial and atheist ideologies. This control of culture has thus evolved different types of culture that prevail in the society. A subculture is described as a culture that prevails in a larger chunk of the society, which is called as dominant culture. Dominant culture is the culture that occurs in the major part of the society that can impose its language, cultural values and behavior through political and economic powers. It is usually done by suppressing and oppressing other cultures by creating a monopoly in the mass media. When a segment of the society is depressed with the certain set of cultural values set by the dominant society, they introduce a counter culture. This counter culture acts an antagonizing force that work against the major part of the society. This counter culture is usually consist of the youth segment, which prefers own version of the lifestyle rather than what is followed by dominant part of the society. The emergence of Hippie Culture amongst the American youth in 1960s is an excellent example of counter culture. Hippie Movement emerged in 1960s that consisted of the youth that believed in peace, had long hairs, lived in groups, and relied on drugs.
There are instances in which various societies and countries influence others to adopt their culture and values. It occurs by the virtue of their economic and political power. This situation is referred as hegemony. This kind of society does not only affect other societies, but it also affects other societies to see how they perceive things around themselves. In myriad instances, they unintentionally accept things that are not actually part of their own culture. The same concept is relevant in considering the case of United States. It can be observed that the super power status of United States allows it to influence its cultural values to other parts of the world, as well. It is done by mass medium like radio, television, internet, and print media that mould the way people view things. This influence is due to its speed and advancements in technology and economic power. A multitude of famous US based multinationals like McDonalds, Coca Cola, General Electric, Wal-Mart etcetera serve the same purpose. This notion does not reflect that the culture of United States is dominant, but it reflects that the culture of United States is dominant due to hegemony. Cultures that are dominated by the hegemony society tend to adopt the cultural identity of the dominant culture. The globalization has also opened door to see and adopt the cultures of other societies. It also helps the community to disregard negative things practiced in the culture. It has evolved the integration of societies and removal of barriers amongst them.
Conclusion
Analysis of the transferred information is pertinent to understand the message that is conveyed. Personal perspective of analyzing images occurs when the viewer perceives the image by incurring his personal thoughts or opinions. The technical aspects utilized can have a great effect on the way we perceive images. Different cultures have different definitions to the symbols. These symbols in connection with the image give a new meaning to the entire portrayal, which is significant to understand its core meaning. Schema is a concept or a cognitive framework through which we understand and interpret things around us. Memory is the primary centre, where the storage and interpretation of the information take places that result in developing its meaning. The way we acquire information and the way we interpret it results in how we perceive information or new signals. To determine what type of information we may recall, it goes a long way through which we process the information. In comparison with perceptual encoding, it is better to do semantic encoding for processing the information effectively. Linear model of communication is a kind of communication that is one way. The message in this case gets transfer from the sender to receiver in one way. Three basic conditions must be met to understand the process of communication. It includes the receiver, sender, and the message. The cultural theory reduces the hindrances caused in the communication by noise. Cultural aspect of the messages assists the communication to become simply by associating it to the cultural factors. Objects have the feature of communicating ideas and thoughts. The objects can be used in a multitude of ways to represent a message. Since ancient times, people have stored significant information through basic tools of arts. Using symbols to record their important cultural elements is a pertinent notion. These symbols are made, and its legacy is passed to transfer the important elements and information about that society. Culture is passed through numerous means and images are one of the most significant aspects of it. For effective development of the culture, understanding and evaluation of image perspectives is a vital tool.
References
Barry, A. M. (1997). Visual intelligence perception, image, and manipulation in visual communication. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Bel, B. (2010). Communication, culture and confrontation. Los Angeles: Sage.
Chen, C. W. (1999). Visual information representation, communication, and image processing. New York: Marcel Dekker.
Hill, A. (2007). Key themes in interpersonal communication culture, identities and performance. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Lull, J. (2002). Culture in the communication age. London: Routledge.
