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 and/or in lesson 10 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 in your repository (whether as its own file or in the README), to more easily track changes as the list moves from prospective to actual assets.

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

[altrnate]

For my visual rhetoric project, I would like to continue the theme of appreciating the mundane. Similar to the message of my audio project, I want to visually remind people that while a mundane life may seem negative at times, it is important to remember "interesting" isn't always a good thing; there could be fires, flooding, illness, financial struggles, etc. While one person might view the routine of getting ready and going to work, others desperately desire to have that normalcy in their lives. As you can see below, I plan to represent this by showing the same tree (no reason for the tree and subject to change) in different panels undergoing individual hardships, with one "boring" tree with nothing happening to it. The word underneath each panel would have a font that matches its respective condition.

Assets

Asset	Source
Tree (Pine?)	Upsplash
Fire	Upsplash
Storm clouds	Upsplash
Rain	Make Myself
Water level	Upsplash
Thermometer	Noun Project
Ice pack	Noun Project
Money symbol	Noun Project
2x4s	Noun Project
Fire font	Font Squirrel
Water font	Font Squirrel
"Boring" Font	Font Squirrel
Broken Font	Font Squirrel
Ill? Font	Font Squirrel

[arianakeith]

For my visual rhetoric project, I would like to create an ad for Patagonia surrounding a nature theme to represent how their brand surrounds sustainability and protecting our environment. I would like to include a picture of a lake and then add in hikers and/or people in a kayak. I will include text in the collage image to make my claim clear, that Patagonia wants you to buy the products the individuals in the image are wearing, but you should buy from them because they are actively doing their part to protect the surroundings these individuals are exploring in. My target audience is consumers who enjoy the outdoors and are looking to purchase apparel for this kind of activity.

Link to repository: https://github.com/arianakeith/visual-argument-2023spring Link to asset list: https://github.com/arianakeith/visual-argument-2023spring/blob/main/assets.md

[jannawohl]

I would like to focus my project around the negative effects of social media and how this impacts people’s mental health. I feel like this is a very prevalent issue in modern times, and while it is certainly an issue people are aware of, it is also something people chose to ignore. So, for this project, I would like to make it an informative graphic yet also something that motivates people to start doing something about this issue. I have been thinking about what potential graphics I could include in this project, and I am thinking I want to do something with pill bottles. Many people take medication for anxiety and depression, which are issues that arise from social media addiction. It seems like the impact of social media on our bodies is extremely overpowering and taking this medication means nothing; the only thing in life that matters is being glued to our phones and having a presence on social media. So, the goal of this idea is to have social media likes, comments, filters, and other social media related concepts coming out of these pill bottles to show that this is what people think they need in life to cure their mental health. This obviously could totally change, but it is an initial idea I had for this project/topic.

Prospective Assets list: Pill Bottles - Internet Pill Box - Internet Instagram Like/Comment Button - Internet (screenshot from the app) Social Media Logos - Internet

Link to my project repository: https://github.com/jannawohl/visual-argument-2023spring

[suchiattota]

Proposal

For my visual argument project I am planning to build upon my audio narrative project. I am trying to create a visual representation of my audio narrative, it could be thought of as a movie poster or a thumbnail picture for the audio narrative. My audio narrative followed the story of two roommates burying a dead body in the woods and was titled "The Cover-up". So, for my visual representation I plan on using the woods as the main background. The tress would be what we mainly see in the image along with a large title, same title as the audio narrative. I plan to like include hints of the story in this image. Some ideas to do so are, including small sized silhouettes of two people holding the shovel somewhere in the forest, a small car far in the forest, and try to have the title/letters itself give a hint like a shovel outline inside the letter U and coyote outline in the letter O.

Prospective Assets List

Image	Source
Woods	Upsplash
Silhouettes	Upsplash
Shovel	The Noun Project
Coyote	The Noun Project
Car	Upsplash
Title	Font Squirrel

Project repository

https://github.com/suchiattota/visual-argument-2023spring

[michaelpacifico]

Proposal:

For my visual rhetoric project, I'd like to create a piece about inflation at Disney World. I think the disparities between Disney World, being the "happiest place" in the world, but costing so much that it's not financially accessible to everyone. I'd like to make the claim that Disney World is only for rich folk that don't see money as a worry and that even if you save enough to go, you'll set yourself back financially by making this investment in buying tickets to Disney World.

