Analysing an advert for a porcelain statue of Gandalf the great

Imagine a world without media. Media is a process of communication, information and entertainment. Media consumes everyone’s every day life… it is imposable to avoid!

With our ever growing world more and more people are now relaying on media as it pervades our very existence, we may not realize it but media is around us twenty four hours a day, 7 days a week, without media we would be thrown back into the dark ages whether it is from us using the internet or using the phone media is the creator of the world today.

Advertising is used to achieve many objectives e.g. to persuade, change opinions, maybe you smoke advertising is possible to change your mind. Advertising is also used to manipulate, sell and influence.

Advertising, it is a large part of our vast world as it is imposable to escape… it is every where! On the clothes we were, on the bags we carry, almost every item we see or use has some form of advertising on it. There are multiple forms of advertising some of these being: tv,radio,posters,bill boards, leaflets and the internet… 87% of u.k teens ages 12 to 17 currently use the Internet, representing about 21 million youth. Of those, approximately 11 million teens go online on a daily basis. Advertising is a leading multimillion pound business as everyone every where has used this many times.

For my assignment, I will be analysing an advert for a porcelain statue of Gandalf the great.

The audience of this advert are adults in particular lord of the rings enthusiasts and people who like to collect memorabilia. The character from the book Lord of the Rings (Gandalf) is clearly for adults because the product is a figurine not a toy as if this was given to a child it would be broken. Another way I no that the target audience are adults is the amount of body copy as it would not appeal or interest a child because there is such a shear amount. The final reason i now the consumers are adults are that the order form in the left hand corner has credit card details of which a child could not access.

The large body copy of the advertisement has six paragraphs which each have a different aspect.

The opening paragraph which initially describes ‘Gandalf’ the character uses linguistic devices such as; alliteration, superlatives and emotive language these are used to influence the consumer to purchase the figurine.

The detail in this has continuously been boasted in the body copy ‘guants on his face’. This is such an amazing work of art with meticulous dental therefore it is quality. ‘Painstaking attention to detail’ this shows the making of their product has taken lots of effort and lots of time in order to achieve true quality.

Buying this product is a bargain. A once in a life time opportunity their product is high, callibre very cheap just �24.99.It is remarkable value for money the word ‘just’ has the connotation of a great offer.

The buyer/consumer are also informed that they will receive an officially authorized product which put forth the idea of this not being a cheap imitation, it’s the real deal!

The product is also part of a collection which means further opportunity to purchase outstanding products, the fact of there being more collectable products available temps the audience to by the figurine to create a montage. The product is exclusive to ‘Danbury Mint’ this gives the connotation of this being a special offer as it is not available to purchase anywhere else also it has been officially authorized and endorsed by Tolkin.

The final paragraph ends with the imperative ‘reserve your sculpture now’ the reader is urged to reserve the product to avoid disappointment as ‘demand is sure to be high’ this implies the product of which is popular.

So far I have analyzed the linguistic devices, yet there are presentational devices used to provoke the target audience. The two main forms of the presentational devices are; the huge amount of body copy which is compact with stylistic devices, and the picture of which dominates the page/advert.

The picture dominates the advert by the size and that it is symmetrically composed it is prominence. The image is also a mid shot to enable that the consumer is able to see before they buy. This gives the connotation that the producers have great confidence in there product. The producer has used a close up picture to boast the product; ‘fearless expression…the lines of his gaunt, aged face…his long beard.

The producer has used multiple colours for presentational devices used to manipulate the target audience.

The green background is soft (subtle) green to enable that the reader is drawn to the image of the statue rather than the background, also this gives the connotation of the green fields and the forests in the book ‘Lord Of The Rings’.

The second colour used in this advert is gold which is in the top left hand corner (title box) this makes it eye catching and gives the connotation of the product being expensive (precious) it also gives the connotation of the gold ring which is in the book aswell.

The final colour that is used is black and white which is used in the order form these colors are used because they are simple (easy to follow) also so it is intimately hard to make mistakes when purchasing.

The gold used in the title box is of which the p.o.a (primary optical area) other than this being eye catching, it displays the title ‘Gandalf’ which provides instant recognisation to any ‘Lord Of The Rings’ fan as he is a key/main character in the book. The title is also in a font of which is antiquated/med evil this provides the connotation of magic, mystic and age… after all ‘Gandalf’ is a wizard.

In the bottom right hand of the page we have the terminal area (T.A).’Send no money now!’ This is placed in the T.A because it is the last place the consumer looks therefore the last fixation the consumer remembers.