This week’s readings were all about the visual rhetoric style of writing. I thought that the two articles that I read were very interesting and made some great points about authors and how they use visuals to portray a certain meaning. One thing that is super important about visuals is that people like when the message is straightforward. People don’t really like to stare at something for a long time trying to figure out what the author or artist meant by it. This is sometimes difficult to do when using visuals. I think that this becomes easier with more and more practice, also especially with more drafts made.
Another point that I liked from the readings was that it is important to compose visual texts that directs a reader to specific aspects of the visual. This is one thing that is very important when creating visuals and is unique when comparing the visual mode to the linguistic mode. While in the linguistic mode it is important to create a message that is appealing to the eye, especially when someone is reading the message. It needs to be clear which way the eye needs to move in order to read the text. I would argue though that it is most important to create something visually appealing to the eye in the visual and spacial modes. If something is not appealing, then the message may be brushed over and possibly not even read by the observer. It really depends on the message the author is trying to get across to their audience and it is so important to create something that goes along with that visually.
In the Multiple Medias of Texts article it talks about how certain photographs are used to bring a sense of immediacy. This goes along with what I was saying above about the certain mode used is important, especially with visual mode it is important to use pictures that get across the desired message. The importance of pictures is also talked about in the Finnegan article. In that article it talks about the spectrum of using pictures and emphasizes that as people, we need to be aware of this spectrum. For example, there is inconoclasm, iconophobia and iconophilia. When creating a visual text. Many people distrust pictures due to the amounts of photoshop some companies and people use. When creating visual texts, it is important to keep this in mind in order to make sure your point gets across to everyone, even the people who may not trust images.
Overall, there are many things to keep in mind when creating a visual text such as placement, images used, and desired message. It is also important to consider how you want to portray that message. It is especially important for me to keep these different aspects in mind when creating my own visual text to get my correct message off to the reader. I know that if I keep all these things in mind, I will be able to create a great visual text with all the correct aspects.
