What makes certain images powerful?/MySpace Profile: Paige Salane

What makes certain images powerful?
In our world today, images mean everything to the naked eye. Images are the way in which people communicate with one another. Whether these images are visual or audible, each type aids human interactions in some way, shape, or form.
Some messages, depending on how they are conveyed, are more powerful than others. For instance, if the eye sees a big red cross, that person is going to recognize that there is some medical connotation being made. More specifically, if a person sees the numbers 9-1-1 they should automatically recognize that help is near and readily available, in a universal sense.
Universal messages are probably the most power images conveyed because they mean the same things to such a large group of people. Creating universal messages, such as 911, the golden arches of McDonald’s, or the apple symbol for Mac computers, help assist us in making it easier to transmit messages in more effective ways. When everyone understands that one visual means a certain thing, or conveys a certain message, there is no confusion present.
On the other hand, there are universal visuals, such as MySpace or Facebook pages, that are uniform in layout but convey different things about the subjects they are representing. Unlike the holy cross or the cigarette butt with a slash through it, each which transmit a message clearly, the MySpace and Facebook profile pages convey the same messages about people in different ways, depending on how the creator chooses to design their page.

MySpace Profile for Paige Salane
I am going to create a MySpace profile for my sister, Paige. She currently has a Facebook profile but she just cancelled her MySpace profile for various reasons.
My sister is a lot like me in that she likes to keep things plain and simple. Her MySpace profile that she used to have was similar to something that I would create if I had a MySpace profile for myself, so I feel as though it will be simple and fun for me to create a new one for her.
To start with, I would put a maroon colored background on her page. I like this color for Paige because a.) It’s her school color, b.) She looks best in clothes that are this color, and c.) She looks good in all shades of red. I would use a shade of light pink for the font to offset the maroon.
For her font, I would use comic sans. Although comic sans is a very traditional, commonly-used font, I think that it best represents Paige because she wants to be a school teacher. To me, comic sans looks like a font that a child would create with a crayon, which makes me think of a teacher, or a person who possesses teacher-like skills.
Paige likes music a lot, so I would want to include as many of her favorite bands as I could. Perhaps there is an application that would allow me to put her top three bands, and a sample of their music, on her profile page. These bands would be Incubus, the Dave Matthews Band, and Dashboard Confessional.
Paige also takes several photos, many of which are of the children that she babysits, her family, and her friends. I would definitely have to include all of her photos on her profile.
Her horoscope is something that Paige makes sure to read as often as she can. I think it would be neat to put her daily or weekly horoscope on her profile page.
For her actual information on her profile, Paige usually keeps things simple, yet complex. Her personal preferences will be t he only thing that will not be too limited. Paige likes to express how she is feeling, what colors she likes, and how she feels about people. Some people prefer to spend time on this while others do not.
For her profile picture, Paige usually only posts a headshot. If she doesn’t use a headshot, she will use some sort of funny action shot that someone took of her. She’s a funny person so it’s easy for her to express that quality through her photos.
Another thing that I noticed about Paige is that she likes quizzes of all sorts. A lot of people post links to quizzes about romance and personality on their profiles and I think that is something that Paige would put on hers.
Her favorite sport is soccer, so I feel as though something soccer-related should be posted on her profile, as well. Perhaps a photograph of her favorite player, or just a separate link that connects the viewer to a website about the soccer team that she played for in high school would be appropriate.