Words&Images examples

When words and images are combined together, it tells story, or convey message to audience. We can find words and images interact in comics, page designs, advertising, book covers, or motion graphics.

(IMage source from Amazon.com)

A good book cover design makes audience starts to engage before reading the book. From the cover of Mom’s Cancer, it has a person sitting and looking hopeless near to the window. In addition, the image is made into two panels, which separates the woman’s head and body. This book cover caught my eyes when I first saw it. I started to guess from looking at the picture, why does this woman looks sad, and why is it designed in two panels? Then, after I know the name of the book, all the questions were solved in a second. I realized the book cover is telling the readers that the woman looks hopeless due to her cancer. And by knowing the woman is illness, I begin to understand the purpose of using two panels, which is a view from observers. Fies’ book cover of Mom’s Cancer is perfectly illustrated that when words and images come together, it connects to the reader right away.

(IMage source from Amazon.com)

The book cover above is another example to show the importance of words and images. This book cover contains two red chairs in a room and one chair looks falling down on the other. Looking at the image itself and since chairs is one of industrial design objects, I could guess that it might be a book for industrial design, or interior design. After discovering the name from the cover, however, the book’s topic is far from my guess. The book has nothing to do with design but is about general theory of love. In this case, we learn when both words and images come together, it create a powerful meaning. I can now know that the two red chairs represents human, and one is lying on the other, presenting human interaction. Furthermore, the color red symbolized “love.”
From these two examples above, we can comprehend the importance of words and images. Both words and images are important to exist in a design, because it both has its function; the words can explain the message, and the image allows us to picture. Combining words and images indeed can help readers to approach the real meaning behind a design.