Chapter 6 The meaning of composition

This chapter talked about the spatial arrangement of semiotic units, and the meanings of different arrangements. In most places in the world, people are used to reading from left to right, from top to bottom. Therefore, some reading conventions are generated, practiced and institutionalized.

In the text, it argues that the unit on left is "Given," and the unit on right is "New," the thing on top is "ideal" and the thing at bottom is "real." Here, "Given" means something already existed even before the visual argument is made, so there is hardly anything can be or need to be criticized or changed. In other words, we can only take it as "given." But "New" is something emerged after the “Given,” and it may have some problems the viewers can make comments. In that sense, if God is put on the left of the image, we don't need to doubt the meaning of God, because he is "presented as commonsensical, self-evident." Meanwhile Adam and Eva who are on the right side are "problematic", "contestable”,” the information at issue." (181)

But for the culture in which people read from right to left, the function and meaning of the left-right arrangement are reversed like the website design on page 182.

On the other hand, it argues that things on the top represent the "Ideal," which is "presented as the idealized or generalized essence of the information," and the "Real" on the bottom is supposed to present "more specific information, more down-to-earth information or more practical information." I guess the reason why we have that visual convention has something to do with the way humans live. Specifically, human walks on the earth and cannot get close to the sky. And we have to look up to see the sky where the sunshine and other source of life is from.

Thus, things on the sky seem mysterious to us, and ancient people used to look for answers to things we were not able to understand from the sky. Far before science was developed, astrology, the theory about sky was invented and spread in western world, which could be seen as a proof that people are used to seeking answers from the sky--the top part of their visions. To the contrary, things on the earth which are beside us instead of above us look more real, more down to earth, and more vulnerable to being realized. Accordingly, the instant coffee is more easily to get than the romantic atmosphere above. And that's why the exact product was put on the bottom, because to put in the bottom means the product is easy to approach.

And the sequence of center to margin is a combination of top to down and left to right orders.

Question:

1. Whether the film makers and painters arranged the visual units in films and paintings when creating them? Or maybe they just happened to do it in that way?

2. Whether there are other ways to perceive the arrangement of visual units in the figures in the chapter?

Visual language in Downfall

This is really a depressing movie. During the class, it spreads a feeling of oppression and despair in the classroom. And I had difficulty getting recovered from that depressed feelings after the class dismissed. In that sense, it is an impressive film, because it successfully conveyed messages to the viewers through a series of visual languages.

1. High walls

Most part of the film is taken inside of enclosed rooms. Hilter and other main characters were living and working in a seamless underground building. And there are even high building around the small exit house of the basement. Until the end of the film, there was no sky, no green trees and other things which can make people feel alive.

2. Small rooms

Hilter and his soldiers lived in a small basement where they had to stand closely to have meetings. And the metal doors don't insulate sound well, so that people can hear each other clearly, which provided a lack of privacy and safety.

3. Monotone colors

The theme color of the film is gray or some color close to gray. The soldiers wore gray blue and gray green uniforms, secretary ladies wore gray yellow or gray shirts. And the basement had gray metal doors, gray walls; the street and battlefield were full of gray smoke of gunpowder. As a result, the whole city was in gray, even the air looked gray.

Additionally, people's faces looked more and more close to gray in their last days, especially for Hilter. His face was terribly pale at the end of the film. This poster also has gray as its theme color.



4. Different colors

However, there are two women wearng clothes different from gray, who are Eva Braun and Magda Goebbels. And they appeared and behaviored differently from other women characters.

Eva showed up in several different pretty clothes in the film, and she was almost always smiling even when she knew she was going to die with Hilter. She was the one who prevented nothing wrong happened, and had herself enjoy the last fun of her life.

Magda wore a dark red woman's suit throughout the film, and she also wore earrings and necklace all the time. She behavoired in good manners, the children followed her, and she got a special award from Hilter. It looked like she always had things in control. Even when she killed her six children by herself, she finished it with a great composedness of mind.

Their dressing hinted their special status in Gemany and close relations with Hilter. And it is a little scary for these two women to dress themselves well under that circumstances. Their dressing gives viewers the impression that they were crazy. If Eva was not crazy, how could she kept dancing when bombs explored outside? If Magda was not crazy, how could she kill her six children one by one? If they were not crazy, how could they dress like everything was like before?

5. Close shots

Close shots were heavily used in the film, especially when it told stories about Hilter. According to Kress and Leeuwen, close shots invoke personal attachment between the roles and the viewers, which helps the viewers consider characters as human beings. In other words, through the heavy use of close shots, the film maker wants to represent Hilter and other roles as common men and women who also have fears and worries.

When looking at Hilter's face so closely, we can easily see the dark circles around his eyes, the deep wrinkle on his forehead. Sometimes he just looked like a small old man suffering from insomnia instead of a Nazi monster. On the other hand, it leaves a question for people to think about--if an old man can become a sanguinary killer, what can those ambitious young men do when they got the chance?