Prospective Assets List:

Mickey Mouse - Internet "Adobe Stock Photos" Top Hat - Internet "Adobe Stock Photos" Cane - Internet "Adobe Stock Photos" Globe - Internet "Adobe Stock Photos" Disney World - Internet "Adobe Stock Photos" Monopoly Game - Internet "Adobe Stock Photos" Font - Internet "Humble Bundle"

Repository:

https://github.com/michaelpacifico/visual-argument-2023spring

[lks50]

The unusually warm walk I had to the Cathedral last Thursday, and the loop writing we did in class, inspired my visual argument. For this assignment, I want to bring attention to the drastic temperature fluctuations the city of Pittsburgh has experienced in the last 20 years. I am planning to design my visual argument to resemble the iPhone’s weather app. I am going to show 3 temperatures on the same day, ten years apart. Below the temperatures I am going to create a warning banner calling for action. I will incorporate mostly cool colors, especially shades of blue, with a few accents of warmer colors for contrast. I imagine the background of my design will be a shade of blue, similar to the weather app, but I would love to play around with gradients or other texturing tools to make the design more interesting. Additionally, I anticipate using graphics for snowflakes, clouds, and the sun. I would like to layer a landscape, or something interesting, along the bottom of the page to make the design more engaging.

https://github.com/lks50/visual-argument-2023spring

Prospective Asset List

Needs	Solutions
Snowflake graphic	The Noun Project
Cloud graphic	The Noun Project
Sun graphic	The Noun Project
Attention logo (triangle with exclamation mark)	Create by drawing
Climate change landscape	Uplash
Text	Font Squirrel

[MikeBailey412]

For my visual argument, I want to make an ad for the band Linkin Park's latest single release, "Lost." I want to focus on how we as humans go through hardships in life and how life can be challenging in general. A lot of their music talks about dealing with life, the pain we experience, and bottling up our emotions. I think that if some people give their music a listen, it could really benefit them due to the messages expressed in their music, especially if that said person is going through a tough time in their life. I know Linkin Park's music has benefited me in this way, and I hope it will for others.

Prospective Assets:	Sounds	Sources
Album Covers	CC-BY-NC
Linkin Park Logo	CC-BY-NC
Linkin Park on Stage	Fair Use
Chester Bennington	Fair Use
Mike Shinoda	Fair Use
Some kind of font	Font Squirrel

Repository

[josieharris1]

My visual rhetoric project will shed light on the influences self-love and self-care have on mental health, which is supported by psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. His ideology states that in order to reach a state of self-actualization, which will allow someone to experience their fullest potential and truest self driven by motivation, they must satisfy the steps it takes to get there, which include esteem, relationships, safety, and the basics. My visual argument will be inspired by a bouquet of flowers, showing how different environmental factors like being watered and seeing sunlight will affect their growth and prosperity. My goal is to reflect human mental health from the physical health of the flowers, which depends on how well they are both being taken care of. I may use my own drawings of flowers as inspiration for the graphics, and include two bouquets and two environments: a healthy bouquet and a positive environment surrounded by sunlight, and an unhealthy bouquet and a negative environment surrounded by darkness.

Prospective Asset List Background images (clouds, darkness) - Unsplash Flower bouquets - Hand drawn Flower vases - Unsplash Text - Font Squirrel

https://github.com/josieharris1/visual-argument-2023spring

[BenA03]

GitHub Repo

Proposal

I want my visual argument to revolve around a simple message but something I think is very important: "Wear a helmet". While I think this message has been conveyed pretty decently to most people, whether it be in grade school or from parents, I notice a lot of people disregard this advice, probably because helmets are pretty inconvenient to carry around, and most adults are capable enough at whatever they're doing (biking, skateboarding) that they don't feel the need to wear one. However, I think that it's better here to be safe than sorry, and a helmet should always be worn during an activity that could end in a collision.

To state my message, I want to make a small, 4 panel collage that features activities where helmets should be worn, with centered text that explicitly advocates for helmet use.

Asset list

Asset	Intended source
Image of helmet	https://unsplash.com/
Text	https://www.fontsquirrel.com/
Image of people biking (or assets to recreate this scene)	https://unsplash.com/
Image of people skateboarding (or assets to recreate this scene)	https://unsplash.com/
Image of people rock climbing (or assets to recreate this scene)	https://unsplash.com/
Image of riding horses (or assets to recreate this scene)	My own camera roll

Sketch

[alcalaaha]

Proposal

For my visual rhetoric project, I want to do a fantasy D&D-esque propaganda poster encouraging people to join the town's army and to fight against the attacking dragons? goblins? I haven't figured out the enemy yet, but I want to try my hand at creating a poster in a medieval art style. I've been reading a lot of Discworld lately, so that was my main inspiration for doing something more fantasy inspired.

