Brief answer: Semiotic principles in design (200 words) ...

At the competition venue, the designer painted the corner walls with black and yellow stripes to remind drivers to concentrate and be alert to accidents. This is because whenever people see black and yellow stripes, they will unconsciously feel fear and vigilance. This feeling may not only come from the visual characteristics of the pattern color itself, but also be related to the association of black and yellow stripes with animals that may bring danger to people, such as tigers or bees. People's fear and vigilance against such graphics is a continuation of people's fear and vigilance against tigers or bees in their life experiences. Green often makes people feel relaxed and happy, as if being in dense jungle and fresh air, and life can grow healthily in the natural environment. Therefore, green is more applied to the design theme of life fields such as medicine and environmental protection.

There are countless such examples, and there are often similar applications in actual design. What is the reason? What laws govern these phenomena? It turns out that behind many techniques that we widely use in graphic design, the shadow of semiotic principle is hidden, and it is precisely because of its existence that the information transmission of graphic design is more scientific and accurate, and the expression techniques are more colorful.

The essential relationship between graphic design and semiotics

1. About symbols and semiotics

As early as the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, Zhuangzi, a famous thinker in China, pointed out in his book "Zhuangzi Waipian" that "the speaker thinks too much, forgets what he says", that is, there is a relationship between representation and representation between language and things. Language is the representation of things, and things are the representation of language. The task of language is to convey the information of things, and the function of language is to convey information. A symbol is something that represents or refers to something by a certain medium.

The famous Italian symbolist Eco proposed that a symbol should be defined as anything like this. According to the established social habits, it can be regarded as something that represents other things-a symbol X represents a nonexistent Y, and the idiom "Goose Mud with Red Paws" vividly and accurately expresses the concept of a symbol. The paw prints left by a swan goose in the mud and snow let people know the fact that a swan goose passed by here, and can infer information such as size from it. Paw prints are symbols X, Hongyan is not Y, and semiotics is a science that studies the laws of symbols.

2. Where did this symbol come from?

Due to the unique social labor and language of human beings, people's conscious activities have reached a highly developed level. People's thinking begins with knowing appearances, then records the appearances in their brains to form concepts, and then generalizes and fixes these concepts from real life experience, so that various objects and processes in the external world and even their own thinking world can produce their own corresponding images in their brains. These influences are separated from direct external relations and maintained and operated independently of thinking. These images are based on narrow language, and they are also expressed in a wide range of languages, such as visual graphics, body movements and music.

3. Graphic design and semiotic principles

Graphic design is a special thinking process.

The process of human consciousness is actually a process of symbolizing the world, and thinking is nothing more than an operational process of selecting, combining, transforming and regenerating symbols. So it can be said that people think with symbols, and symbols are the main body of thinking. Graphic design aims to convey information. Undoubtedly, the planning of the position, proportion and relationship of visual objects in two-dimensional space is also a thinking process, but at the same time it is not a thinking process in the usual sense. This is a thinking process that starts from the designer and continues to the psychological activities of the audience, and this continuation depends on the symbols as the main body of thinking. Just like the example mentioned at the beginning of this article, the designer symbolized the dangerous animal tiger or bee as yellow and black stripes, and relied on it to convey the information of danger and vigilance to the driver's consciousness.

B. graphic design can be said to be a symbol.

In essence, the purpose of graphic design is to convey information by using print media, which determines that it must be a part of generalized language. Therefore, graphic design itself is a symbol expression; At the same time, it is also based on the way and principle of symbols. From this, we can imagine how important it is to use symbols reasonably and accurately to achieve the purpose of information transmission. Finding a symbol X can accurately convey the information of Y, which has become the key to the success or failure of a graphic design work.

Second, explore the characteristics of symbols more and use the language of symbols more accurately.

Graphic design itself is the expression of symbols, and designers use it to convey their own thinking process and conclusions to the audience in order to achieve the purpose of guidance or persuasion; In other words, through the designer's works, let the audience use their own experience to confirm and finally understand the thoughts and feelings that the designer wants to express. Obviously, graphic design works, as an intermediate medium, act as the symbol of designers' thoughts and feelings at this moment, and whether the information expressed by this symbol can be accepted and recognized accurately, quickly and effectively by the audience has become the symbol of the success of the design works. This is determined by the accuracy and effectiveness of the designer's choice, combination, transformation and regeneration of symbols in the process of design thinking. It can be said that symbols are tools to express thoughts and feelings. The old adage "If a worker wants to be good at his work, he must sharpen his tools first" has a new interpretation here.

In order to better understand and use symbols as a tool, we should understand three concepts:

1. deepens the symbol.

