Med-Tech Visions is the aesthetic associated with a certain style of digital scientific stock images. It is seen most commonly on the websites of both internet and print news sources whenever medical news is presented (but other area of sciences like math, computing and astrophysics may also have it). It can also be seen illustrating science magazines and the cover or editorials of biomedical journals. It usually presents a very slick, digital pseudo-CGI image of organs or cells. It is common to have one element highlighted in a different color.
History[]
The exact origins and rise of the aesthetics are unclear and require research. Visually, it seems to follow naturally from traditional medical and scientific artificial color imagery and Early Cyber visuals combined with Silicon Dreams 3D aspects. However, the slick, digital look associated with these images wouldn't have been common or easily achieved until at least the mid or late 90s.
The need for such imagery exploded in the age of internet social news sharing, specifically the launch of Facebook's Open Graph Protocol in 2010. With these functionally requiring each article to have a header image, thousands of science and general news websites found themselves in need of such images for content that was not easy or outright impossible to illustrate in-house (especially when there were often no in-house photographers to begin with). Although the aesthetic is most prominent in fairly generic pure stock imagery, it shows in the broader realm of biomedical sciences: covers and illustrations in scientific books, journals and magazines, visuals in documentaries and advertisement, medical tech startup websites, product packaging... Larger businesses in this industry are more likely to stick to actual photographs, though Corporate Memphis is not entirely absent.
Visuals[]
The design style makes heavy use of a slick 3D style. With a color palette usually based in the blue or cyan end of the spectrum with contrastively highlighted elements, if any, are typically in warmer colors like red, orange or yellow. Inverted versions of this palette may also be encountered. Pinks, purples, and magentas, although not entirely absent, are rare, usually being featured within gradients. Green is highly unusual within the scheme unless the imagery is referring to plant biology.
Particularly common visual hallmarks include:
- DNA helices
- Brains and neurons
- Various other organs
- Bones and muscles
- Electrograph lines
- Viruses
- Individual cells of all sorts
Materials on topic like computing, mathematics, chemistry or astrophysics may be significantly more abstracted. These images are also a lot more likely to use pink shades. Although these sometimes verge close to Vectorcore laser grids, they are usually still figurative enough to remain outside what would be considered Abstract Tech or Metalheart.