Prospective Assets:

weathered paper background - unsplash swords - hand drawn + unsplash knight - hand drawn dragon - hand drawn ? text - font squirrel

Repository

[Asher-Goods]

Explanation

I was struggling with figuring out what to do. Earlier tonight when I was teaching a class, I showed an image of a map of the Jewish diaspora. The map showed a bunch of red arrows coming out of Israel to show the paths of migration following the forced expulsion of all Jews from the land of Israel in 70 CE. I was explaining how this map was a good representation of how the Jewish diaspora. Today, the Jewish diaspora is still at large (over 9 million.) But, I would like to think that following the creation of the modern state of Israel in 1948, the existence of a Jewish state has allowed Jews to rebuild a beautifully diverse community that has been disconnected for almost 2,000 years. I know that the topic of Zionism is very controversial for some people. I want whoever sees this graphic to understand that this visualization of Jews reconnecting and returning to their ancestral homeland does not mean that I am ignoring or negating a Palestinian narrative. If you would like further clarification on this topic, please feel free to speak with me.

So, after all of that... I decided that I would make a graphic that flips the arrows and illustrates Jews coming from different places all around the world and reconnecting. I wrote in Hebrew in the top right, "עם ישראל חי וקיים" meaning, "The people of Israel are alive and real." This is something we like to say that basically acknowledges that after everything, we are still here.

Assets

Map - Hand Drawn Arrows - Hand Drawn Jewish People Traveling - Hand Drawn Hebrew Writing - Hand Drawn

NOTE: I would like to refine these and add more figures traveling in the future. I would also ideally like to source some images and font from the internet so that it will look better than my god-awful drawings!

[kellenapp]

For my visual rhetoric project, I wanted to do something having to do with disabled people. At first I was considering doing something along the lines of "Anything is possible!" However, I remembered being like 12 in physical therapy and absolutely hating being told that I could do "anything you put your mind to" because some things just are not possible and it's important to understand that. So, even though I guess it is kind of sad, I will be arguing that it is necessary to understand you're limits. There will be text saying something similar to "Some things are just not do-able", the A in "able" will be a person-like-figure (think bathroom signs) with crippled legs (personalizing it to me) and it will be red (haven't decided whether I want to make just the 'A' red, or the whole word red). There will be a light blue background, with other regular figures in a similar shade throughout the background. It should look like a grid of figures all similar color, that look the same to make sure the 'A' figure stands out. The text will probably be grey or another shade of blue. Here is a rough sketch: I get this is kind of depressing but it's definitely something I wish I could go back and tell my younger self, and other people. It also kind of goes against the norm for what to say to someone, so it serves as a good argument. This won't require many assets, but they include: Background - Gradient/design made in photoshop Regular Figures - Hand-drawn (copy and paste) in illustrator 'A' figure - Hand-drawn in illustrator Text - Simple font that is a little bubble-y/curvy found on web Here is my repo: https://github.com/kellenapp/visual-argument-2023spring

[bst20]

For my visual argument project I want to highlight the issue of food insecurity, specifically on college campuses. Oakland itself is a food desert and many students find it increasingly hard to access healthy and affordable food, especially those who don't have the expensive Pitt meal plans. So for my argument I plan to make some type of visual of a desert with a few pieces of food, with text that reads "everyone deserves access to food" and "40% of college students experience food insecurity." My goal with this is to highlight the issue of food deserts and the fact that many students silently suffer with not having proper access to nutritious food.

Asset list:

Photo of desert | The noun project -- | -- Icons/photos of food | The noun project Fonts | Font squirrel Effects/edits | GIMP

https://github.com/bst20/visual-argument-2023spring

[taylorjenkins]

my repo

For this project, I am thinking of involving elements relating to fast fashion and all of the harm it does to the environment and society. I am not completely sure which direction I want to take my message in; there is the issue of excess clothing being dumped into landfills causing harmful chemicals, microfibers from clothing ending up in the ocean and ultimately the food chain causing negative health effects or the practice of sweatshops that some companies use. 

