Visual Rhetoric By: Makayla Lowe

Visual For Analysis

Background Information This ad is considered one of the best anti-smoking print ads according to Designer Daily. This photo is part of a group project that was a no smoking campaign titled “Kill a cigarette and save a life. Yours.”

Questions to consider Why is this ad so shocking? What makes it different from other smoking ads you’ve seen? What is this ad trying to say?

At first, I was completely taken aback by the bluntness of this add. My Initial Reaction At first, I was completely taken aback by the bluntness of this add. Then, I was accepting of what this profound ad is trying to portray to its audience.

Point of view and intended audience The intended audience for this ad are those who smoke. It could also be intended for someone who loves a smoker and values their life. This ad was created by people who advocate to end smoking.

Purpose This ad is trying to portray the damaging effects of smoking by using a very shocking image to convey the seriousness of the situation. Its purpose is to persuade people to quit smoking because they are slowly killing themselves.

Tone ,Mood, and Theme The tone for this ad is blunt and foreboding. This makes the audience feel guilty as well as mournful, but could also make them feel motivated. The theme is danger. It serves as a warning to the audience and does it in a powerful way.

Logical Appeal Half of cigarette users will die because they smoke. Six million people die every year because of tobacco. This figure includes five million smokers, but also about 600,000 non-smokers exposed to second-hand smoke. It is expected that, without any action, eight million people will die annually, by 2030. This ad is logical because it depicts a real issue that effects many people.

Ethical Appeal Kelly Ashcraft is a photographer that lives in California She collaborated with Micah Rush to this “No Smoking Campaign”

Emotional Appeal This ad appeals to emotion by being blunt and cutting straight to the point. It doesn’t beat around the bush and portrays the act of smoking as a slow suicide. Whether the smoker knows it or not, they are slowing killing themselves with every puff of a cigarette and this ad brings the consequences of their actions to life.

Metaphor The smoke looks like a noose and represents the fact that smoking is a slow suicide. Coincidently, both also effect airways.

Juxtaposition The noose made of smoke around this women's neck represents death, but is a juxtaposition to smoking because smoking will kill you slowly, while a noose is associated with a quicker death.

Symbol The noose made of smoke is a symbol of imminent death and how she is slowly killing herself.

Who/What is Left Out of the Advertisement? I think that the author left out what kind of damage is actually being done to your body(images of lungs and other organs), but this aspect is also very powerful in the fact that we don’t actually know how we are destroying our bodies until it’s too late. This ad is powerful enough without adding pictures of smoker’s lungs but still has the same effects other ads do because the mystery that lingers in this pictures is just like the mystery of lung/organ damage.

What would be the author’s thesis statement be? In order to save lives, we must quit smoking and get rid of cigarettes for good.

More Examples

Citation Ashcraft, Kelly, and Micah Rush. No Smoking Campaign | Kill A Cigarette and Save A Life. Yours. TheTruth.com. Web.