As I read my section, Spy and Counter-Spy, I just kept thinking about my own visual essay and how I would use text to guide the audience through the essay. In "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men" Evans does not have any sort of caption, description, title, date, even numbers to go along with his pictures. Agee writes a "Book 2" that follows the "Book 1" of photos, but the reader has no guidance through the pictures, no help at all. This is somewhat of an extreme of describing that photography is and isn't a language. I would say that this case emphasizes the point that photography is a language because the audience should be able to "read" the photographs to "read" the essay. The photos are in no specific order. Mitchell says they don't tell a story, so what makes them an essay and not just a collection of pictures?
So, do I need text? Do I even need to talk during my presentation? Should I let the audience guess what the pictures are? Should I guide them through? I will put some sort of caption/explanation/description because my personal opinion is that context gives the audience more reality on the situation. They are guided and have an idea of where they are going. What they think of it and how they interpret the meaning is up to them, but context can help them form these ideas.
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