This is a video I have uploaded from Youtube and I think that anyone especially women who love fashion should watch this. It is about a legendary woman named Coco Chanel. We knew her in Dr Chris's class in our week 3. This is actually just a movie trailer, a biography of the legendary Coco Chanel, of how she started to rebel and make women clothes much more simpler and go against the convention of the society. To me, she is an inspiration, a perfect example for women who wish to be independent in any way. Enjoy! 

When you look at these pictures, the first thing that appears in our mind is 'the perfect' or 'the ideal' family. We see these type of ads everywhere from our milk cartons, TV commercials and also our family portraits. However, we know that these are not always what it looks like right? We know that a real family are not always as happy and all smiles like what we see in these ads or family portraits.But that is what ideology really means, which is to make everything 'look' positive. Well, who would not want to be positive? Everybody does! But in reality, it is not always as positive as what our TV commercials show or how we pose for a family portrait. 

I realized that these type of ads could actually offend certain people. I once had a friend and she always have problems with her family. She usually goes to me and tell me everything about her problems, how she was always being beaten by her father and mother, and that her parents always fight with each other and in the end, they got divorced. She knew that she does not have the perfect family like some people do and this actually makes her angry. I remembered that one morning when we were in the library, we were just reading some random books while waiting for our parents to pick us up, she suddenly threw a book over the desk and sulk. I was surprised and asked her why but she did not answer. So I pick up the book from across the table and found out it was a magazine where the cover shows a beautiful looking people, young and old, hugging and smiling together. The title of the cover was 'Your Family'. I immediately knew why and when I turned to her to comfort her, she was already crying. 

After she looked at the cover of that family magazine, it made her angry thinking how the cover is generalizing it to everyone because it is not true. So every time she sees a picture of a happy family, she would sulk, groan, scowl or just roll her eyes. After the divorce of her parents, she became rebellious and hot-headed. I tried to help her by giving her advice but it did not work. Until now, I do not know where she is but I hope she has changed into someone better.

Therefore, ideology sometimes can alter perception. It depends on our own interpretation and perception of things and sometimes our life affects on how we view things. Positive ads are not always as positive as they think they are and it is possible that these ads could change someone's personality. My friend thought that it is not fair for these type of ads to be widespread because it is not true but we know that it is because of her problematic background. Other people might find those type of ads appealing and nostalgic sometimes. It might remind them of their own family photos which they took during Hari Raya or Christmas.

To conclude, when we ever see any type of ads, we must always put in mind that they are not always what they seem to be. Most of the time they are lying to us, to be honest. They just want us to buy their products or services and maybe indirectly ask us to payback the money they pay for the ads.

Nostalgia basically means the pleasant things that has happened in our past.  They are our memories that are sentimental, beautiful and that we cherish them whenever we think about it. It is what makes us happy and keep us moving on. A person should have at least one or two nostalgic experience or life would be in misery and I  am sure of it.

Whenever I hear this word 'nostalgia' my mind immediately picture a Malay karaoke CD my dad used to have when I was eleven and the album name is Nostalgia. It was a compilation of the greatest Malay singers in the old days and most of the singers are my dad's favorite such as Broery Marantika, P.Ramlee, Sheila Majid and some others. So when Sir Chris asked us 'What is nostalgia?' it made me smile because it reminds me of the CD and also the surprising fact that my dad can sing! I found out that my dad could sing the next day after I saw the CD on his desk. For your information, my dad is a very serious man and it is a rarity to see him in such...personality...I would say.

Other nostalgic things that you keep other than the memories you play in your mind would be photographs, videos, music and perhaps objects. I, for one, would say that I am fortunate to be given my own space in my wardrobe and I have these two huge drawers where I kept all the things of my past such as my diaries, trophies, photo albums, birthday cards and gift wrappers, perfume bottles and some shopping bags and receipts that are memorable and somewhat like souvenirs I intend to keep for memories. I would keep all these safely inside my wardrobe and is strictly forbidden for anyone to touch anything in it. So whenever I feel bored or nothing to do I would just sit there and rummage everything out and I would smile and giggle just by looking at the wonderful treasures I have kept all these years!

Today I am posting about my understanding of the term 'ideology'. Ideology means a set of ideas that has been created by one society and those ideas will be applied to the lives of the people in the society. It is another way of saying the 'ideal' way for everything. For example, men are said to be the dominant sex in most society and women to be inferior. However this does not apply to some societies, some are of the opposite. 

However, in visual communication, ideology would mean that how we perceive and look at things, our ideas and our concepts, depends on our own perspectives, culture and our beliefs. For example, if we see an old man wearing a tutu walking in Bandar, we would laugh or think that the old man has gone mad, right? And if we see a woman wearing a short skirt to pray at the mosque, would you be surprised? So these are some of the things we are not used to see in our everyday lives. But some people might not be surprised by these because they are the things they commonly see in their society. For example, in some countries, women are allowed to wear short skirts in a religious building such as in the church. However in Brunei, women are forbidden to wear as such. And also, in some western countries, there are men wearing tutus, usually for certain events they do. Thus it would not give a greater 'jolt' compare to our society.

