For my production piece I created three perfume
advertisements to represent how women are objectified and glamourised, drawing
influence from my research project on perfume advertisement for Gucci and Tom
Ford. From research I found that women are viewed for sexual gratification when
the advertisement is for men. Investigating the different ways that women and
men are glamourised in the industry I noted all relevant conventions, themes
and styles. Examples of this are women shown to be in ball gowns to make them
seem glamorous and specific colours are used such as gold to show wealth and
money. Women like to feel independent and that they have their own authority so
the advertisements create mystery and make them very bold by having them stand
out by making the women brighter than the background on photo shop.
The mise en scene on each for each of my posters
needed a preferred reading of 'glamour' and 'sex. For my first piece I entitled
'Gucci Passion for women'. I decided to show how lusting over women gratifies
men and show how women have the authority. This is a very bold image and with
the use of iconography it will immediately make the viewer look even if they do
not appreciate this genre. I feel this was a successful decision to help engage
the viewer and make them focus their eye on the advertisement. The iconography
is strong as the women is wearing a red dress which is very bold and gives
connotations of power and romance and the man is in the suit which is used to
attract the women’s attention as many women find men sexy. A female audience
will aspire to this primarily as the passive male audience appreciates the
image. I did this to help highlight Laura Mulveys theory of the male gaze that
in media, film and advertising it is the eye of the male. I used this theory in
my research project I found that to engage my female target audience, I also
have to target the male audience as the camera has been taken from a male
perspective as you can see the women are being sexually objectified.
On my second poster of perfume advertisement I
entitled it "Gucci Passion - For men' which was layered on top of the
image eith text. The mise en scene was very important as this linked to my first poster
as it showed very sophisticated men and women I needed to accurately make it appeal
to men. I used different connotations to help with this by having a man in a
suit, which shows that he has authority, and looking in to the camera, which
creates a connotation of passion and strength. This could show ideology, as it
is very stereotypical of upper class men to dress smart with a well-paid job. This
could also highlight mulveys theory as they are making men out to be in control
and women should lust over them. When taking this image I ensured to have him
very central and looking directly at the camera to show authority. After I
edited to the image so that he would stand out from the image better to make
him more bold and created a vignette around the edge to add extra effect. I
feel that this image was good however would have been useful to take it in
different surroundings and backgrounds such as in a French style house or
cottage.
On my third piece I used a completely different
approach with using one female to help show how women are the preferred
audience and are advertised to promote glamour. I chose to have a darker background
with her in a glamorous outfit to show that in women’s advertisement it isn't
always sexualised women want to aspire to be glamorous and innocent. The
audience this would attract is a higher age audience of 20+, as they want to
have more maturity. All of the models in my posters are young, attractive white
male and females, and the text is very bold, I feel that people with an ethnic
background or an older audience may have an oppositional reading due to the narrative
representations. This is because they have religious beliefs about exploiting
the body.
Another downfall for my production would be that
the people i used in my production are not models and they are all 17
demographic range, which may make them seem a little unrealistic or not as
professional. Therefore trying to portray a objectified women was very
difficult as they were only young. However you could argue that with the young
women modeling and being seductive in the media today could highlight the
brutal reality of societies today. However I did feel that some of my strengths
did show with my quality of the image they did look very professional and were
focused very well also with my ability to use spot healing tool and adding
different levels to the image to help enhance the original image it did help to
make it a successful poster. This was common to my final piece to help heighten
the theme of 'glamour' and to help appeal to the audiences as they aspired to
look like the models.
I feel that when beginning my production my
original idea of to using a model in the image would very difficult and I would
not be able to reach the main target audience as effectively to make it more
believable and often poster sets are used to suit the occasion. I feel I would
be able to use these advertisements on many others posters such as billboard as
the quality of the images are very clean meaning there would be no pixilating.
