5 ms·

It’s not fantasy, it’s an abstract idea represented by that visual symbol. The ♡ symbol, for example, pictorially represents a naive understanding of a heart, b

It’s not fantasy, it’s an abstract idea represented by that visual symbol. The ♡ symbol, for example, pictorially represents a naive understanding of a heart, but the connotation of love— itself not accurate— is the real message. We don’t say someone had a “♡ attack” merely because we’re don’t think the symbol is accurate enough, it doesn’t jibe with the real meaning of that symbol. We also don’t assume MacBook Pros are fruit storage containers. Those symbols are *everywhere * in our lives. Check out triadic semiotics.

lukan 3y ago
But the ♡ and the apple in Apple are clearly abstracted. Those butterflies in the article look real. That makes the difference to me, because it brings a wrong conception of reality. "triadic semiotics" But I learned a new concept, so thanks for that.
- chefandy 3y ago
  But it's not any specific facet of their form that distinguishes it from communicating an idea vs something physical about the represented object -- it's the context and the intended message. Nobody puts a butterfly decoration on a pillow to say "there's an actual butterfly on the pillow," or say something about that butterfly's physical disposition. They're using the idea of a butterfly, generically, to evoke appreciation for the intricate beauty in natural patterns, life, warm months, spring, symmetry, insects, and/or any other connotation inherent to butterflies which will probably change based on the context and specific representation. When deployed for communication tasks like that-- as emoji are-- they need to evoke the idea of something rather than portraying an actual instance of that thing, so having an immediately recognizable form, most importantly its profile or silhouette, is far more important than physical accuracy. In fact, physical accuracy often requires more visual complexity, increasing the cognitive load to parse it, which makes it worse at its actual job for little to no benefit. Even heavily abstracted symbols may need to communicate a specific physical disposition. Consider the door-open indicator on a car. It's not a physically accurate-- it doesn't need to portray anything except "this is a car, this door is open"-- and it would probably be less effective if it tried to be. But since the physical disposition of the door is important and you're not just evoking the idea of a car, it must be included. For illustrating stories about a butterfly, or using a photo to reference a butterfly doing something specific, or trying to illustrate something else about the physicality of butterflies, then sure... that physical accuracy is important. But the author doesn't make, or even seem to understand that distinction. Yeah, semiotics is a pretty neat topic even if the available literature skews dense. How well a designer wields those concepts to solve communication problems without words is one of the things that distinguish novices from juniors, and juniors from art directors.
  - lukan 3y ago
    'Nobody puts a butterfly decoration on a pillow to say "there's an actual butterfly on the pillow,"' But it seems implied to me that it shows a living butterfly, if the butterfly seems realistic otherwise. I don't want a picture of a dead butterfly on my pillow, if I know only a dead butterfly looks like this. Most people don't know, so they are not bothered. That's why this symbol works the way it is - it would not work, if everyone recognizes it as "dead butterfly".
    - chefandy 3y ago
      > Most people don't know, so they are not bothered. That's why this symbol works the way it is - it would not work, if everyone recognizes it as "dead butterfly". Yes-- symbol meanings are even more malleable and imprecise than English words, and on top of that, each of us interprets it through our distorted lenses formed by life experiences, cultures, priorities, successes, traumas, etc. Without being able to design for individual people, you can only try to design for specific groups or communities, and you always risk alienating people for whom the message lands differently. To get a little more info about some more involved communities' usage of these symbols, I did a quick google image search for some related terms, like "Lepidopterist Symposium" and "Butterfly Expert," and got these references: This person holding up the hand-painted sign for their monarch butterfly preserve: https://www.sonomanews.com/article/entertainment/return-of-the-western-monarch-butterfly-at-artefact-design-salvage/ https://www.sonomanews.com/article/entertainment/return-of-t... This proudly displayed Lepidopterist society T-shirt: http://ucanr.edu/blogs/bugsquad//blogfiles/62301_original.jpg http://ucanr.edu/blogs/bugsquad//blogfiles/62301_original.jp... The signage for this Lepidopterist conference: https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/56/2023/11/acentropines.jpg https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/5... I didn't see anything indicating the people in these photographs were unrepresentative. In this situation, I'm pretty confident that very few people see "dead butterflies" when they see a butterfly symbol that references one-- even people that absolutely know the difference.