I wanted to highlight the multitudes of clothing in people’s closets that go unused most of the time in contrast with the excess pollution in landfills or oceans. I also wanted to added text that possibly relates to statistics on the issue I choose or some informational elements besides strictly images.  

Background images - ocean or landfill	unsplash
Images of people wearing fast fashionOr fast fashion images in general	unsplash
facts/text	Can type in to image

[juradodiego]

Diego Jurado's Visual Argument Repository

Asset List

For this project, I am thinking of crating an anti-internet of things poster. Internet of Things, or IOT describes physical objects (or groups of such objects) with sensors, processing ability, software and other technologies that connect and exchange data with other devices and systems over the Internet or other communications networks. Some of the more famous examples of IOT tech are Amazon Alexa, Google Home, and other smart speakers. I am not a fan of this tech for privacy violations, and for taking advantage of unknowing users.

The idea is to create a poster that resembles a "Big Brother is Watching You" poster. However, instead of big brother it is an Alexa device with the tagline "I am always listening". I also plan to have an ominous face (playing around with opacity) in the background representing big data & big tech.

[anayoungblut]

Projest Proposal

Admittedly, I have struggled to come up with an idea for my project, though the activity we did in class did help generate some ideas. I think I want to do something with the saying "money doesn't grow on trees," but intertwine it with climate change and forest fires. This isn't a fully developed thought; I plan on attending office hours to hash through it a bit more because I think a visual with this idea would be interesting and a challenge to create, hopefully filling some aspirational criteria.

I also considered doing an anti-smoking campaign poster based on Nike's "Just Do It" slogan, but changing it to say "Don't Do It" or "Just Quit It." With this idea, I would have a cigarette shaped like the well-known Nike swoosh and the slogan underneath, mimicing a Nike advertisement.

Asset	Source
Cigarette	Noun Project
Checkmark	TBD
Trees	Noun Project
Money	Noun Project
Flames	Unspalsh

Link to repository: https://github.com/anayoungblut/visual-argument-2023spring/blob/eac80c1bdfa7fa45cb96a53f428b39c306f713c4/README.md

[eliotann99]

Proposal

For my project, I would like to visually demonstrate the importance of finding a good work-life balance. There are multiple directions I can approach it but I'm not sure which one yet. However, I know that I'll be demonstrating two main outcomes. The first outcome would be materialistic acquisitions that a person would accumulate over time if there were to prioritize a career. The second outcome would be personal experiences they would go through if they were to prioritize other valuables over their career.

Assests

I licensed many photos from Adobe Stock. I will be using only the ones that I think fit in. I pushed them to my Github repo and you can check them at https://github.com/eliotann99/visual-argument-2023spring

[ChrisTroina]

https://github.com/ChrisTroina/visual-argument-2023spring

For my visual argument, I want to show the problems with capitalism, specifically the exploitation of people who have less money as well as the commodification of everything. I plan to show that with a picture of someone in grief from bad finances that is then being sold to investors or something akin to that

Office building | Stock photo -- | -- Business person | Stock photo Person in ruins | Generate myself or stock photo Money | Stock photo Corporate font | TBD

[jordanmarch]

https://github.com/jordanmarch/visual-argument-2023spring

For my visual argument, I am planning on raising questions about our constant, and often unconscious, media consumption. With social media, advertising, and technology everywhere we are always intaking new messages, but often not processing what we're really seeing. I plan to use words along the lines of "we consume but do not digest" to represent my argument and remind my audience to be conscious consumers. I think I want to use images of advertisements/ a lot of screens, something that maybe replicates times square?

I plan to use mostly adobe stock for images, adobe illustrator to create assets I can't find online, but I have to start hunting these assets down and see what I can find to get a better idea.

[skygel]

For my project, I want to create a visual shining light on overconsumption. In today's world, we are constantly consuming whether it's media, products, etc. I would like to make a visual showing the harms of that. As of right now, I think I would like to focus more on the overconsumption of products and items and the effect that can have. I have one idea about how I would like to portray this visually. I think it would be interesting to have a large pile of items and then have a hand reaching out like it is drowning in all of the items. I would then put a quote at the top talking about overconsumption. I'm still not sure what quote or statistic I would like to use yet on the graphic.	Asset	Source
Clothing	Stock Photo
Shoes	Stock Photo
Beauty Products	Stock Photo
Single use bottles	Stock Photo
Old electronics	Stock Photo
Font	TBD