Three types and levels of symbols

At present, in the field of symbol theory research, it is generally believed that from the perspective of the relationship between symbols and the objects they refer to (that is, the things or fields they point to and involve), symbols can be divided into the following three different types, which are also symbols of three levels:

■ Icon image symbols are formed by simulating or resembling an object. Such as a portrait, is a symbol of someone's image. People have an intuitive perception of it, which can be identified by the similarity of images.

■ INDEX means that there is causal or spatio-temporal correlation between the index and the referred object. Such as road signs, are indicators of roads; And the door is an indicator of the exit of the building.

■ There is no necessary or inherent connection between the symbol and the object it refers to, which is the result of convention. The object it refers to and the acquisition of relevant meaning are the long-standing emotional associations of many people, that is, social customs. For example, red represents revolution, and peaches are a symbol of longevity in the eyes of China people.

The above three aspects are not only three types of symbols-coexisting but not replacing each other, but also three levels of symbol deepening, which is a process from image symbols to indicator symbols to symbol symbols, with deeper deepening and wider information content. When the image of a hammer appears on the packaging of a product, it is undoubtedly just a symbol of the goods in the packaging, and the message conveyed to consumers is "the goods in this packaging are hammers". At this time, it appears as an image symbol; Because hammer is an important basic tool for people's production, it has widely recognized industrial characteristics. Therefore, when it appears on road signs or signs of places, it appears as an indicator, conveying the information that "this is an industrial field"; When this image reappears, it and the sickle together constitute a symbol of the belief in productism. No longer has the above two meanings, but refers to the working class, and together with the sickle symbolizes the political system of the workers-peasants alliance. The image of the hammer is presented to people as its symbol here. At this time, the expression of its meaning is accurate and effective, which is the inevitable result of the process that it evolved from a simple image symbol to an indicator symbol through its inherent causality, and then it was given a broader meaning by the feelings and associations of many people for a long time, and jumped into a symbol. (See Figure 1)

In a poster showing the theme of anti-corruption, the author chose a puppet as the main image, which was manipulated into the unknown darkness. Puppet, also known as puppet. This is a kind of props or toys for performance, and it is recognized as its characteristic that it is manipulated by actors. People also often use puppets to describe people and things who have no opinions and are at the mercy of others. It became a symbol of being manipulated. I use it in the poster to symbolize the national moth that is manipulated and degraded by desire, and it is just a symbol of "being manipulated". Puppet can be used as such a symbol because its characteristics have been recognized by people and based on this association. This work is also my attempt to use deepened symbols. (See Figure 2)

It can be seen that in order to convey the information of thoughts and feelings more effectively and accurately, a process of symbol deepening is needed. But it is irresponsible and contrary to the original intention to deepen the reference of symbols blindly and aimlessly.

2. The variable thinking of grasping symbols is a category of time and space.

As a narrow personal thinking, it has the same length as life and explores different living spaces; As a thinking activity of human society in a broader sense, it has universal significance of eternity and applicability to all involved spaces. As the main body of thinking, symbols are also changeable in the transformation of time and space.

■ Different time and space make a specific symbol have different reference objects;

■ Different time and space, different symbols refer to the same thing;

In design, these variables should be grasped in the selection, mining and application of symbols in order to convey information accurately.

Different time and space make specific symbols have different references.

A large number of tortoise shells and animal bones unearthed from the Yinshang site in Anyang, Henan Province are engraved with a large number of hieroglyphics, which are called Oracle Bone Inscriptions, which is the earliest text that can be verified in China. These words are used to record the divination results at that time, that is, to record the symbols of events. With the passage of time, thousands of years later, in addition to the characteristics of the symbols that record events in the eyes of archaeologists, in the eyes of most people, these illegible words have become the symbols of that era thousands of years ago. In a large number of graphic design works, the image of Oracle Bone Inscriptions appears repeatedly, and the information it conveys is no longer the result of the ancients asking about their fate, but has become people's recollection of that era. Here, these words have become a reminder of the glory of Chinese civilization for thousands of years.

