What is the role of text in photo publishing?
Apologies for the late posting...
Text and imagery have always been linked in publications, and the role text plays in accompanying photos in publications is widely varied.
Text, letters, language have always been primal tools in communication. There are some things that an image can not capture, that a written description may. The majority of photos are very much so fixed in time, for after all they are taken within a single moment that has past. Text can provide information beyond what we can see or ever know regardless of how much we study the picture. It can provide us with a background to the origins of the image, in for example its exact time and location, information about the scenario they were placed within or things external to the frame of the image. Biographys on the publisher and the artist themself is very much common to be released alongside images. At times, in order to understand more conceptual imagery, text can provide information on related theories and movements that the images may be associated with in order to gain a full understanding and appreciation of the work. Though the saying goes a picture is worth a thousand words, a few words combined with that picture makes the picture a thousand times larger.
Text, is also used by the artist themselves within the composition of the image, where photographers have written alongside their images, at times in a poetic manner (Duane Michals, Robert Frank), or at times in the factual manner, right alongside their imagery. Photographers have traditionally kept writing to a minimum, with their strongest form of communication assumed to be in the imagery and not in their words.
Steichen's Masterprints book is an example of text used alongside the imagery to procide background to a time around when the picture was taken. The text varies from letters, to extracts from conversations, to personal diary-style entries. The text is not always directly linked to the content of the image, but in the prose, and emotions felt in the writing an aura is created around the images.
Text is also linked to imagery in a graphical sense, where the combination of text within imagery is used in a very symbolic manner.
Advertising and promotion is virtually non existent without the use of text or symbolic logo to back it up. At times too much text can be seen as the company who is really trying to connect, whereas in the form of a graphic logo, or one worded brand names, it is more about the package of the two that comes together to provide consumption needs.
Recently text in photo publications, has come one step further through the help of photo blogging. People can now interact with text to one anothers images. To express opinions on the images, ask questions, and debate issues raised amongst a vast community ranging from professionals to just somebody who has something to say the opportunity to express ones self through words directly to the publisher seems easier than ever. In showing a history of all that has been said it avoids questions being repeated, and provides an extended background on the image.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/christinawill/6865934/
Text and imagery have always been linked in publications, and the role text plays in accompanying photos in publications is widely varied.
Text, letters, language have always been primal tools in communication. There are some things that an image can not capture, that a written description may. The majority of photos are very much so fixed in time, for after all they are taken within a single moment that has past. Text can provide information beyond what we can see or ever know regardless of how much we study the picture. It can provide us with a background to the origins of the image, in for example its exact time and location, information about the scenario they were placed within or things external to the frame of the image. Biographys on the publisher and the artist themself is very much common to be released alongside images. At times, in order to understand more conceptual imagery, text can provide information on related theories and movements that the images may be associated with in order to gain a full understanding and appreciation of the work. Though the saying goes a picture is worth a thousand words, a few words combined with that picture makes the picture a thousand times larger.
Text, is also used by the artist themselves within the composition of the image, where photographers have written alongside their images, at times in a poetic manner (Duane Michals, Robert Frank), or at times in the factual manner, right alongside their imagery. Photographers have traditionally kept writing to a minimum, with their strongest form of communication assumed to be in the imagery and not in their words.
Steichen's Masterprints book is an example of text used alongside the imagery to procide background to a time around when the picture was taken. The text varies from letters, to extracts from conversations, to personal diary-style entries. The text is not always directly linked to the content of the image, but in the prose, and emotions felt in the writing an aura is created around the images.Text is also linked to imagery in a graphical sense, where the combination of text within imagery is used in a very symbolic manner.
Advertising and promotion is virtually non existent without the use of text or symbolic logo to back it up. At times too much text can be seen as the company who is really trying to connect, whereas in the form of a graphic logo, or one worded brand names, it is more about the package of the two that comes together to provide consumption needs.
Recently text in photo publications, has come one step further through the help of photo blogging. People can now interact with text to one anothers images. To express opinions on the images, ask questions, and debate issues raised amongst a vast community ranging from professionals to just somebody who has something to say the opportunity to express ones self through words directly to the publisher seems easier than ever. In showing a history of all that has been said it avoids questions being repeated, and provides an extended background on the image.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/christinawill/6865934/
posted by lens_blur at 12:07 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home