Burger King - Premium Kuro Burger
Source : http://laughingsquid.com/burger-kings-premium-kuro-burger-features-black-squid-ink-ketchup/

Fig. 1 The poster that drew in the class

Fig. 2 Rough work by Photoshop

"Where's my burger?"

     To choose a poster that I like most among five groups, I would like to choose my group's poster.  As McDonald's  has already introduced a similar products in early time, it is quite difficult to design a poster for Burger King. In addition, the burger is black in color. Black gives people a idea of dirty. People usually have a negative first impression towards black things, especially the food. So, how can we have an idea that is both interesting and creative, and also easy for people to accept it? And the most important is, the product image would not duplicate with the McDonald's one.

     My groupmates created a message for this campaign - "Where's my burger? Eat the burger in dark".  We associated the burger with something in black or dark in our daily life.  Firstly,  during the brainstorming, we think about what people would do during mid-night.  We think that many people love to eat snack during mid-night and don't want to let their parent know. Therefore, we try to create a poster that can associate with our behavior in daily life.

     Using a simple line and monochromatic tone on the poster can arouse audience's curiosity as people like to perceive something special. As the poster is in black,  people would to like to pay more attention to discover something from poster or even search its information online. It can impress people and the idea can keep in audience's mind longer. In order to transmit the message successfully, it is vital to create a simple and easy message in the campaign as people hate complex things. Finally, we add the question "Where's my burger" as the headline to draw people's attention. 

      I really appreciate my groupmate's idea. As a result, I made a rough poster by Photoshop after lesson. Is it easier to understand our message and idea now? :)

Rape is not the rapist’s fault?

   Pennsylvania’s Liquor Control Board launched a PSA (Public Service Announcement) campaign “Control Tonight” in 2011. The purpose of this campaign is to curb the excessive alcoholic drinking among young adults. However, this advertisement was seen as victim-blaming, which mentioned the link between rape and drinking, and put too much responsibility on the victim rather than the rapist. It is suggesting that the victims were to blame for the rape.

   The advertisement featured the thin and smooth legs on the ground, implying that the character is a female. Her underwear was pulled down to the ankles.  For the background, the tiles look like the bathroom tiles, pointing that the incidents were usually happened in the washroom. From the above clues, it is clear that the PAS was describing something related to rape.

   The PSA is supposed to educate the young adults to raise the awareness on binge drinking and suggest the ways to protect themselves and against anti-drinking.  Using fear on the advertisement to terrify the audience with the horrible consequence is a way to persuade the audience step away from the wrong behavior.  Yet, the choice of words and images should be moral.  Obviously, the captions beside the image were the main problem of this PSA.

   “When your friends drink. They can end up making bad decision. Like going home with someone they don’t know very well.”

   “Decisions like that leave them vulnerable to dangers like date rape. Help your friends satay in control and stay safe”

   These two captions have intentionally shifted the blame away from the rapist but to the victim and their friends. Instead of telling the people who were raped “It is not your fault.” to comfort them, the ad seems to say that being rape is their wrongs and responsibility.  It is their responsibility to control themselves not to being rape. That sounds ridiculous. Although the victim has the responsibility to take care her body, they cannot control what the rapist want to do and not to rape. Moreover, the sentence “Like going home with someone they don’t know very well.” is trying to blame the young adults about their dissipated dating. That is rubbing the salt on the victim’s wound.

   Nevertheless, the image that used on the poster is a provocative image.  The campaign used the sexualized image, which objectify the female body, to inject a dominant idea of rape culture – female is used to be the victim in the rape culture. It also stereotyped the image of female and also those female who consume alcohol. Whenever there is something related to sexism, female must be stereotyped by the people, which lead to the misconception about the female image.

   Instead of using the provocative words and image to promote anti-drinking among young adults, Pennsylvania’s Liquor Control Board should highlight the consequences of excessive drinking and teach them how to prevent the misfortune. Although the intention to create fear emotion in the advertisement was good, using the proper image and words on the advertisement is also the one of the main considerations to persuade people to follow their idea and action. The board should try to avoid create any unpleasant feeling on the victim and take a balance between the message and the victim as well.