6. Close shots to Hilter's hands

There are a lot of close shots to Hilter's hands in the film. When the first bad news came, Hilter's hands cannot stop shaking and drawing circles. When he went into the hall to attend the big meeting, his put his hands behind his back so that they wouldn't be seen by other people. But the camera went to his back and took a close shot to his hands, which enabled the viewers to see Hilter's weakness.

And when Hilter went out of the basement to meet young men staying to defend Berlin, the camera focused on his shaking hands again. No matter how Hilter pretended to be calm and self-collected, he cannot help to be nervous and restless, because he is a human after all.

7. The war medal


That medal appears in the film for a lot of times. The Nazi Generals wear it on their collars; the child volunteering in the street battle won one; and in the battle hospital, soldiers were given that kind of medal before they went to the final battle.

That medal was the sign of battle achievement in the past, and it became the stimulus of self sacrifice which encourage people to participate in a hopeless battle for the sake of Nazi Germany. At the same time, the meaning of the medals was greatly reduced.

Life and Eternity

About the Theme

The theme of these three pieces of digital remix is written on the picture—Life and Eternity. They are listed here as an opposite and conflicting pair. Here “life” refers to the comparatively fragile life of human beings, and it also represents a real life which has breath, feelings and enthusiasm to the world. On the other hand, “eternity” refers the immortal life of vampire beings, and it conveys their endless struggle with the darkness around them and inside of their hearts.

“Eternal life” is a common topic in vampire literature and movies. Immortal life adds a mysterious mask to vampires, which is the main temptation to most of human victims and readers. For example, in Bram Stroker's Dracula, the mental patient played by Tom Waits became one of Dracula’s loyal followers for his desire for eternal life. And some people will even trade their soul for the undead body. After they get the kiss from vampires, they will have to abandon the sun and stay in the darkness forever. Moreover, they have to sacrifice others’ lives to survive. (But there is a saying that the oldest generation of vampires are powerful enough that they don’t have to live on blood. And they can even walk in the sun like a human. Here I will focus on those vampires who are not that powerful to defend the sunshine.)

However, the immortal life is also a problem for some vampires with a human heart. For example, Louis in Interview with the Vampire, was always suffering from his immortal life and the behavior of killing people. A worse example is the mentor of Kei in Moon Child; he got so tired of endless and hiding living that he went to the beach and burned himself in a sunrise. However, there is indeed someone who enjoyed their vampire life, such as Lestat who would be the most famous vampire created by Anne Rice. He was like a charming prince in upper class parties, and a play boy with girls (Interview with the Vampire), and he turned to be a rock star in modern society (Queen of the Damned). Wherever he goes, whenever he lives, he will make sure that he is enjoying the immortal life. That may be a fairly positive attitude towards life for vampires.

These three pictures aim to reflect the life situation and life attitude of vampires and some of their victims. Some of them enjoyed the eternity in cost of taking others’ life; some of them struggled with hardship in the darkness; some of them did the sacrifice for the loved. And they are various facets of vampirism—under control of the bloody red.

About the Design

Picture 1

Key words: desire, fears, power

The background is from the poster of Bram Stroker's Dracula, and the man and the woman in the front is Lestat and his victim from Interview with the Vampire. In the original poster there is Dracula holding his bride Mina, and the figures around them provides the background of their love story. Accordingly, in this picture, Lestat is placed in the center which makes connections between these two kinds of vampire stories. As a whole this picture is telling a story about desire, fears and power.

In the center of the top, there is an angry devil’s head sculpture, whose outstanding teeth hint his aggressiveness and danger to living creatures. That is the signifier of dark power. And the figures at the two sides of the devil are representatives of the ones under control of that vampirism power. In the center of the picture, Lestat is going to attack the helpless woman in his arm. When he is getting close to her bared neck, he gave a glazing look at the viewer, which conveying messages to people outside of the world in the picture. His left hand was risen up, and it looks like that he may stretch out his arm to drag the viewer at any time. Here fears rise from that atmosphere.

Lestat is known as an attractive, cold-blood vampire killer. In Interview with the Vampire, not only he took people’s lives, but also did he play with them and make fun of them before their death. He put their blood in chalice, tasted it and enjoyed it. However, the women did not know his cruelty. They just saw his charming appearance, his golden hair, his blue eyes and his mysterious smile. As a result, they got into his brace without hesitation, because they had a crush on him, a strong desire on him. On the other hand, Lestat also had desire on the women, on their fresh blood, their beating hearts, and their energetic young lives.

In general, the whole picture is under the red curtain of blood from top down, which can be considered as a representation of vampirism—the desire for blood, the desire for sacrifice, the desire of eternal devil spirit.

Picture 2
Key words: sacrifice, love, temptation

The picture is aimed to tell a story about sacrifice, love and temptation.

The woman in the left side is Mina, Dracula’s bride in Bram Stroker's Dracula. And the woman with blood tears is a random picture found in Internet. They are also under the red curtain of blood, which hints it has the same theme of vampirism. Since Mina is in the left part of the picture, she is presented as the “given” fact in this picture. (Kress & Leeuwen 2006, 180) And the face at right is the “new” which serves as specific explanation to the given fact.

