Time to Reflect

In creating my weblog I learnt a lot about the Internet and communicating to a broader global audience. This process forced me to consider who I was addressing, and the nature of my content with relevance to this audience. I aimed to not only engage readers, but inform them, providing useful links and commentary to current media issues. Additionally, I sought to analyze the rise and importance of the internet in contemporary media practice, and how social media has affected the nature of the industry and the field of communication in general.

In regards to design, my research helped me to understand the importance of a visually pleasing blog. In such an evolving visual culture, aesthetics are what draws the viewer in to read a document, before they even have a chance to grasp the content. For this reason, I understood that my blog needed to be eye catching without being overwhelming. White space, paragraph breaks, images and headings assisted in making this possible, as they gave readers space to rest between blocks of content (Reep, 2006, p. 157). Also, small pops of colour were used to emphasise relevant content, and provide interest.

I found the process interesting and challenging, coming from a first-time blogger perspective. Having read and followed blogs before I understood their concept, yet writing one’s own blog is a slightly different experience! I underestimated the amount of consideration that goes into each post, and the editing of content and layout that bloggers employ in order to make their blog readable and enjoyable.

I think there is definitely a place for bloggers in the future, as we have seen already in the presentation of news events, as this gives people a voice over traditional media outlets. Freedom of speech in society always has both good and bad aspects, but after all we are a democracy in Australia right? And that’s what it’s all about!

I hope you have enjoyed reading my blog as much as I have enjoyed writing it! Please feel free to leave feedback or comments on any media issues or design issues i can respond to!

Image Source:
<http://eiris.edublogs.org/2012/09/09/welcome-to-our-new-student-bloggers/>

Reference:

Reep, DC 2006, Technical writing: principles, strategies and readings, Pearson/Longman, New York, pp. 133-172. 

Twitter for President!

There’s no campaign fever quite like that of the United States election. For months leading up to the day, the world is bombarded with images, articles, footage and statistics about the campaign runners, and who is looking like claiming the coveted title of president of one of, if not the most influential country in the world.

This year, a new contender has emerged. Twitter. Social media has stormed the election campaigns of both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, as voters and media professionals alike, rely on such sites to broadcast their views as well as inform their decisions.

Obama and Romney shake before engaging in debate.

In a recent debate between the political contenders, social media documented the event while it was played out in live television broadcast. An article by ABC claimed ‘as the debate progressed the Twitter storm became a blizzard. Political reporters were watching the TV with one eye and the Twitter feed with the other. As a result 90 minutes of prime time TV became a political eternity. In cyber space no-one can hear you scream but they can sure tell if you're off your game. They used to say you could tell who won a TV debate even with the sound turned off - but no-one can control the volume of instant messaging. And politicians all over the world are being caught flat-footed by it’.

How true it is! Today we are so entwined with social media it has become a given in not only personal networking, but it seems now professional and political networking. Let’s just hope Obama can tweet his way back into office!

Image Sources:

<http://www.usatoday.com/picture-gallery/news/politics/2012/10/03/obama-vs-romney-debate/1611571/>

Photography in the Digital Age

Many new forms of publishing are emerging as the digital age continues to wow us with new technologies. Uploading, downloading, streaming, browsing - the internet has made viewing content faster and more accessible than ever before.

One such form of publishing is photography. The changes in this medium have been huge, as not only has photography moved from film to digital, the way we view photography has moved from printed hard copy to online images. This shift has affected many aspects of photography, as content is viewed, interpreted and used in different ways.

Moving to more online platforms, single images are now accessible globally. Sharing photos is no longer a private event, as photo hosting sites including PinInterest, Instagram, Flickr, PhotoBucket and even Facebook allow users to publically share photos with fellow internet users. This has expanded the potential audience infinitely, as this is not just limited to friends and family overseas, but as long as the content is declared public, can be seen by literally anyone.

In this way, the production of content and subject matter in photography has changed also as people are tailoring their photos to their audiences. The immediacy of internet sharing has seen photography become more about candidly capturing an event or a moment, rather than staging an elaborate and carefully considered shoot. Younger generations especially are, in many instances, more concerned with the quantity of the images they are sharing rather than the quality. Social media platforms are used as vehicles for image sharing, or rather a visual diary of someone’s daily life.

Additionally, technology has contributed to photography becoming more digitally enhanced and edited and less ‘raw’, as society struggles to imitate perfection by creating manufactured identities and landscapes. Is this then a false representation of reality? Or does digital enhancement motivate us to improve aspects of our lives in pursuit of these ideals? 

The possibilities of extreme photoshop: Before (right) and after (left)

Image Sources:
<http://www.hemmy.net/category/links/page/5/>

<http://activerain.com/blogsview/2182791/taking-pictures-of-your-home-4-simple-tips-for-getting-the-best-picture-of-your-house>

Things to Consider in Web Design

Within our society, varying modes of communication exist to provide creative avenues to effectively communicate an idea or piece of information to an audience, in the most logical and accessible manner. As theorised by Kress and Van Leeuwen, different ‘kinds of texts are no longer just written, but 'designed', and multimodally articulated’ (1998). This idea proposes that the presentation of a text is concerned with not only content, but with layout and the visual arrangement of the document, and how this enables the reader to successfully absorb the information.

Reep builds on this idea by claiming your audience reads the presentation of your document as much as the printed text itself (2006). Just as the arrangement and presentation of relevant text can foster effective communication, presented poorly can have equally negative consequences on the transmission of your message to a reader.

Such factors must be considered when designing for both online and printed documents. While the importance of relevant and direct content must be considered in both forms, layout is especially important for web documents. The nature of web documents is that they are heavily connected to other sources and links on the internet. Meaning, someone may unintentionally come across your document or site while ‘web browsing’.

This is less common in printed documents, as they must be physically bound together in a book or magazine for example, for someone to unintentionally come across them. Printed documents are more commonly books searched for in a library, or newspapers and magazines bought for a specific purpose. The act of reading a printed document is much more intentional and planned by the reader.

In this way, web documents must be eye catching. The layout should be easy to follow; simple yet grabs the reader’s attention. Additionally, links and tabs must be easily located and relevant to the content of the document, meaning they must compliment and reinforce what is being said.

Some other tips for designing for web documents include:

• Stick to single column layouts – don’t make readers scroll up and down continuously!
• Use shorter line lengths and wide margins on your page – keeps text succinct and easy to follow.
• Use page breaks and paragraph spacing.
• Use sub-heads and sidebars for manageable sized blocks of text – also lets readers know where they are at when they cannot see the entire document in one screen without scrolling.
• Use contrast in headings, subheads, titles and bylines – bold, italics, larger fonts and contrasting fonts all signify importance and stand out from regular body text.
• Use colour appropriately.
• Keep images and backgrounds relevant – they should compliment your text not overwhelm it!

Image Sources:

<http://infotechworld.net/services/web-design/>

<http://www.bridewelldesign.com/blog/?attachment_id=29>

References:

Kress, G & Van Leeuwen, T 1998, ‘Front pages: (the critical) analysis of newspaper layout’ in Bell, A & Garrett, P (eds), Approaches to media discourse, Blackwell, Oxford, Chapter 7, pp. 186-219.

Parker, R.C 2003, Looking Good in Print, Paraglyph Press, Scottsdale.

Reep, D.C 2006, Technical writing: principles, strategies and readings, Pearson/Longman, New York.