Urban symbols, icons and Semiotics

Symbols and icons can have many different meanings and history's behind them

and it can mean different things to other people with different cultures or religious view.

Semiotics is the study of symbols and icons as well as the study of there definitions to the many different peoples, experiences  and cultures.

in modern day Semiotics study a much deeper meaning of  a symbol 

studying how effects  on a certain person , the way it is used in communication

,,the way they are organized and the context in which they are used. 

Charles Sanders Perice a philosopher recognized  in modern times as the founder of modern semiotics

Hi's work was less concerned with the meaning but more concerned on how people  recognise the world and the things in them. 

Perice invented a system of three different types of symbols to allow them to be recognized easier. 

1. icon 














An icon is a sign that resembles something such as a photograph of a persion , it can also be an
illustrative or diagrammatic like this stop sign



2. Index 

a index sign is something that relates to an object or location this 
sign relates to the location telling the person that it is the location of a bathroom. 



3. Symbols 

 A symbol will have no logical connection to the object there are many symbols on and off the computer screen one could be the symbol for a web hompage but this would be usually represented

by a house these two have no connection bar the name 

a example of a symbol in real life could be a flag for nation which will also have no connection but will represent it. 

all these types are often used on the internet to help users to navigate from page to page and help the user distinguish information. 

Urban Semiotics 

An urban semiotics system is a system of symbols and icons located in urbanized areas to 

hep locate areas ,designate problems or distinguish different areas or  useful points of interest

such as train stations ,shopping areas or schools 

and example of these would be the sybol for a zoo on a sign could be a elephant or the symbol for 

a parking space could be a capital P as these are associated with there designated locations. 

C.R.AP. Work

C.R.A.P. is good design 

C.R.A.P.  Stands for Contrast.repetition,Alignment and proximity four key standard used in design to convay a message or navigate properly mostly for websites.

i have examples of some below.

 This web page shows a few of the C.R.A.P principles however the most prominent is Alignment
for example the main context of the page has been centered between the margins not only to allow the background to standout but also to centeralise the the information also the illustration and text bubble are connected together to create one function this is also seen below as the image to the left and the text to the right of it also work together in this way.
another principle that can be found is repletion within the texts as the heading within the speach bubble   as well as the sub-heading are the same colour and similar font.
the last Principe visible is  the proximity principle shown hear by the distance between the main heading and illustration and the information below.



















this image shows mostly the proximity perspective using the rule to manipulate negative space and allow the human eye to create the image there are two examples in this image the first being the out line of the dog being created by were the pattern of zeros stops and the white space starts ,the second
being the white space contrasting with the black dots,eyes and nose.

There is also a example of alignment in this image with the zeros in the background aligned horizontally to help create the dog image
 

This image shows the principle of contrast mainly between the flower and the background manipulating the colours of the image for example the colour used for the background is a darker colour even ot of the flowers shadow which slightly dominates the background but also as the image itself is slightly blurred out of vision to allow the brighter and more various colour scheme of the flower to stand out even thow it has not been aligned within the center. 

This image shows Two  of the principles that work together to create the images affect 

the First alignment of the steps,the space between each of the steps and the spaces within the steps 

creates the look of perfection and uniformity with both the steps and the shadows they create 

Secondly repetition is obviously used in the image  created by the continuous perfect alignment of the steps creating  the image.

This image clearly uses alignment to convey its message  as the road and the road lines all 

perfectly move straight forward in the direction of the horizon not only does this convey depth within the image but also creates a sence of motion or movement. 

 

Visual communication in art 

02 ideograms 

An ideograph is a symbol that represents a hole idea rather than one word or numerical unit it is often used for way finding a example might be the representation of a key location E.g a air port,train station or docks they are also used in Arabic numerals and mathematics which are used globally. 

in this picture the symbols based within the upper most parts of the book could be describing or showing a scene or perhaps important information

Cuneiform

Cuneiforms were created by a ancient society in southern iraq over five-thousand years ago known as the sumerians due to there society expanding and beoming extremly large and complex however rather than imploying a wrighting system for the purpose of  storys or documentation but ratther it took on a more bureocratic tone creating a system of  symbols to represent a number of diffrent things like numbers,words or the sounds of words.

The standard for the documentation was to be written on squares of clay mostly becuase the matriel was plentiful as well as reuseable but also becuase the "reed stylus" would create the imprints easly on the surface, the tip of the  reed styluses was stroked onto the surface creating a wedged shaped
symbol which is why it is called a  "cuneiform" as this translates from latin to "wedge-shaped"
in addition the slabs of clay could be molded into diffrent shapes like cones or shperes for diffrent purposes.

This system of wrighting has inspired many others to imploy a similiar system the most famous of which includes the old persian cuniforms a simplified version created from there own alphabets.

The literal meaning of this set of cuneiforms could represent a documentation of sorts
accounting numbers of objects or even pepole.
The more abstract definition could be a depiction of some sort of story or event
as some of the cuneiforms seem to be shaped like humans or animals.

Hireoglyphs

hireoglyphs were a system of symbols and drawings created in ancient egypt to communicate storys or important events,hireoglyphs are made up of three types phonetic glyphs a single symbol that represents one thing alone like letters found in the alaphabet , logographs which represent morphemes
and determantives and ideograms which simplfy the maning of phonetic glyphs and logographs
threw out the ears of the three kingdoms (old,middle and new) over 700 hireoglyphs had been used by the time of the Greco-Roman period its estimated over 5,000 hireoglyphs had been created.

This seris of hireglyphics could literally described
the ascension of a pharaos,
the abstract meaning could tell the story of
a pharaos being granted life or after life by what could be Ra
the egytpian god of the sun one of the most important figures in egypt
and usally represented by a strange eye symbol located in the top left and right of this picture.

Visual communication in art  

01 Cave Art 

petroglyphs 

Dateing back to at least 10,000 BC used by pre-historic  cultures usually neolithic peoples

many different styles cn be found world wide but each of them hold the same amount of secrecy in Language or definition.     

 

The literal meaning of this image is that the carving may be representation of daemons or monsters of some form or prehaps telling a story including these strange creatures.

The abstract meaning could be a religious meaning based around gods/religous symbols 

and there contrast with different aspects of life like time witch could be represented by the small circle the firgure is carrying in the image as these continuous circles were meant to represent their thought of time cyclical.  

           Cave paintings 

 Cave paintings are paintings painted inside caves, on the walls ad the ceilings these paintings have been created since the upper paleolithic estimated to be about 40,000 years ago, the paintings are most often based around wild animals and hum figures a rare and usually very vague, historians believe the paintings are the works of elders of the tribes or religious chiefs know as shamans. 

the literal meaning seems to be to record a hunting event or to record a encounter with a new/Different

Creature. 

the abrstrat meaning is the unknown language or

form of communication to reference something culturially important

           Geo glyphs

 geo glyphs are large drawings on the ground or motifs which are generally larger than 4 meters 

the largest of these is known as The Nazca Lines located in the Nazca Desert stretching 53 miles 

from the town of Nazca and the town of pal-pa in Peru, however there are many more similar to these around the globe including Australia,Scandinavia,Iceland and parts of the former Soviet union. 

it is thought there general use of these glyphs are to be viewed  by there gods but for what purpose remains a mystery though people ether (inaccurately )  accuse it of being for the purpose of terrestrial

travelers as well as assuming the tribes men were added by these creatures because of the mathematical accuracy shown by the glyphs as well as the tools required are thought to be more advanced than this culture however studies have shown that even with today's tools its is possible and very easy to be accomplished by a small group in under 48 hours , therefore many experts believe 

that considering the possible man power  of the tribes it is possible to achieve these feats with no foreign intervention. 

 

the literal meaning seems to be just depicting a creature like a spider or other insect perhaps to be viewed by a god for religious purposes similar to rituals

the abstract meaning could be to represent achievement or serve religious purposes.

  

What i did today

a brain storm created by using bubble us a free brainstorm creation software the brainstorm was used to create a story path and plan out how the story is told and the Oder in which he story's sequences plan out.

A Ying Yang Created with the path tool in illustrator  on 10/1/11