Sandwiched inside Lucky Magazine, Canon’s advertisement is out to convince young-middle aged consumers to buy its digital cameras. The layout of the advertisement is fairly traditional,as the majority of the ad is split vertically by two largely contrasting photos with white space at the bottom for text. The left photo features a relatively monochromatic picture of a small slide, whereas the right photo is of a vibrantly colored roller coaster. Two bulleted phrases are allocated to the top of the photos: “Digital” over the monochromatic picture, and “Canon Digital” over the bright, roller coaster one. The text at the bottom promotes the new “DIGIC” chip now included in Canon’s digital cameras and reinforces the message given by the pictures. By emphasizing the superiority of the Canon brand, adding symbols and creating a focal point to draw in the viewer, and using the images to reinforce its text, Canon’s advertisement introduces its newly designed chip and distinguishes its brand from others.

     Canon is definitely not the only brand in the market of digital cameras. Unfortunately for Canon, potential customers have lots of options. Even so, Canon relies on this ad to show how it is distinguished among all the other brands and to make the consumer specifically want Canon and no other. The way that the advertisement achieves this is that it makes Canon cameras sound like a separate entity. Instead of comparing Canon to competing brands like Minolta or Nikon, Canon generalizes every other brand under the phrase “Digital.” This way, the viewer is not actively given a chance to consider other brands. Using the boring picture of a dingy slide that takes up barely one-third of the picture space, “Digital” is automatically portrayed as jaded and lackluster. The negative space in the picture implies the lack of outstanding or desirable qualities, and the monochrome cool blues cause the picture to further recede into the background. Even the subject matter, a slide, is simple and ordinary and is associated with the past. All this is juxtaposed against “Canon Digital,” which glows with color. Not only is the photo so much more vibrant than the “Digital” one, but it has so many more qualities: depth, complexity, and clarity. These qualities are what a potential consumer would likely value in a new digital camera. Canon also tacks on its tagline – “digital revolutionized photography, we revolutionized digital.” This statement similarly excludes other brands and focuses on the revolution that Canon claims it has made. People the revolution that digital has brought to photography: erasing photos on the camera, uploading to the computer, viewing of photos thumbnails instantly, manipulating color, etc. The “Canon Revolution” is not quite as recognizable, but Canon uses this advertisement as an opportunity to create for the viewer a vision of    While Canon may wish to elaborate on their revolution, their effort is wasted if the viewer is not interested and his/her attention isn’t captured. To do this, the advertisement creates a path for the viewer’s eye to follow. This path begins by directing the eye to climb up the ladder of the slide, swoop down and rush into the pathway of the roller coaster. The viewer is then taken up and around the roller coaster as if experiencing the ride. The advertisement further integrates the viewer by suggesting that the viewer is one of the people in the cart in the center loop. The link between the pathways of the slide and the roller coaster helps emphasize the stark difference between the photos as well as gets the reader to explore most of the advertisement. The use of symbols also helps involve the viewer by giving them something they can associate with. The two distinctly bold phrases on the top over the photos, “Digital” and “Canon Digital,” are respectively headed by the universal symbols for “Play” and “Fast-forward.” Not only do these symbols add emphasis to the words, but they also highlight the acceleration between merely playing and fast-forwarding. Like a catalyst, Canon has sped up the process and brought the future of digital to the should-be buyer.

     To exemplify the futuristic qualities of their camera, Canon uses its text to complement the images it portrays. While the tagline “Know How” does not lend very much to the main message, the other text in the image serves the advertisement well. The bottom one-fourth of the advertisement devoted to the text explains how the "DIGIC" Chip now featured in Canon’s new cameras is so special: it adjusts your image to make it sharper and clearer so that you get the best picture. The text also states that taking pictures with Canon’s cameras is so easy that “you just relax and enjoy the ride.” This statement is targeted to the young audience of Lucky Magazine that can relate to how easy and fun it feels to ride a roller coaster like the one depicted. This phrase also refers to the point-shoot automatic functions of the camera. The emphasis here yet again links back to the roller coaster picture. Even though the cart must be moving at incredibly high speeds, the cart is not at all blurred. This implies that Canon’s cameras not only are easy to use, but they also have very high shutter-speed capacity. This is not a standard quality feature found in most point-and-shoot cameras. Having this function just might help sway a potential customer into buying Canon’s product, the implication of which is reinforced by the text and image in this advertisement.