In Roland Barthes’ article “Rhetoric of the Image”, he lays out three messages one can gather from an image. Here I will examine a professional ad and a personal snapshot using his three message system.
The Linguistic message:
In this ad, there are only five words in small print in the bottom right corner: “Air Wick, with Motion Sensor”. The audience can gather right away that “Air Wick” is the name of the brand, because of how it is written within a graphic image and is set apart from the other words. Secondly, “with Motion Sensor” plays with the image itself and “participates anecdotally” as Barthes says, and how this phrase does that will be discussed further on once the image has been discussed.
The Denoted message:
This is the non-coded message, or what is plainly seen in the ad without cultural meaning attached. In this ad, a home bathroom is shown which contains a sink, soap, a bathtub, towels, colorful tiles on the walls, etc. The room is dark and light can be seen coming in through a crack in the door and the image appears average and unexciting. What captures the viewers interest is that on top of the ajar door sits a bucket filled to maximum capacity with all kinds of flowers. This alone is abnormal and interesting to the viewer.
The Coded message:
This is the message which comes from cultural meanings which the viewer attaches to certain colors, situations, people, settings, etc. In this image, the bathroom suggests an average, middle to upper class home bathroom. We can see that the lights are off in the bathroom and that the light is only coming in through the crack in the door, which suggests that no one is in this bathroom that we are looking at. The flowers sitting on top of the door is a reference to a cliché and well known prank: by putting a can of paint(or some other liquid) on top of a cracked door, the next person to walk into that room will unknowingly push open the door only to have said paint dumped all over them. The audience is expected to understand this reference, and to infer that the flowers have replaced the paint in this situation. Since “Air Wick” is an air-freshener company, the audience understands that the ad is saying when you walk into the room you will be bombarded by a great smell (the smell of flowers, for instance).
Now that the image is understood, the already mentioned linguistic
message can now add another layer to the image. “With Motion Sensor” now to the audience gives the last bit of information: not only will you be bombarded with a great smell when you walk into the bathroom, but only when you walk into the room with the air wick device be set off.
The second image analyzed is a snap shot from a friend.
I will analyze this image with the same three message system as the “Air Wick” ad.
The Linguistic message:
The linguistic message in this image is seen solely on what looks to be some sort of map. It says “you are here!” with an arrow, and the word “skoma...” below, cut off by the girl’s hand. The message here is pretty ambiguous– the audience here is unsure as to what “skoma” is or why the map is so large with so little detail other than “you are here!”.
The Denoted message:
The Denoted message in this image is that there is a girl who was looking at a map, and she is looking with wonder and reaching out to a monkey that is sitting on a table. The lighting in the picture is dim, and there are coats and other homey items about.
The Coded message:
Since the curtains are closed and the lights are on, the audience can assume that it is dark outside. She is looking at a map so we can also infer that she is traveling, and is somewhere she is not familiar with. The image suggests that while she is traveling, she is not in a hotel (because of the coats and other home items) but rather a friend or family member’s house. We can then further assume that the monkey in the picture is some type of pet. Since the girl looks entertained by the monkey, it seems that she is from a part of the world that does not typically see monkeys, much less as pets.
The coded message is the message the audience gathers from cultural context, clues, and meaning given to certain objects, and from this candid shot we can gather a basic understanding of the situation in which it was taken. It is more difficult, however, to analyze a candid shot for meaning than the company advertisement, because in the ad there was specific meaning created intended for an audience. In this snapshot, there was no meaning intended for anyone other than the people who were there when the picture was taken. Of course, therefore, it is quite impossible to know exactly what is happening.