In What Ways Do We Think about Visual Storytelling Every Day?
After reading Seth Gitner, “Visual Storytelling: In What Ways Do We Think about Visual Storytelling Every Day?” Multimedia Storytelling for Digital Communicators in a Multiplatform World, I finally began to understand the meaning of “everyone in life has a story to tell”. Yes, when you meet someone you begin to hear about their life story throughout deep conversations, dinner table talk, etc. but what I didn’t really pay attention to is that we learn a lot more through visual storytelling because it’s so embedded in our day to day communication.
Seth Gitner did a wonderful job with expressing how visual storytelling is evolving in our everyday lives. Visual storytelling has gone from being formed on glass plates, to rolls of film and then present day we have digital images and videos being taken on our mobile phones. Although print media is still around and important, it is slowly being pushed to the shadows with the technology (Cell phones, tablets, etc.) we have now. With glass plates and rolls of film you can only tell so much of your story, with our mobile phones we can tell so much more in the moment. To me, the main idea Gitner was trying to portray to readers is that visual storytelling is pretty much being ingrained into our everyday communication because it tells others more about us than the words that we use.
One assumption and interesting idea that Gitner mentioned is that photography is becoming something easy and for everyone because of digital storytelling. A connection I made to this assumption is that in every moment or situation, you most likely will see someone taking a photograph which can be looked at as practicing photography. After capturing that photo you may see it uploaded onto social media which can be seen as a portfolio that you receive feedback on (likes, shares and comments). With social media platforms your feedback can come back to you faster rather than waiting on a picture to be edited from print media or rolls of film; the evolution of photography while visually storytelling.
The theory of climax was easily grasped because climax is the most used part of visual storytelling. The climax of a moment, which Gitner describes as a short bit of time but also very important. Why is a moment short but important? Well it is the only part people really seem to care about, they rather cut straight to the chase and that’s why visual communication seems so easy, there are shortcuts in telling a story. For example when you witness a fight video, you see bits and pieces of what leads to that fight but the overall pleasurable scene is when the fight actually happens which will be labeled the exact instant (climax).
Even though visual communication has its pros, Gitner also provides some points that some may look at as cons. Gitner talks about how technology is fast and easy to use but then he also speaks on how technology really does not allow us to go deep. I agree with this theory because we normally focus on what’s right in front of us, when focusing on what’s only in front of us we may miss the picture picture of what is trying to be portrayed. A contribution Gitner provides readers are steps and support to become a better image maker or a good image maker.
This text was right on point and touched bases that experienced visual storytellers could connect to and people who are trying to advance their communication visually. The arguments made in this text were hard to disagree with because the author avoided bias which I feel like is usually a problem in text like these. I wouldn’t recommend anything to be changed about this passage, from my point of view this text would not be for someone who doesn’t use social media and mobile phones. It would take someone who is an active user of social media platforms and cellphones to agree with points in the argument. What could be useful is the skills that Gitner talks about that improves photography overall regardless of your device.
This text is something that can be kept as a guide to better visual storytelling and photography in general.
