The_Tankman

Images are used as visual texts to help evoke key ideas through the use of visual conventions by the author. These visual devices are used as vehicles to engage the reader and stimulate correlating motifs evident in different visual texts. Conventions such as symbolism, camera angle and lighting can be used aptly to help typify versions of reality present in the image. This can be exemplified in the image (quote image number/author) and its social ideals conveyed are also embodied in the visual mixed documentary, Tankman (2006), directed by Antony Thomas, an expository form of non-print media. Moreover, the use of these devices helps convey a specific version of the truth and in doing so evokes that the country should view the rights of their citizens over that of the state. TECHNIQUES Camera Angle: Eye level – Second scene of the Chinese soldier in the back of the army vehicle. It portrays the key theme of individual vs. state by conveying the congenial citizens and the malevolent communist party of China. Citizens described the soldiers as “one of us” and a “peaceful city asking for more freedom.” High Camera Angle – In the key motif and image of the man standing in front of the tanks. It conveys the powerless and “insignificance of the individual” against the clout of the communist party. Although this, it embodies the paramount influence and effect that the tankman had on communist party and its citizens. Low Camera Angle – Show the poor worker on top of a government construction site in China. The significance behind this image is to evoke the power of poor, underpaid workers in China and the supreme effect that they have on the countries economy. The irony behind the image is that the reason for China being a world super power is due to these workers, such as the one evident in the image, but the communist party doesn’t recognise how important these workers are in keeping a stable economy, government and country.