Re: 3d meaning
Torbjoern Caspersen (Torbjoern.Caspersen@ark.unit.no)
Wed, 31 May 1995 19:01:42 +0100
>
>The problem with this view is than something need not be "universal"
>to be iconographic. An iconographic image is sort of like an
>onomotopoetic word: the fact that there are people in the world who
>may never have heard an explosion doesn't mean that "boom" isn't
>onomotopoetic, nor does the fact that some people dont think the
>sound a cat makes is like "meow" mean that "meow" isn't onomotopoetic.
>
>What it means is that images can be iconographic within a cultural
>context. The difference between a code and an icon is the following:
>if you know what a dog and a cat are and you can recognize a picture of
>a dog, you should be able to recognize a picture of a cat. However,
>the ability to recognize the word "dog" does not imply the ability to
>recognize the word "cat."
>
>This has nothing to do with universality. However, properly chosen icons
>*may* be universally comprehensible (or effectively so), as a happenstance
>of culture. This means that some icons may be better choices than others,
>but there are many icons likely to be better choices than words from
>particular languages.
>
>--Andy
The next step then is to discuss _how_ to make functional icons. Either we
can find something that has an already sybolic meaning, like the now famous
envelope. Or we can look for form which easily can be asociated with some
reference. Form that are distinct and easily recongnisable from different
angles and distances, yet capaple of holding suble variations (So that you
can have a form symbolise a category, then distinguise between the
different individual parts through minor variations in the form).
But this is probably better suited for trial and error than discussion. :)0
-----------------------------------------
Torbjoern Caspersen casper@due.unit.no
http://www.stud.unit.no/~casper/
Student of Architecture
at the Norwegian faculty of technology, NTH, Trondheim.