Proposal: Visual Argument / Rhetorical Collage

[benmiller314]

Write a brief proposal for your visual rhetoric project. What idea or argument will you try to represent? What claim will you try to make – or, at least, what is the triggering idea (starting point) of that claim?

See the full range of thought-questions in the assignment prompt for brainstorming strategies.

NB: I am asking you to include a prospective assets list, i.e. a table of the images you think you'll need and where you might be able to source them. You can choose to include that assets list here or place it as a file in your repository, to more easily track changes.

Either way, please include a link here to your visual-argument repository, making it easier to find when we get to group work.

Due as homework before lesson 12 (which is on October 8th).

[racheljfu]

In my visual rhetoric project I want to argue that there are lots of benefits and usages of public libraries, to show that there is much more that you can do there than just read books and study. For example, you can do research projects, play instruments and do crafts, learn new skills such as budgeting and gardening, meet new people through clubs, listen to guest speakers, learn a new language, watch movies or play games, etc.

In my final image / product I want to display different people / groups of people alongside a bookshelf (or maybe multiple bookshelves) who are engaging in some of these activities. The side of the bookshelf will list the names of some of the activities, and then the main text of the image will say something like "Support your local library...it's not just about books."

I plan on utilizing a more minimalist, cartoonish style (think of the drawings that Duolingo uses, something like that).

I go into more detail with this in my assets file. There's more information in there about the images, fonts, etc. I'm planning to use.

Here is my repository--you can find everything in there.

[kevinikea]

For my visual rhetoric project, I want to do something about sports. People often talk about the "G.O.A.T." (greatest of all time) in sports as something they hold to a high standard, so I thought that we could do something that I feel hasn't really been touched on by major media outlets like ESPN and Fox Sports. Who is the greatest "G.O.A.T." of all time? Which of the 4 major sports (hockey, baseball, football, basketball) "G.O.A.T."s is really the best of them?

For design purposes I really like the idea of having a bracket style tournament set up with the 4 major sports "G.O.A.T."s. Putting an iconic picture (barring copyright and all that jazz) at each of the contenders corners of the bracket would look nice I think. Outlining basic stats (font wise I want something like ESPN's bold text on their Instagram posts) for "G.O.A.T." conversation (i.e. championships) somewhere near the player would look great too. I was thinking of putting the primary colors of each "G.O.A.T."'s uniform as a background. It might not be the most visually appealing thing though, so I'll see where it goes and adjust as I go. I'm not going to fill out the bracket, as it will be up to the audience to decide who they think the greatest "G.O.A.T." of all time. Sports are always being debated, so why not put that into my argument? I'm also gonna put some literal goats in this piece as it is a clash of "G.O.A.T."s.

Here is my potential asset file.

[fathimashabnam]

For my visual argument, I want it to center around wildlife and habitat conservation. Recently, I have been watching a lot of nature documentaries, and despite being aware of nature threats, I was nonetheless surprised at the extent of neglect shown toward the issue of biodiversity conservation. The negative impacts of deforestation, poaching, introducing invasive species (including domestic pets), and climate change on different species that share this Earth are profound and heartbreaking. We tend to ignore issues that we don’t see and don't directly affect us, but we fail to realize that in the long term, losing beautiful aspects of nature will certainly impact future generations.

This is the message and reminder I hope to convey with my visual argument. To do this, I plan to create a "timeline" of sorts with humans on the left to pictures of recently endangered species in the middle and extinct animals on the right. Above this, there will be a heart rate flat lining, showing the limited time left. The extinct animals will be below the flat line part of the heart rate and I am considering making the extinct animals grayscale. I'm leaning toward using a quote like “The greatest danger to our future is apathy” (by Jane Goodall), but I am unsure if it's more powerful to let the audience derive the purpose. I am also considering putting words like “deforestation”, “poaching” etc faded in the text part of the image if I don't end up using a quote.

Here is a link to my repository

[epesetsky]

With my visual argument, I plan to represent the extensive problem of pollution in our oceans and the effect it has on marine wildlife. My claim will have something to do with the harm to these animals, although I am still cleaning up this idea. This is somewhat of a hot topic in recent years and I am sure that there are thousands of visual arguments making this same claim to reduce waste and clean up the oceans. For me, I think the vast contrast between happy turtles and other marine wildlife, swimming in these beautiful blue/green waters, next to old soggy cigarettes, broken glass and plastic threatening their lives creates something difficult yet achievable. This aspect is one I am excited to work with in creating my visual argument.

Here is a link to my prospective assets.

Here is a link to my repository.

[ajs1102]

For my visual argument, I would like to convince others to play dungeons and dragons. My claim will simply be that the viewer should join my D&D campaign. My visual argument will most likely center around two things: the social aspect of D&D (snacks, drinks, friends, etc...), and the story aspect (adventure, treasure, quests, etc...).

I was thinking that part of the image can be dedicated to art of giants, dragons, caves, and treasure, and the other can be dice, pizza, and character sheets. Then in the center I could have text with a more explicit argument, and giving contact information and details.

Here is a link to my repository EDIT: Because lfs was not working with the original repository, I made a new repo before the solution was found. I've updated the link to the new repository.

[fatemaquaid987]

For this project, I will make use of visual rhetoric to convince people that climate change is real. For Millions of years, humans have inhabited the planet we call Earth today and all of us know to some extent that our day to day activities and luxuries are affecting the climate of this vulnerable planet we live in. However, what we fail to realize is the extent to which this change has progressed over the course of years. Despite several global conferences on global warming and climate change, this issue meets no fate, giving us the impression that climate change is not real or at least not as critical. With this impression, we delve into our same to day to day activities realizing little that the earth is going to die someday. This needs to change. The mindset that 'climate change is not critical' needs to be lifted and for that, it is important to zoom into the 'real' picture of our planet. The picture we have painted ourselves. I will use GIMP as the digital editing software to create a poster that will display on one side, how we think our earth is and on the other, its harsh (zoomed in ) reality- the reality we have painted our selves.

Here is a link to my repository which contains my assets list.

[cjc162]

For my visual argument, I would like to convey the message of how technology such as phones, tablets, computers, etc are slowly taking over things such as books, newspapers, and traditional toys. As technology continues to progress, we see more and more people preferring to use phones and tablets over books. To convey this, I would like to have the newer technology destroying the older items in someway.

I have a couple different ideas but the main one I am focusing on is having some type of boot stepping on the older items and destroying them. In the boot, will be the names of the newer technology items with certain letters highlighted to spell another word that is yet to be determined.

My repository with assets

[jlatiniii]

For my project, I would like to utilize visual rhetoric to argue that neglecting to vaccinate your children/yourselves can have serious consequences. The population of anti-vaxxers has increased drastically ever since the early 2000s based off of false research. My goal is to emphasize the importance of herd immunity and how it protects the lives of those who are too young or cannot receive vaccinations due to health reasons. Thus, anti-vaxxers are putting lives at risk by refusing to vaccinate their children. I will portray this by having a herd of cows surrounding young children (representing herd immunity) and the anti-vaxxers shooting at the cows, ultimately destroying this protective barrier between the young children and the pathogens.

Here is my assets list.

[ram716]

For my visual argument, I would like to show the political divide of the USA. As it is, it's practically impossible to escape politically charged news nowadays. Most outlets are either left-leaning or right-leaning and tend to target the same audience on a variety of issues: immigration, taxation, healthcare, energy production, climate change, military spending, etc.

I plan on incorporating these ideas as images into the word "AMERICA". To create division I plan on noticeably breaking the R in half (vertically) where the ideologies of two largest political parties in the USA (Democrats & Republicans) clash. I might use an outline of the USA to frame the word and to add other supporting background images (TBD).

Assets list

Repo Link

[emaur]

For my visual rhetoric project, my argument is hidden in the question I will pose: What is art? I am arguing that there is no concrete definition of art; what one may consider to be art is entirely subjective. Because I am framing my argument as a question, it forces the reader to ponder it and question what is or isn’t considered art. I am not arguing that some pieces are art and some aren’t — I am arguing that art can be or mean a multitude of different things to a variety of people.

