This article reminded me of Mc Cloud's "Vocabulary of Comics" when he explains how by simplifying the text, the writer makes it easier for the reader to comprehend it. This is what Mc Cloud calls "amplification through simplification" (8). The same thing happens in visually-organized texts when they reduce syntax from full sentences to phrases without taking away their meaning.
BEFORE YOU READ
I analysed this article from http://thepost.ohiou.edu
Field Hockey: Bobcats fight to find the net as Ohio enters MAC play
Taylor Brown watches her pass travel downfield during the game against Ohio State on Wednesday at Pruitt Field. (Michael PronzatoI | For The Post)
Throughout the Bobcats’ last four games, they have amassed 66 shots, half of which were on goal, 37 corners and only four regulation goals. The number of times the ball is blasted to the twine is Ohio’s chief focus as it enters Mid-American Conference play Friday.
The Bobcats’ play, for the most part, has been acceptable, said Ohio (4-3) coach Neil Macmillan. Ohio has moved the ball well and has put itself in situations to score. But the Bobcats’ focus is improving the quality of their opportunities and turning them into goals.
Ohio’s shots per game (16.3) have improved by almost two shots from last season’s 19-5 team. The difference is that, with the exception of a nine-goal performance against Radford, this season’s squad is averaging only 1.33 points per game, as opposed to last season’s 2.67.
The team’s shooting percentage is .37 points fewer than the 2011 team.
“The one key that we need to address is finishing,” Macmillan said. “We don’t have enough opportunities from the possessions we have at (the other team’s) end.”
Another abnormality facing the Bobcats has been their sudden abundance of overtime appearances. Ohio has gone to two penalty shootouts (Indiana and Ohio State) in its past three games, which, Macmillan said, is unheard of in the field hockey world.
“In my 13 years before these two games … there’s three or four (penalty shootouts) that I’ve seen — not only been a part of, but seen across Division I hockey,” he said. “So I told the team, ‘It never happens. Don’t worry about it. It never happens.’ Then we get two in a row.”
But it’s not like the team isn’t prepared to play in strenuous situations. Macmillan stressed conditioning early in the year, a decision that has paid dividends so far this season.
“We rely on our fitness a lot,” he said. “And I think at the end of the game that starts to show. So we don’t mind getting into overtime games.”
The team is 1-1 in overtime situations and and senior Taylor Brown is proud of how the team has soldiered through games despite the extra pressure.
“We leave everything out on the field,” she said. “It’s just the fact that we put everything that we have in the game. We got really unlucky going into shootouts again, but I think the fact that we put all of our effort into it is good.”
Sophomore goalie Brittany Walker, who has logged 340 minutes in the past four games, has thrived as of late. She’s allowed only three goals in regulation over the four-game stretch and has stood her ground in the shootouts.
“We really practice them a lot even though Neil says that he never sees it come down to a shootout,” Walker said.
The article's title is in bigger letters than the rest of the text. There's an image from a previous game and the rest of the text is below it, in smaller letters.
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION AND JOURNALING
1. I do struggle reading this king of writing especially now that I'm not reading them in my native language. Sometimes I don't know the majority of the words that appear in these "full, declarative sentences" (36) so I have to translate them to Spanish. Also, there are times when the words used by the writer are so "big" that after I translate them I have to find out what their meaning too.
APPLYING AND EXPLORING IDEAS
3. The gestalt described by Bernhardt is the shape of the text. It's form by equilibrium or balance between the visual fields, good continuation, closure and similarity. I think that what help me understand the article was having the example of the wetlands sheet to identify what he was talking about.
AFTER YOU READ
I think Mc Cloud would have made a comic where a full, declarative text is screened leaving only key phrases.
META MOMENT
I consider visually text to be most appropriate in texts designed for public audiences like advertising texts. In the case of the formal writing assignments in this course, In think we can use visual thinking in every text we want to because it's not only about adding an image to the text but know how to organize it so it looks good to the readers eyes.
Pretty good work here, Luciana. I like that you brought in the article the Post.
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