Ashley Soltis - Chap 1-4 Reflection

These chapters assisted in introducing me to the fundamental aspects of advertising and its various elements in design. It aided me in seeing the positivity in particular ads, like PSAs, because they are attempting to benefit society. Previously, I had a more negative association with advertisements as a way for mainstream media to bombard people with ideas and concepts to agree on a set of social norms or to have identical preconceptions about beauty, finances, or priorities in life. I found it very interesting that there are many steps that go into creating a successful ad campaign - whether it's the research, critiques, edits and different drafts. These tie into the notion of 6 phases of completing an intriguing ad - knowing the client, strategy, ideas, design, production, and implementation. I found the branding aspect in Chapter 4 to be most interesting on a personal level because I have worked on branding for my graphic design/photography clients. The image in the text that caught my attention the most was the Chik-fil-A billboard (pg 16, figure 2.2) because it reminded me of ads that promote vegetarianism, such as the following: