Cigarette package designs in Korea
Abstract
This paper analyzes the graphic design of cigarette packages in Korea. For visual analyze I use two analysis methods such as content analysis and social semiotic visual analysis, those methods come from a book, Handbook of Visual Analysis, which is written by Van Leeuwen, Theo, and Jewitt, Carey in 2007. Through the content analysis, I compare the graphic design style on 32 cigarette packages. With social semiotic visual analysis, I analyze a new tobacco package design guideline by the Korean government to recognize how the graphics interact with common people.
Introduction
In Handbook of Visual Analysis (Can Leeuwen, Theo, and Jewitt, Carey. 2007), the authors explain several different methods for visual analyzing such as content analysis, visual anthropology, cultural study, semiotics and iconography, a therapeutic perspective, visual meaning, an ethnomedhodologically approach, and analyzing film and TV. For this study, I chose content analysis and social semiotic approach to analyze the graphic designs on cigarette packages in Korea.
Content analysis
Content analysis is a systematic, observational method used for testing hypotheses about the ways in which the media represent people, events, situations, and so on. It allows quantification of samples of observable content classified into distinct categories. It does not analyze individual images or individual visual texts. Instead, it allows description of fields of visual representation by describing the constituents of one or more defined areas of representation, periods or types of images. To observe and quantify categories of content it is first necessary to define relevant variables of representation and/or salience. Then, on each variable, values can be distinguished to yield the categories of content which are to be observed and quantified. A content variable is any such dimension (size, color, range, position on a page or in a new bulletin); or any range of options of a similar type which could be substituted for each other. In content analysis, a variable refers to aspects of how something is represented, no to ‘reality’. A variable consists of what we will call value. These are elements which are of the same logical kind. Contents analysis begins with the definition of relevant variables and of the values on each. For my study about the cigarette packages, I set variables first such as background color, typefaces, graphic styles, linguistics, the size of alert window, and mood of design. Once I set these variables, I observed package designs to find values per each variable. For the background color variable, I got four different variables such as white, solid dark, solid bright, and gradient color is used for the package design. For another variable, typeface, I found that serif, calligraphy, san-serif, and modern lettering styles are used for packages. For graphic variable, illustration, decorative graphic, simple graphic, and typography is founded as variables. For Linguistic variable, almost packages used English with Chinese, Korean, or numbers. For the size of alert window, there are three different sizes. For mood of design, there are type of mood I found such as Old/Traditional and Young/ Modern (Table 1. Variables and values of cigarette package in Korea). To get more detailed quantitative analysis, percentage analysis is used per each variable and value. For background color 50% packages use pure white background color, 22% use solid dark color, 16% use solid bright color, and 12% package designs use gradient color for package design (Table 2). For the typeface on the package, 44% use serif, another 44% use san-serif, 6% use calligraphy, and modern style lettering is used for 6% packages (Table 2). For graphic style, 6% use illustration, 15% use decorative graphics, 66% use simple graphic with brand symbol, and 13% use typography for cigarette package design (Table 3). For linguistic variable, 100% of packages use English primarily, but 3% use English with Chinese letter, another 3% use it with Korean letter, and 9% use it with numbers (Table 3). For Alert window, 25% has no alert window on the front side of package, 1/3 size window on 43% packages, and 2/5 size window on 32% packages (Table 4). For overall feeling, mood, 58% of packages look like old and traditional, and other 42% look like young and modern. As a conclusion, depend on who the target customers are, packages use different style of background color, graphic style, language, and typeface, to create a better mood for the customers.
Social semiotic visual analysis
The author says that there are kinds of ‘rules’ for social semiotic, from laws and mandatory prescriptions to ‘best practice’, the influence of role models, expert advice, common habits, and so on. Two points needed to be made social semiotic influence. First, ‘power’, ‘detachment’, ‘involvement’, and so on, are not ‘the’ meaning of these angles. They are an attempt to describe a meaning potential, a field of possible meanings, which need to be activated by the producers and viewers of images. Secondly, symbolic relations are not real relations, and it is precisely this which makes point of view a semiotic resource. Images can create particular relations between viewers and the world inside the picture frame. In this way, they interact with viewers and suggest the attitude viewers should take towards what is being represented. With this method, I analyze the new design policy for cigarette package design in Korea that was started on December 23, 2016. Cigarette packs in Korea would be sporting one of 10 graphic images showing the harmful effects of smoking. A diseased lung, a hole in a throat, and rotten teeth were among the 10 pictorial warnings unveiled by the Ministry of Health and Welfare earlier this year. The Ministry of Health and Welfare is hoping to cut the smoking rate of men to 29% by 2020. However, I’ve found a lot of my friends’ post on Facebook related this design policy. They said that “I don’t want to see this terrible picture, when I get a cigar pack. So, I will buy an awesome cigarette case to avoid see it”. It was pretty interesting reaction how the images interact with people in real world, sometime it doesn’t work as designers or governments expect to society.
References:
Van Leeuwen, Theo, and Jewitt, Carey. Handbook of Visual Analysis. London: SAGE Publications, 2007. Print.