I am striving to produce a chaotic image, which I hope will allow my question to stand out more. The question will be in bright colors, whereas all the images will be in dark colors or less saturated. It will also appear chaotic because of the collage-esque design I am hoping to achieve. My plan is to overlap images of controversial works with quotes about them, and then place the question over all of that.

Here is the link to my repo.

[wsc9]

For my visual rhetoric project, I want to show the dangers of traumatic brain injuries, and chronic traumatic encephalopathy in combat sports. This type of campaign would rely a lot on evoking pathos from a viewer, so I am going to go heavily in that direction. My main argument is more towards awareness of what can happen if you over do it in the octagon or boxing ring, and less a specific argument. It will be more in line with the Peta advert we saw in class.

The main idea behind it, is a dark and empty arena with a boxing ring in its center. There is only one person left in the ring, a showed figure bent over on the stool. The copy will say something along the lines of “sometimes when you leave it all in the ring, you leave behind more than you bargained”. It will most likely be cleaner and more succinct than that. The asset list is going to be fairly small I believe. All I really need is the ring, and the fighter. Most of my work is going to be done in GIMP, manipulating images, creating my desired font, shading, blending, and masking.

[emmaknaub]

I've been having a difficult time for the past couple of days trying to think of an argument for my project. I've had a lot of ideas, but most of them boiled down to the simple argument that people should be able to do what they want with their own lives. We, as a society, are so quick to judge others for how they dress, how they identify, what they do, etc., but if they're not hurting anyone then who cares? It shouldn't matter what choices people make with their lives, because it's their lives. As long as they're not harming anyone with the things they're doing, then they don't deserve to be criticized. So, I guess my argument is that people should stop judging others and just mind their own business.

I think I want to approach this by using pictures of people who represent things that people are often criticized about. I'll add text that asks something like, "What's 'different' about these people?" and then "Who cares?" and add something about if they're not hurting you or anyone else, then worry about your own life, not theirs. I might want to shift this more towards a focus of being kind to others, because as I'm writing this, it seems a little harsh. I'll make that decision once I work with the project for a bit, though.

Here is my assets list.

[brittanybenson8]

For my Visual Argument, I want to shine a light on pollution. I once saw an article that said in 25 years we will have to enter the ocean in hazmat suits. While I have no idea how true or false this statement is, but it has stuck with me. I feel like when we see picture of polluted beaches, they are usually deserted so it makes the problem feel distant. I feel like a lot of people have the mindset that beaches I go to aren't covered in trash, so the problem doesn't effect me. At the rate we are going, soon all of our beaches will be polluted.

I want my argument to show a future setting where people are trying to enjoy themselves on a beach covered in garbage. I think showing people attempting to have fun in an undesirable setting will show how real this problem actually is. I am hoping it will acknowledge the fact that people tend to take their clean beaches for granted.

Here is the link to my repo: https://github.com/brittanybenson8/visual-argument-2019fall

[jadenash21]

For my project, I am going to visually argue the importance of mental health. I decided mental health would be a great issue to depict since it is an internal struggle. Since mental health struggles can reference many difficulties, I want showcase how people with anxiety feel internally, while often times putting on a confident face. To do this, I plan on showing a person who seems put together on the outside, but being pulled in many directions as they try to completely attend to all their commitments that they are dedicated to. Above the person's head, I want to display all thoughts that the person is thinking about at the one moment.

I think my target audience will be young adults and parents of these people who are a part of a generation that may not understand the expectations of today's society. I want my claim to question about our generation's happiness and ask people to consider the importance of their commitments. I am excited to see how this argument will provoke a proper discussion about mental health. https://github.com/jadenash21/visual-argument/blob/master/assets & https://github.com/jadenash21/visual-argument

[rmr78]

For my visual argument, I want to argue that all people should be treated the same, no matter what gender or sexuality they are. For some reason, this is always a controversial issue; however, it is an issue that I feel very passionate about arguing for. I think more people need to stand up for these issues, especially for transgender and non-binary people. My visual will represent the fact that everybody is the same on the inside, we are all people, so we should be treated the same. We should not be treated differently based on who we love or how we identify.

Here is a link to my assets list: https://github.com/rmr78/Visual-Rhetoric-Proposal-/blob/master/Assets