Σύγκριση μεθόδων

	Οπτική Ανάλυση	Εθνογραφία
Πεδίο	Ποιοτικές Μέθοδοι	Ποιοτικές Μέθοδοι
Οικογένεια	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Έτος προέλευσης	Formalized in social sciences from the 1980s–2000s	c. 1922 (Malinowski's Argonauts of the Western Pacific)
Δημιουργός	Roots in art history and semiotics (Panofsky, Barthes); social science applications developed by Gillian Rose and Marcus Banks	Bronisław Malinowski (modern ethnography); rooted in 19th-century anthropology
Τύπος	Qualitative research approach	Qualitative fieldwork tradition
Θεμελιώδης πηγή	Rose, G. (2016). Visual Methodologies: An Introduction to Researching with Visual Materials (4th ed.). Sage. ISBN: 978-1473943056	Hammersley, M. & Atkinson, P. (2019). Ethnography: Principles in Practice (4th ed.). Routledge. ISBN: 978-1138504462
Εναλλακτικές ονομασίες	visual research methods, image analysis, visual inquiry, visual data analysis	Etnografi, participant observation, fieldwork, ethnographic research
Συναφείς	6	5
Σύνοψη	Visual analysis is a qualitative research approach that systematically examines visual materials — such as photographs, films, artworks, advertisements, and diagrams — to understand how meaning is produced, communicated, and interpreted. Drawing on traditions from art history, semiotics, and social science, it treats visual objects as data that carry social, cultural, and ideological significance. Multiple frameworks exist, from formal compositional analysis to discourse-based and audience-reception approaches.	Ethnography is a qualitative research tradition in which a researcher immerses themselves in a social group or community over an extended period — typically three to six months or longer — to study its culture, values, and behaviours in their natural setting. Originating in social and cultural anthropology, and consolidated as a rigorous method by Bronisław Malinowski in the early twentieth century, ethnography produces rich, contextualised accounts of how people live, work, and make meaning together.