Reading An Image

This advert poster has been endorsed by 50 Cent, promoting the Reebok brand name.

The poster denotes a very serious looking 50 Cent, his quote and a tag line which covers the poster. Also the brand logo, Reebok, appears at the bottom right.

The whole poster is monochrome with various shades of black and white included within the imaging. The use of monochrome may be reflective of the rappers past and how he has been through dark times. This is further supported by his background being purely black. He himself is directly addressing the audience, within his pose, and looking towards the light essentially, connoting his 'enlightenment' or the fact that he has moved past his darkness and is now emerging from the shadows.  His eyes are intimidating as his expression is stern and almost angry, perhaps connoting his deception as an individual. The fingerprints are denoting his identity yet connoting the fact that he has a criminal record and he is not ashamed to hide that.

The composition of this poster is particularly interesting as both his fingerprints and him himself take up the same amount of space, both equally sized. Here we can assume that this is deliberately done to suggest that his wrongdoings are who he is and he can't change his fingerprints so he cannot change his past. The lighting of the poster creates a mysterious atmosphere for the audience but also makes the poster bold and explicit. Although it is not bright, in lighting or colour, it is still bold and it still stands out, making it seem much more powerful, supporting the fact that 'pictures speak louder than words,' as before even reading the text, we as the audience are intrigued.

The type of shot used is a medium close-up on 50 Cent, adequately showing his expressions and emotions without deterring our attention from the right side of the poster too.
The tag line across the poster reads 'i am what i am,' again representing the idea of identity. The typography is in a serif font, which is quite traditional, connoting him as a classic rapper. Furthermore, as the 'i' is not capitalised it could specifically connote to the audience that no matter who you are, you can pursue your dreams and achieve whatever you want to achieve, regardless of how grammatically correct you are or how educated you are. However, the use of the sans-serif font for his quote, connotes his modern edge. This type of font is clear to read and has a more simple design, perhaps this is used to simply and explicitly communicate the message to the audience; it's so powerful that it does not require any fancy calligraphy or flicks, just minimalistic font.

The subject matter of this poster is to essentially advertise the Reebok brand as there is no product on this particular poster, therefore the aim of this poster is to promote the brand. The subject is potentially success and individualism, on the whole and Reebok may have been attempting to tell the audience, through the use of 50 Cent, that regardless of what has happened in your past, these Reebok products can essentially help you reach success and find out who you are as an individual.

The target audience is mainly youths and we can assume this by the use of 50 Cent promoting the brand. Young people would be interested with this product as soon as they see 50 Cent, who is primarily addressing the audience with his eyes and communicating with us. The use of the quote also shares a bit of his life with us and gets the audience to connect with him, therefore attracting the younger demographic.

The dominant reading of this poster is that no matter who you are and what troubles you have experienced in your past, we all have the ability to rise to success through the Reebok brand. We can tell this as the image on the right, fingerprints, connotes criminality however this has been expressed in a positive light as it shares the message that everyone can be whoever they want to be, even if you do have a criminal record. However, the oppositional reading is that this poster almost promoting criminal behaviour. The Hypodermic Needle Theory expresses that the mass media has a direct influence on the targeted demographic, therefore conveying a message of  'being a criminal is good,' provides a negative impact upon society. The stereotype of black people being criminals has been institutionalised and the fact that 50 Cent is on this poster freely promoting misconduct produces a bad image for both him and the brand.