Importance of Photographs & Visuals
How important is a photograph and visual? That is the main question in today’s day and age where we live in a time of social media and heavy technology usage. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and it definitely is. Photography was developed with a heavy appeal in Western Europe and the U.S in the 19th century. Photojournalism began to develop right after newspapers found a way to get visuals in their readings. Because of this, photography became the stories and had a heavy influence to certain events. Looking at a picture is still very much different than watching a movie or show on television because when you look at a visual that doesn’t move, it gives you time to react, feel emotions, and think about the visual. Photography plays a role in freezing time for the viewer because while it is a still photo, it gives you time to look at the picture in terms of the way its sculpted, what’s going on in the image and looking in depth within the photo.
Let’s talk about the story behind the picture of the Afghan Girl. This photo was taken in 1984 by Steve McCurry commissioned by National Geographic in the refugee camps of Afghanistan and Pakistan. He had traveled 30 camps but at the Nasir Bagh camp which was a girls school, he came across a girl in a class of 15 named Sharbat Gula. This Girl stood out the most amongst everyone because of her green eyes which he depicted as haunting, penetrating and intense. When Steve McCurry had taken the photo of the girl, she covered her face with her hands but her teacher told her to show her face and let the world see her story. This is a perfect example of the famous saying “ A picture is worth a thousand words.”
I think your comment "a picture is worth a thousand words" was a great way to express your thought process when analyzing a photo. I used the same analogy so when I read up to that point in your blog, I got even more interested in the post, it was nice to see somewhat similar aspects in someone else's blog.
ReplyDelete-Usman CASD 1643
I enjoyed your blog post as it was informative and interesting and illustrated the importance and meaning behind photographs, Images allow us to freeze time and capture crucial moments in one’s life and our history.Additionally, images allow us to look into various worlds from the view of images.
ReplyDeleteGreat blog post! I really enjoyed your visuals. A picture is definitely worth a thousand words, they tend to have so many different meanings and interpretations. When we start to analyze an image more we begin to notice things that we wouldn’t have with just a first glance. Photographs are also a great form of communication, they lure out so many emotions such as anger, happiness, sadness etc. Photographs are also great for capturing monumental movement's in history, to this day we still have photographs of martin Luther king during his famous “I have a dream” speech and it will certainly stick with us forever.
ReplyDelete-Akilah Pereira CASD1643
This is a very thoughtful blog post. I love how you gave a little history behind pictures and photography. Then used Sharbat Gula as a perfect example, very well done. The picture that Steve took is known all around the world. The piercing eyes looking at the camera tells a story that was heard from countries to countries. This shows how a picture "is worth a thousand words." Keep up the good work!
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