In our most recent 'Media Histories & Culture' lecture we studied Semiotics, a.k.a. 'The study of meaning.' Which focuses on the creation and interpretation of content across any platform.
As humans, we interoperate images based on memories and our own general knowledge of a subject, the most basic example of this concept is the use of Signs and Symbols, which we most often learn from a young age and retain that information for the rest of our lives. This is also why international symbols (such as a sideways triangle representing 'play') are the most successful and efficient forms of communication. This leads me onto my chosen media for this week…
I first watched 'Logorama' (an animated short film by French animation collective: 'H5') almost 2 years ago, around about the time that I became certain I wanted a career in animation. It's definitely one of my all time favourite shorts and after receiving the topic of Semiotics I immediately knew this was a perfect piece of relevant media.
Logorama from Marc Altshuler - Human Music on Vimeo.
The first reaction to this video (from any audience) is the process of finding logos that you recognise, pointing them out to your peers and then feeling a sense of success soon after. For me the best part of the movie is the sound design, its completely flawless. This combined with classic action camera angles (such as the view from the hip when a character is running) makes a very realistic and eye catching scene. The whole film acts on humour, there is no character that the audience can feel sympathy or empathy for. The only character that should deserve some sympathy for being held hostage (Big Boy) is portrayed as a complete brat, therefore any feelings of sympathy are made redundant. I think the strongest feeling during this film is 'the thrill of the chase.'
Two terms discussed under the title of semiotics is 'Iconic' and 'Arbitrary.' This describes the scale of likeness of a sign to its actual form, this can be shown in this order:
Photograph > Drawing/Painting > Name (text form) > Numerical Data Representation > Graphical Data Representation.
In most cases, logos for companies are designed to be eye catching and memorable, not necessarily a representation of the companies goals or purposes, if that wasn't the case then 'H5' would be in a lot of trouble with McDonalds for making their number one mascot a murdering fugitive! For example, Coca-Cola's original logo displays a glass bottle with a dark fluid inside, which we now know to be Coca-Cola, this is an iconic logo. Pepsi, who sell an almost identical product have a very abstract logo that has no iconic features at all, yet we relate it to the product because of memories from advertising or past purchases.
In Semiotics we also use 3 terms to describe an interpretation of a sign...
Denotation: What the sign is, at the most basic level of understanding.
Applying this to Ronald McDonald in Logorama would be that he is a tall, slim clown with red frizzy hair, a yellow suit, white face paint and a red nose. This is the simple description of what he actually looks like.
On a slightly more psychological level, Connotation: What the sign suggests, a more subtle culturally determined reading.
This is where Logorama bases its theme; unlike most films, Logorama completely reverses our past connotations of a sign to promote humour. We would usually connote Ronald McDonald to be a happy clown that represents McDonalds' welcoming nature to all, especially children. But in this film we are instead shown that Ronald is a violent, murdering psycho, hence the audience laughs...
In very deep Semiotics we use the term Myth: An interperatation of a sign using cultural associations.
Our original view of the myth of Ronald would be that Ronald enjoys McDonalds' food and wants to share his joy with the world and promote mcdonalds. Logorama however, have managed to change it to something like: Ronald is a misunderstood clown thats had enough of his city, he's dead set on world domination and wont let anyone or anything stand in his way. Probably the biggest contrast in myths ever to be successfully portrayed.
H5 have used Signification in order to achieve this effect. When we see a sign we link two components in our brain in order to conclude what the sign is:
Sign = Signifier (physical manifestation) + Signified (Mental Concept)
Logorama makes the audience laugh by breaking this concept, our original Signified of any of the characters in Logorama is proved completely wrong, im sure that no one who watched logorama for the first time had a preconception of the Pringles' character being a stereotype pervert. If you did then you need to ask yourself why your still buying Pringles!
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