The "swastika" is an ancient spell, amulet or religious symbol, which is usually regarded as a symbol of fire or the sun and has appeared in many countries and regions. In China and other Asian countries, "Zi" is a Buddhist symbol, which means "auspicious place" in Sanskrit. People think it is an auspicious symbol appearing on Sakyamuni's chest, and it is used as a symbol of "universal virtue, good luck and wishful thinking". Wu Zetian lived for two years (AD 693). She customized the pronunciation to "ten thousand, ten thousand sounds" and wrote "ten thousand" in the Buddhist scriptures. However, the same character has a completely different meaning in modern Europe. 1920, Hitler, the leader of Nazi Germany at that time, regarded Zi as the Nazi party's party emblem, which he thought symbolized "the mission of fighting for the victory of Aryans" and Zi became a symbol of fascist rule, violence and bloody terror. (2) the same symbol, but in different spaces, there are diametrically opposite references, and "shua" is a typical example. The design works of "the auspicious canal" in China or Asia are absolutely unacceptable to people in western countries. They can't understand that this symbol is different from the reference they are used to. (See Figure 3)

In the case of relatively consistent time and space, social factors are also the main factors to change the symbol reference. Condom is a very common birth control tool, but in just a few decades, as a symbol, it has undergone tremendous changes in every corner of the world. Because of its use, in early design works, its appearance only implies its behavior itself. However, in the 1950s and 1960s, with the discovery and rapid spread of AIDS, the image of condoms appeared more frequently in design works, and its reference object changed from the original meaning to "preventing the spread of AIDS in different regions", and people's recognition of its new meaning can be seen. (See Figure 4)

Medical syringes have a similar experience. Because drug abuse has become a major cancer in contemporary human society, and syringe is only one of the main tools for drug addicts, its original meaning as a medical symbol has gradually been forgotten and replaced by one of the symbols of drug abuse. This point is also repeated in graphic design works of related themes. (See Figure 5)

B Different time and space, different symbols refer to the same thing.

Our society is experiencing more and more rapid changes. The ever-changing time and space endows things with new meanings, and things are constantly changing their symbols to adapt to the new meanings. People who live in such a constantly changing time and space are constantly changing their cognition of things, and the images-symbols constructed in their brains will naturally be different. Fashion, perhaps the fastest changing thing in society, is different every year, every month and even every day. The symbols representing fashion are constantly changing.

In 2000, an American film "The Matrix" swept the capital, and it conquered the audience with its wonderful plot and eye-catching visual effects. Many friends will ask each other when they meet, "Did you watch The Matrix?". There is no doubt that watching such movies is the embodiment of fashion and has become one of the many symbols representing "fashion". Inspired by this film, the poster design of Maiweibao TV set-top box created a group of images similar to the protagonist in the film. The purpose is to convey to the audience that buying and using TV set-top boxes is just like watching the movie "The Matrix", which is a fashion behavior and one of your lifestyles to keep the pulse of fashion forever. The target consumer group of TV set-top box is such a group that pursues lifestyle. (See Figure 6)

It is conceivable that at an earlier time, when the film was unknown, designers would not have thought of using these images, and these images could not be recognized by people. Because there were no such movies or videos in the symbols representing fashion at that time. The Red Cross is a voluntary and international rescue group developed from battlefield rescue. Up to now, about 140 countries have established the Red Cross Society. In most countries, the Red Cross on a white background is used as a symbol and is called the Red Cross. Some countries and regions, such as some Arab countries, take the Red Crescent on a white background as their symbol and name the organization "Red Crescent Society". In Iran, the Red Cross is called the Red Lion and the Sun Society, which means the red lion and the sun on a white background. However, no matter what the name and logo are, the effect is the same. The only difference is the cultural, religious or historical origin of the Red Cross. (See Figure 7)

To sum up, as a thinking process or symbol expression, the symbol elements of graphic design works' selection, combination and application should be symbols with clear reference function. It should conform to the requirements or performance of its space, time and social reality in order to properly play its due role. This requires the designer to grasp the possible variables of the symbols he uses and ensure that the current values of these symbols are exactly what the designer needs to express his thoughts and feelings, rather than their existing, eternal or possible other meanings.

"Nothing is more complicated and basic than something related to symbols. Symbols are related to the whole field of human knowledge and life. They are universal tools in the human world, just like the movement of physical nature. " ③ Graphic design, as one of the means and ways for human beings to express consciousness and convey information, also depends on semiotics. Eco even put forward that "man is an animal of symbols", and the purpose of graphic design is the communication between people, and symbols are undoubtedly an inevitable tool. As a designer, learning to use semiotic tools will make the design more effective. As a medium to convey ideas, design itself is a symbol, and design is composed of symbolic elements. Designers successfully select, combine, transform and regenerate these elements, and assemble them into symbols that refer to their own thoughts and become symbols recognized by themselves and the audience. This is the real formation of communication and the accurate and complete transmission of information, and the thinking process of design is complete.

Semiotics, as an interdisciplinary comprehensive science, its profound principles and methodology are quite common and in-depth in the research and practice of various applied disciplines, as well as in graphic design.