Text:
Satisfy your golf obsession any time of day.
Aalysis:
This is an excellent example of a visual image that uses a visual form of metaphor. Here a golf ball is metaphorically portrayed as the moon (a figurative that also resonates with the text that says golf can be enjoyed, if not played, any time of day (even at night). We also see a golf ball hit so strongly that it achieves orbit around the earth. Such prowess should appeal to golfers. In addition, the image allows the viewer to associate the indentations on the surface of a golf ball with the pockmarks known to exist on the moon. Perhaps the moon has been used as a "golf ball" by some incredible extraterrestrial force.
This photo is also what visual arts theorists call a "low key" image, meaning that most of the image is very dark with only some features rendered in light or semi light tones. This low key feature of the image is perfect for use as a night scene while it also encourages the viewer to let the imagination take flight.
Chapter 14 describes common features of advertisements. This golfing ad illustrates some of these features, such as: catching our attention; promoting the name of the client; associating playing golf with the flight of the moon in orbit around the earth; and alluding to a problem (the desire play golf perhaps at night) with a solution (spending time at Golf.Com). If the ad works, over time the viewer may not actually remember watching it (decay effect) but will be left knowing something favorable about the organization golf.com. The ad also reaffirms positive feelings about playing golf.
For analyzing this ad and the ones below consult chapters 8 (pathos in persuasion), chapter 14 (techniques of advertisements) and chapters 15 and 16 (skills for senders and skills for receivers).
Text:
The world's first foolproof lipcolor.
Lipfinity with permatone:
Lipcolor that stays. Topcoat that shines.
The first to last through leftovers.
MaxFactor: the make-up of make-up artists.
Analysis:
The visual at the left grabs our attention because of its novelty—a model wearing a hat made of deep dish salad pizza that has what looks like mozzarella cheese oozing off the side onto a fork. The copy for the ad uses clever words such as lipfinity (a play on the word infinity emphasized with the symbol for infinity shown at the left of the hat) and permatone (another made-up word that emphasizes the durability of the product). The ad also implies that show business people (who should know) use this product line.
This somewhat "high key" image with its warm, bright tones sizzles. The model, perhaps with a 1930s retro look, seems about to eat the gooey cheese, even with the product's deeply colored lipstick applied to her lips. Will this wanton act of self indulgence ruin the appearance of those luscious red lips?
The ad, of course illustrates a problem-solution format built around the claim that the use of this particular brand lipstick will not be marred by eating messy foods even down to the leftovers. The ad clearly associates the product with an attractive model. Does it suggest anything else? (See chapter 8 on pathos for more discussion of this type ad.)
Even if you don't read French, this ad for France Telecom (a mobile telephone service with clients in France and the United Kingdom) tells a story with visual rhetoric. The ad was designed to appear on two successive right-hand pages in various print publications.
Analysis:
Both images have a clean, modern look due in part because they are "high key." In the first image we see one apple being selected from a group of six. (Will the remaining five likely fall down when the selected apple is removed? If they do fall, they probably deserve such a fate.) The message in the first ad, of, course, reminds us of the biblical saying that "Many are called but few are chosen." Another implied theme may be that the French know their food.
In the second ad, the ongoing analogy between a delicious apple and a good mobile telephone service continues with each of the common features of the service being expressed as a slice of the delicious apple that was selected in the first ad.
Text:
Luxury reborn
Analysis:
People in the ad business generally think this ad uses sex to sell the vodka. According to one expert: "The high-end liquor market is crowded these days, so Belvedere came up with an idea so crazy that it just might work: an advertisement that implies that drinking their brand of vodka could get you oral sex from an attractive woman. And they even got sexpert and James Frey collaborator Terry Richardson to do the photo! Might this radical notion of using an image to subconsciously connect their brand with the idea of sexual conquest in the minds of consumers actually serve to boost their sales and, consequently, their revenues? Stranger things have happened"
Is this a subliminal advertisement or is it too obvious to be so? (Notice the image in the belt buckle and the other phalic shaped images.) The skin of the model shows reflections of light (almost like a flash). Was this an attempt to give the photo a sense of "caught in the act"