Man wearing a tutu, do you see this everyday in Brunei?

Therefore I was wondering, well most of the time, when I go out shopping I usually buy clothes, shoes, bags and basically pretty little things. Since I was a girl, I have been raised to love soft colours like pink and purple, Barbie dolls, little plushies, watch Disney Fairytales and had a dream to be a princess. Until now I  still love the things I love when I was a child. However, my preferences developed into the things a young adult would love such as handbags, cosmetics, lingerie, high heels, shiny things and an ambition that seems to be impossible as a citizen in Brunei to achieve. To be honest, all my life I have always wanted to be a fashion designer who owns her own fashion empire and contribute to her country's economy. But this kind of dreams are not that very much available here so I guess I could just dream about it. :)

These are some of the photos I took. These are some of the things I usually go out shopping for. :)

This is a photo I took from one of the stores in Miri

                                       

Remember when I said that my ambition is to be a fashion designer? 

This is something I created a year ago. I gather all my lipglosses, perfumes and other cosmetics and turn them into a city. My city. I am basically trying to say that my life is practically revolves around fashion and style. To be honest, I am not that stylish and fashionable but I just love fashion! :) And yes, most of the time I always think that this is just going to be one of my fairytale dream but I do not know what the future holds for me. :)

 Two months ago, I was out shopping with my sister in Miri and we were trying on clothes. I picked out some clothes and tried them on in the fitting room. When I got out wearing those clothes I took, my sister went shock! She asked me 'What the hell are you wearing Kak?!' with a very disgusted look. Her expression shows as if I was wearing such ridiculous clothes when I was actually wearing a plain blouse.Therefore,  ideology is created by the things that we used to see in our everyday lives and  should we ever try to change it, it will be hard for us to accept it in our minds. For example, my sister used to see me in certain types of style and when she sees me with a different style, it is hard for her to accept it.But sometimes, when I do change into a different style, my sister would say 'Okay, I'm just going to try to get used to it'. It is the same as how we do not accept the idea an old man wearing a tutu walking in Bandar.

 *Human mind is such a powerful thing that it could change the world just like that. :)

As what you can see, Road Signs. I know it is obvious but these are the things I usually see in my everyday life. Signs that do not just show pictures or images but also telling us something. This is my basic understanding of Visual Communication. Instead of people telling you which to go, symbols like these help us to be safe on the roads. Therefore, the road signs are trying to communicate with us with the images they are showing such as the Bus Stop sign and left and right turn signs. The reason that they give these visual symbols is that so that it is easy for road users to immediately capture the meaning of the symbols shown while they are driving instead of using words or sentences which you need to carefully read them. It could be DANGEROUS! especially for slow and some...careful readers.

Moreover, if you look carefully at the signs above, they have captions under each signs but none of them are the meanings that the signs are showing such as the No Dogs Allowed sign, the caption says Gorgeous Girls Only. What I am trying to say is that people can make different kinds of ideas just by looking at the images.  This is because people have their own perception of things. Some of them are reasonable, such as the Traffic Light sign, the captions says, Disco. It does look like a disco light because it is colourful. However not all the signs above are real road signs, some of them are just jokes. But just imagine if we do put those funny signs on the road, I am sure that there will be people panicking or probably just wondering if the government is crazy or just to think twice whether to follow it or not. But as far as they are concerned, it is the law that we have to obey road signs after all.

SO what I have learned is that signs and symbols are easy to use in order to communicate with people. It is easy to learn and understand than wordy and long sentences. Moreover, it is also another way for the disabled people to communicate such as using braille and sign language.

Here is a short animation I got from Youtube. It is a video promotion for Visual Communication during a monsoon fiesta at the National Institute of Design in India. It is simple and short but it gives a very powerful meaning for visual communication. I hope you enjoyed it! :)

To be honest, I have to watch this clip for three times until I finally understood how it represents visual communication. I have my own interpretation and I hope those of you who have watched it could tell me your own interpretation of the video by commenting on it. 

My interpretation is that the caveman tries to get rid of the lion by using various kinds of weapons but he just could not kill the lion. Eventually, he successfully kill the lion but more of making the lion to disappear by using a somewhat flimsy blank paper. The lion seems to dissolve into the blank paper and somewhat turn into a photo. After my third attempt of trying to understand the animation, I finally understood what it is trying to say. What I understand is that the lion is captured into the photo 'literally'. We know that we use camera to take pictures and the we will have a still life image captured into the photo after it is being developed. It means that we capture these real life images and put it into the photos so that they do not move and we are able to look at it any time we want without the images in the photo changing. That is the purpose of photographs and that is what the animation is trying to say. 

If any of you have different interpretations please do comment on it. Thank you.