Source : http://thehousenews.com/gaze/牢籠狹小-問題巨大/

While you are living in a comfortable flat with your family, could you imagine that there are more than 170,000 people living in the cages in this 21st century? [1]  In your daily life, have you noticed that there are many people living in such bad environment and surrounding you? Or like the first four photos, you just walk away and ignore the problem? 

Housing problem in Hong Kong is getting more serious nowadays. In the past two years, the housing price rose dramatically. The poor could not afford to pay the high rents. The only way for them to survive is the inadequate housing. However, according to the government’s report, the number of people who live in the inadequate housing have significant decreased in these years. If it is true, why there are so many people need to live in a flat that only has 40 meter square to maintain their daily needs? The answer obviously is NO! No one would like to live in a cramped, dirty and unsafe condition. 

In order to gain the public attention to improve the living environment of this group of people, the designer created three cage homes’ model and put them on different streets to attract people’s gaze. Since the models are so small, many people just passed by the models, showing that the models are easily neglected by the people. This symbolizes the actual living size of the poor and their situation – they are the minority  and did not get the attention from the society.

This photo series carries a powerful message to alert the government that they should take action immediately to solve the housing problem. The creative team tries to to use this raise public attention about the social issue. After raising the attention and gaining the extensive media converges, the team wants to force the present government to think about what they have promised to do with the hosuing problem when they took office, urging them to look at the problem deeply and seriously. Additionally, they also hope that citizen would notice the housing problem in Hong Kong is so “Big” while looking at the “small” cramped cage homes so as to offer more help and assistance to this group of people.  

[1] Report of Society of Community Organization
http://www.soco.org.hk/publication/publication_index.htm#four 

     In September 2012, ten thousands of demonstrators participated in the anti-national education protest outside the government headquarter.  This photo was published on a local magazine iMoney in September, one of the winning photos of the “Focus at the Frontline 2012” photography competition.

     Hong Kong is known as a democratic city, which enjoys a high degree of freedom, including a free press, the right to assemble and transparent. Yet, the government in Beijing repeatedly intervenes the Hong Kong policies after Mr. Leung Chun-ying (C.Y. Leung) is appointed as Hong Kong chief executive in 2011.  National education is one of the controversial issues after he inaugurated.  The introduction of national education has been criticized as an attempt to brainwash the city's children to praise and appreciate the Mainland China.

     Color can create people’s emotion towards something. Black has the symbolic meaning of sadness and anger. From the photo, all protesters wore the black T-shirt and the government headquarter had been surrounded by them. This created a black sea of people which making the photo looks dark and dim. Moreover, all the people gestured a cross to show their refusal for the launching of compulsory national education in primary and secondary schools. Although the faces of protesters were not being seen clearly, viewer can still feel how hopeless and angry the protesters were towards the HKSAR government from the photo.

     As the photo is dark, the flash in the centre is prominent. This creates a big contrast between the flash and the theme color. The white flash in the centre just likes the only hope for the Hong Kong people. People surrounded it seems trying to protect this last hope not to be destroyed by the government. This flash also symbolizes the Hong Kong’s democracy.  Hong Kong has only left this little piece of democracy since 1997 handover. If this flash is stuffed, there is no more democracy and freedom in Hong Kong future. At last, Hong Kong will only be the puppet of Mainland China forever.

     To conclude, this message of this photo is powerful. It succeeds to carry a strong message and emotions to the viewers, which helps the non-participants to understand and make a reflection about this issue.

Source : http://www.scmp.com/photos/recent/76670/1204371
Editorial cartoon by Harry Harrison on April 12, 2013

This editorial cartoon was published on the South China Morning Post on April 12 in 2013. Harry Harrison, the well-known editorial cartoonist in Hong Kong, is addressing the issue about the increasing number of nuclear and missile tests in North Korea after Kim Jong-un become the supreme leader of North Korea. 