lukan 3y ago

But the ♡ and the apple in Apple are clearly abstracted. Those butterflies in the article look real. That makes the difference to me, because it brings a wrong conception of reality. "triadic semiotics" But I learned a new concept, so thanks for that.

chefandy 3y ago
But it's not any specific facet of their form that distinguishes it from communicating an idea vs something physical about the represented object -- it's the context and the intended message. Nobody puts a butterfly decoration on a pillow to say "there's an actual butterfly on the pillow," or say something about that butterfly's physical disposition. They're using the idea of a butterfly, generically, to evoke appreciation for the intricate beauty in natural patterns, life, warm months, spring, symmetry, insects, and/or any other connotation inherent to butterflies which will probably change based on the context and specific representation. When deployed for communication tasks like that-- as emoji are-- they need to evoke the idea of something rather than portraying an actual instance of that thing, so having an immediately recognizable form, most importantly its profile or silhouette, is far more important than physical accuracy. In fact, physical accuracy often requires more visual complexity, increasing the cognitive load to parse it, which makes it worse at its actual job for little to no benefit. Even heavily abstracted symbols may need to communicate a specific physical disposition. Consider the door-open indicator on a car. It's not a physically accurate-- it doesn't need to portray anything except "this is a car, this door is open"-- and it would probably be less effective if it tried to be. But since the physical disposition of the door is important and you're not just evoking the idea of a car, it must be included. For illustrating stories about a butterfly, or using a photo to reference a butterfly doing something specific, or trying to illustrate something else about the physicality of butterflies, then sure... that physical accuracy is important. But the author doesn't make, or even seem to understand that distinction. Yeah, semiotics is a pretty neat topic even if the available literature skews dense. How well a designer wields those concepts to solve communication problems without words is one of the things that distinguish novices from juniors, and juniors from art directors.
- lukan 3y ago
  'Nobody puts a butterfly decoration on a pillow to say "there's an actual butterfly on the pillow,"' But it seems implied to me that it shows a living butterfly, if the butterfly seems realistic otherwise. I don't want a picture of a dead butterfly on my pillow, if I know only a dead butterfly looks like this. Most people don't know, so they are not bothered. That's why this symbol works the way it is - it would not work, if everyone recognizes it as "dead butterfly".
  - chefandy 3y ago
    > Most people don't know, so they are not bothered. That's why this symbol works the way it is - it would not work, if everyone recognizes it as "dead butterfly". Yes-- symbol meanings are even more malleable and imprecise than English words, and on top of that, each of us interprets it through our distorted lenses formed by life experiences, cultures, priorities, successes, traumas, etc. Without being able to design for individual people, you can only try to design for specific groups or communities, and you always risk alienating people for whom the message lands differently. To get a little more info about some more involved communities' usage of these symbols, I did a quick google image search for some related terms, like "Lepidopterist Symposium" and "Butterfly Expert," and got these references: This person holding up the hand-painted sign for their monarch butterfly preserve: https://www.sonomanews.com/article/entertainment/return-of-the-western-monarch-butterfly-at-artefact-design-salvage/ https://www.sonomanews.com/article/entertainment/return-of-t... This proudly displayed Lepidopterist society T-shirt: http://ucanr.edu/blogs/bugsquad//blogfiles/62301_original.jpg http://ucanr.edu/blogs/bugsquad//blogfiles/62301_original.jp... The signage for this Lepidopterist conference: https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/56/2023/11/acentropines.jpg https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/5... I didn't see anything indicating the people in these photographs were unrepresentative. In this situation, I'm pretty confident that very few people see "dead butterflies" when they see a butterfly symbol that references one-- even people that absolutely know the difference.