This reflection is based upon Dawn Woolley’s assessment of the avert “There’s a science to looking good” (Woolley, 2016). This is an advert for Clinique face wash for men along with some kind of scrubbing machine – both produced in a metal looking grey (see Fig. 1).

The initial part of the analysis focuses on the subheading to the advert “New power tools for men”, which he points out position the products not as cosmetic products but as tools. This is manifest in the words themselves but I must confess that until reading this assessment, had not actually occurred to me.

Woolley talks of this linkage with work being a technique used since 2008. I can just remember the type of adverts that existed before this, Old Spice and Brut 55 would be examples. In those types of advert (and I cannot remember any text from them) tended to portray a lifestyle choice, old spice focussed on a surfer for example.

What had not occurred to me was the shift in selling technique from one of lifestyle to one of utility. And yet, all aspects of this advert support Woolley’s assessment, the words on the page, but also the look of the products, their angular style, the scrubber does look like some kind of sanding tool.

The mail part of the text “There’s a science to looking good” seems to me to add an air of sophistication. If the tools aspect are aimed at the working class, then perhaps the headline aims to elevate the products into something towards the higher end of professions, the scientific, the higher-brow. Between the two titles they have covered off the two tiers of male working pursuits and I feel that they have done this without drawing any attention to the gap that might lie between them in terms of wealth or power.

With reference to the course, the text and the image are, I feel, orientation in nature, that is they are intended to achieve the same thing, to invoke the same thoughts and emotions. There is no gap between them for the viewer to fill in.

Bibliography

Woolley, D., 2016. Looking At Adverts: 15. [online] Oca.ac.uk. Available at: https://www.oca.ac.uk/weareoca/photography/looking-adverts-15/?cn-reloaded=1 [Accessed 27 April 2020].

Figures

Figure 1. Clinique, 2016. There’S A Science To Looking Good. [image] Available at: https://www.oca.ac.uk/weareoca/photography/looking-adverts-15/?cn-reloaded=1 [Accessed 27 April 2020].