In this cartoon, there are three characters. A man who wore the suit with the pattern of the United States’ flag represented the United States. He is also recognized as Uncle Sam, a common national personification of the American government.  There is also a panda in this comic. Panda represented China because it is known as China’s treasure.   On the painting, there is a North Korea’s emblem on the sword. With the help of this cue, it is easy to recognize that the man represented Kim Jong-un, the leader of North Korea. Harry perfectly drew the characteristics of Kim in this portrait.   Three missiles behind Kim implied that this editorial cartoon was related to the recent nuclear and missile tests in North Korea.

North Korea has been causing crises since the end of the Korean War 60 years ago. Northeast Asia and the United States hoped a cycle of provocation and demands would end with Kim Jong-un taking power, but he has proven even more antagonistic than his father and grandfather. More nuclear and missile tests seem likely. The North Korea’ ally, China, is under intense pressure to force a climbdown. However, Kim wanted to show that China could not influence his regime.  He refused to stop preparing the upcoming nuclear tests.

Harry used symbolism to represent the U.S. and Chinese government. From the comic, it showed that they were discussing how to solve the crisis. The U.S. government urged Chinese government to warn North Korea to stop being provocative. Since the distance between Uncle Sam and panda is close, it showed that China has already worked closely with the U.S. as she released North Korea has become a headache of China. She wanted to give a lesson to North Korea. However, from panda’s facial expression, it can also be predicted that China chose to do nothing about this crisis now because China wants a stable environment. She didn't want to involve too much in this crisis because it may destabilize her regime. The dialogue of panda has further proven this prediction.  

Harry conveyed his opinion through the facial expression of Kim and the word on the painting. Kim held the sworn with a malevolent face and evil glint in his eyes. These showed that the determination of Kim to test the missile. He wanted to scare other countries, especially the U.S. and South Korea, through the testing. However, Harry used ‘unhinged’ as the caption of painting to say that Kim’s decision is not smart.  Kim did not have a comprehensive planning before taking this decision. As Beijing certainly aware that the recent moves by North Korea have a significant impact on China, what Kim has done may lose his ally and will only bring North Korea into danger. 

Matt Madden: Exorcise in Style
Source : http://www.exercisesinstyle.com/exercises/

Same storyline with different genres, different characters and different point of views can create many variations.  From the various variations of Exercise in Style, I like Exorcise in Style most with the following reasons.

The first reason is about the use of color. Colors can create different perceptions for human. Before reading the texts, people can already predict which comic genre is by looking at the theme color. For example, blue represents peaceful, white represents pure, and so on. For most people, red is associated with danger, horror, blood and etc.  Dull yellow is associated with caution. When these two colors and the other dark colors are used together, they created a terrific feeling for this story. When comparing with the template, the template is so flat and dull by using black and white only, which leaves people boring impression and not much emotion can be created. However, making good use of colors is also vital for creating a 'right' emotion. If this comic used the light colors like pink and orange, it cannot create a scared atmosphere.

The second reason is the use of description on the top of the frames. Even though this piece of comic keeps the original storyline, it added more descriptions on each frame, which create a different perception on the story.  Unlike most of the comics only use dialogue and images to present the story, making good use of descriptions can help the readers to have better understanding on the story and lead them to the author’s expected atmosphere. For example, if we hid the description by just looking at the second frame, we may imagine that the man was looking at somewhere only. However, by adding the description like “Unknown Force” and “Inexorably”, it created a mysterious atmosphere on it.  It also aroused readers’ curiosity to finish reading. From this, we can see that words can influence how a person interprets a story and their perspectives.

Last but not least, the whole idea of this piece of comic is the reason why I like it .  When comparing with the template, this one is much more attractive and exciting.  The original one is so flat that simply describe what is happening on the main character without any climax.  For me, the original one stay in my mind for short period only while this piece of comic lasts longer.  By adding different elements like colors and extra descriptions on the same storyline, it totally changed the story genre from (maybe) comedy into horror, creating another experience for the audience.  It also surprised me because I couldn't imagine how the author can use the same storyline to create a totally different genre, but turn out he succeeded. 

I appreciated this idea because it perfectly showed how words and images cooperate each other to create another level of enjoyment and experience for the audience with the same storyline. It also presented how colors can influence one’s perspective and its importance on building story atmosphere as well.