In Bram Stroker's Dracula, Mina continued the love of four hundred years with Dracula with the cost of her soul and anything as a human. She abandoned her friends, her fiancé, her religion to be the bride of the dark prince, walking with him in the darkness forever.

She is a totally different part of vampire stories, which is used to be filled with the fighting between hunters and preys. She sacrificed her life and her soul on her will, and she didn’t join the evil to pursue immortal life but eternal love. On the other hand, the most powerful vampire, Dracula, did not treat her as other women victims. Instead, he let her drink blood from his chest where is closest to his heart. He granted her the power to dominate the beast and storm. At the end of the film, he even sacrificed his eternal life to set Mina free. It not surprising that film is called “a love song of vampires.”

On the other hand, Mina is also a victim of vampire’s temptation. She is enchanted by Dracula’s sincere and passionate speech and action which convinced her it is worth sacrificing anything of hers for their love. The blood tears represent her regrets for her wrong choice. The shining blade beside hints she was physically and psychologically hurt in the story, so she cried. Both of Mina and the face are starring at the viewers, which develops an interactive relationship between them and the viewers. And there they are producing a temptation to people appreciate them, which is reflected in term of beautiful things in the picture, such as Mina’s wide innocent eyes, her gorgeous dress, and the fresh red thick lips, the pretty red eyes.

Picture 3
Key words: recluse, power, fears

The creature hiding behind the pale hands is the oldest vampire, Dracula, from Bram Stroker's Dracula. He is the main character in various vampire theme movies, in which he is considered as the first and most powerful vampire. And in this picture, the decorative pattern on his clothes shows he is from the ancient age and he has the blood of nobles.

He is damned to live in the darkness forever, living on human’s blood. He is a scaring and damned creature; he brings evil to the earth; he brings death to human beings; he is the representative of the dark power. With the sunrise as the opposite of Dracula, this picture aims to represent the recluse, fear and power of vampires.

Due his fear to sunshine, vampires have to stay in the dark, and wait for nights to feed themselves, which makes them recluses away from human society. In this picture, with hands covering his face, he appears as a recluse to the viewers. The red curtain of blood is fragmented under the impact of the sunrise. The blood fog is being banished to the side of Dracula, who is also suffering from the sunshine and the stare from viewers. In this picture, Dracula’s power is being diminished when exposed to the sun and attentions.

In the left part of the picture, as the sun rises, the blood fog is cleared away from the earth, which represent the darkness in vulnerable to the sunshine, the immortal life of vampires is vulnerable to eternal sunshine, brightness beats darkness, good beats evil.

The project aims to discuss and represent vampire’s appearance, life and spirit. And this digital remix serves to reflect the thoughts and spiritual part of those damned creatures. In vampire’s world, power, fear and desire are mixed together; love, temptation, and sacrifice are hard to distinguish. Those characteristics of vampires’ life and thoughts provide great imagination space for literature and movie creations, which will be further discussed in the film subproject.

Chapter 5

This chapter inspired me to think about visual products in a different perspective. Specifically, I would like to talk about these questions below. What do people use as the criteria when evaluate pictures or paintings? Why do they hold those measurements as criteria? How do the criteria change over time?

1. What do people use as the criteria when evaluate pictures or paintings?

The authors categorized the criteria into 4 kinds of orientations, that is, technological coding orientations, sensory coding orientations, abstract coding orientations and the common sense naturalistic coding orientation.

Generally, those orientations can be summarized in this way:

• Technological coding orientations (TC): the principle of effectiveness
• Sensory coding orientations (SC): the principle of pleasure
• Abstract coding orientations (AC): the principle of generalization
• The common sense naturalistic coding orientation (CSNC): the principle of likelihood

2. Why do they hold those measurements as criteria?

I think which kind of criteria people choose to use depends on their personal experience, such as education and jobs and so on. On the other hand, it also depends on the contexts of the communication. And it is also possible for people to combine several criteria together under certain situations.

For example, due to their education, scientists would more like to use technological coding orientation when they are writing research articles. However, they will also choose to use the common sense naturalistic coding orientation when they draw pictures for their children at home.

3. How do the criteria change over time?

Since the choice of criteria depends on people’s experience, the content of criteria is also vulnerable to the experience of the society as a whole. For instance, before the arrival of computers, people are not likely to appreciate the orientation of interface design. And until now, senior citizens are still not as used to navigation interface as the young people.

In addition, I think the arrival of MACs and other Apple products also brought some changes to the orientations of computer interfaces. Its smooth and light-reflecting tool bars were appreciated by so many people that a lot of byproducts came out, such as Apple style desktop background pictures.

4. Besides, I have one question I failed to find the answer for the chapter: which kinds of orientations does Ryman use in his paintings?

I don’t think any of the orientations introduced in the chapter apply to it, because his paintings barely have content to be evaluated. And what is the representation of representation process? Is Ryman trying to present a generalized presentation process (AC)? Or is he doing this for his pleasure (SC)?

But one thing I’m sure about his paintings: he use the orientation to get him detached from the mainstream community.