Advert Analysis #1

 Vans Commercial - Student Made

This is an advertisement for Vans Shoes, made by a student. It was released in May 2nd 2016. Vans is an iconic shoe company that is originally made for skateboarders but eventually became popular to youths and teenagers these days. Vans promotes its shoes as  comfortable and well rounded to be used anywhere in pretty much every situation. 

Media Language

The person in the advert is wearing an old Vans shoe, which sort of subverts our expectations, since most people would expect the best way to advertise a product is by showing it as being completely new. But this way of storytelling, makes it so, that audience have a feeling of longevity of the product. That even an old shoe with tears can still do stuff that an otherwise new shoe could. This is furthered emphasized with various codes throughout the text. Like how dirty the skateboard looks and how the stickers on it are decaying? ( Don't know a word to explain it ). This is more appealing to skateboarders I would think, as it feels as its sort of their vibe.

Representation

 The Main Character is representing skateboarders in a good light. Doing cool tricks here and there and minding His business, Which sort of breaks the stereotype of skateboarders being punks, unruly, causing mischief and mayhem. The color green is also pretty apparent in the advert, Green has the connotation  of growth, peaceful, nature and calming which is words the you don't usually associate with skateboarders. So this leads me to believe that this advert subverts the audiences expectations.

Audience

The advert is somewhat targeted to white teens or young adults, coming from middle class or under households and this is shown by set, where the streets and location looks clean, peaceful and empty. But above all, this advert is clearly made for skateboarders, using the reception theory people who associate with skateboarders or are skateboarders themselves would have a preferred reading towards the text as they are seen in good light. For teens, just having those cool tricks on display is likely enough to attract them and possibly persuade them to buy the products.  

Industry 

The Big 'Vans' text at the end of the Advert, is made in post production likely with an editing software. This likely done to catch the viewers attention and to be aware of the product being shown.  On top of that, Its very typical for a Vans advert to be paired up with a skateboard, as Vans are famous for being skateboard shoes. Its no different on this one, While the main focus of the advert is the shoes, the extensive usage of the skateboard within the advert can attract audience to research or be more interested on the skateboard. As a result both Vans and Skateboard companies mutually benefits from this.