Page 88 - Student: dazed And Confused

Visual communication is a vital part of any medium of fiction, and you will instantly
know whether it has been successfully achieved by whether it has created a strong picture
in your head. The picture created in your mind may be different to that of the writer, it
doesn't matter. A situation or event has been created in living colour - it has been
communicated.

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You will have doubtlessly read hundreds of pieces of prose that instantly created a
picture in your mind. When the image in your mind is as instant and crisp as a frame of film,
it has been well written. The author of that piece has used visual communication to the
max without once resorting to such devices as pictures in the book - though some writers
do choose to do so.
This is a piece of my own writing:

In the corner of a darkened room, an old TV in a wooden case flickers away
with no sound. The
owner of the set has muted it for he enjoys the comforting light and familiar
images it gives out,
but he is less than keen on the noise that comes
along with it. It sounds harsh and too synthetic to
his ears. So, the set is often switched to mute, or
right down until it is barely audible. The curtains
in the room are drawn over the windows to add to
the darkness, but a few rays of familiar sunshine

have managed to sneak in through the chinks in the dark red fabric. Comic
books are strewn around
the large room in, and the coffee table is covered
with yet more comics, magazines and a copy of Stephen Hawking's A brief
history of time. The
waste paper basket and the surrounding floor space
is littered with fast food wrappers and soda cans
that have missed their three-point target.

It creates an image of the room and you could easily show this on film by showing
exactly what is in your mind. Maybe you could describe it just as effectively in a poem, or an
exchange of dialogue.