Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics states that an icon is any image used to represent a person, place, thing, or idea. There are many different categories of icons. The first category is images that can be identified as symbols, for example, a peace sign, the Star of David, a cross, or a skull and crossbones. Symbols can represent concepts, ideas, and philosophies. Numbers, letters, music notes, mathematical operations are some icons that make up the category of icons of science, language, and communication. Pictures are icons that are designed to resemble their actual subject. When it comes to non-pictorial icons, (symbols, and icons of science, language, and communication) their meaning is fixed and absolute. A dollar sign will always look like a dollar sign ($) no matter who draws it. Pictures are different, their resemblance to the real thing varies on the depiction making them fluid and variable. You could have a group of people all draw a hamburger, some drawings will look more like hamburgers than others. Photographs and photorealism are more accurate representations of the real-life thing compared to an abstract rendering of an object. Even photographs will not fully represent the real object, they are flat, only depict one angle, and sometimes lack true colors. The difference between non-pictorial icons and pictures is that non-pictorial icons depict ideas while pictures depict real things. Words are also icons but they don’t resemble what they are representing (when you write out the word “hand,” it does not actually look like a hand.)
Comments
Post a Comment