Deconstructing an Advertisement

Step 1: Make Observations

• There is a Mexican/Italian female that is depicted into this ad. She is young, stylish and beautiful. Her facial expression is seductive.
• The camera angle was straight on, as it covers all of her face and a little bit below the shoulders. It was definitely fairly close to her, and it was taken eye-level. 
• I think it is most definitely artificial as the background is all white and she is illuminated to perfection because they want her looking as perfect as possibly and cant have any shadows on or across her face. Her skin and hair are definitely highlighted, I think this is so you can clearly see how perfect she is. there is one shadow outlining her jaw which is not big i think it is there just for the effect. 
• Yellow is used on the little bubbles floating around and yes they are bright, yellow is also used on the word 'beautiful'. Everything else, her tank top is white, her hair is dark and brown, and her jewelry has a tint of gold to them. They do contract each other so this is a very vibrant advertisement. 
• The text in the ad is very bold and easy to read. I think the font used is book antiqua for the Pantene writing, but I think the font for the rest of the writing is just calibri. All off the text is bold black except for the word beautiful. Which is only yellow. The large text says 'Fuel Your Hair' and the small text including the yellow word says 'Strong is Beautiful'.

Step 2: Determine the Purpose of the Ad

• The product being sold is shampoo.
• Yes I do, because it makes my hair soft and smell nice.
• The target  audience for this ad is female teens and adults.
• The feelings and emotions that the ad is trying to associate with the product are envy for the women in the ad because she is so beautiful and may be trying to hit the insecurity feelings a touch due to the fact that if you want to look like her and that is the reason you use this shampoo then you must not love the way you look which means you may or may not have a little bit of insecurity about yourself. I imagine it does work on some girls, but personally i choose my shampoo by the scent and how it makes my hair feel. 

Step 3: Determine the Assumptions the Ad Makes and the Messages it Sends

• The assumptions the ad makes about the gender is that women love their hair soft and they want to look like Selena Gomez. I think partially yes, every women wants their hair soft, but I disagree with the part that every woman wants to look like Selena Gomez, yes she is beautiful but not everyone wants to look like her. I think they enforce stereotypes about gender identity. 
• I don't believe that there are really any assumptions about race within this ad. They could have used any beautiful celebrity and it would be the exact same thing, I think the biggest part of why they used Selena is not for her race but for her publicity.
• Again I don't think that there is any assumptions having to do with class, other than I suppose the fact of the person in the ad being a celebrity. Which therefore the assumption would be that everyone wants to look like her and because she is a celebrity, everyone will buy their product. I think it partially reinforces it because it is true in many cases that people will buy products based on whomever that celebrity is that is in the advertising. 

Step 4: Consider the Possible Consequences of these Messages

• Some of the possible consequences of the words said in this ad are that women who can't buy this shampoo may feel like they aren't beautiful without it due to the words 'strong is beautiful'. This could be long-term or short-term, but to be honest I don't think people are really that crazy over the fact that a shampoo commercial says you can only be beautiful if you use this product. 
• Having used this shampoo, it does make my hair feel great and strong, but on the other hand it does create unrealistic expectations because by having your hair strong by using this shampoo or any other will not make you any more beautiful.
• I think it undermines social change because there will certainly be a lot of girls who 'need' this shampoo because Selena Gomez uses it. 
• I think that this ad is not socially responsible because it is not contributing anything to the environment, it is only taking away. For an ad or a company to be socially responsible they have to be selling or providing information to help the earth grow and be a better place, shampoo does not fall under that category. 
• To think of yourself primarily as a citizen and not a consumer is to think about yourself doing good on this earth, rather than just buy things and support the companies that are destroying it. Yes, one can be both a citizen and a consumer, they just have to be smart about it like buying from local companies which will contribute to the small towns. This ad is definitely not encouraging to be a citizen, it fully supports you to be a prime consumer, and Pantene is a chain of shampoos that are sold all over, which means usually that it is all made in a factory in China or something by laborers.