June Spring Multimedia Corp provides seven points for consideration when designing an effective poster:
1. Get attention: (using graphics )
2. Keep it simple: (limit text, and keep color scheme and graphic elements consistent)
3. Use great fonts: (Raleigh gave us a resource for some examples of these)
4. Think, "information consumption:"(Start the poster with the most important piece of information)
5. Use colors carefuly: (Understand color theory, and if you don't, learn it; like what we did with the palette picker)
6. Think symmetry: (Keep the graphics and text on the poster balanced, use space wisely)
7. Break the rules: (Know these guidelines so you can know when to break them!)
Chapter five in our textbook "mini art school" expands on these concepts and includes further ones for consideration. Each of these are relevant when creating a poster or brochure, and should be considered in relation to one another throughout the design process.
Chapter 15 in our textbook, "fit to print" provides other information related to the preparation of document, attention to file size and type, and more, when preparing a poster or brochure for professional print. While some of us may only be concerned with the design of our media products for this course, it is important to remember who we are giving these deliverables to. Should our clients want to print what we create, they will (most likely) have no way to edit the file size/type, create bleeds for print, or understand what type of paper should be used to achieve the intended look of the poster or brochure. Part of our responsibility as designers is to consider the end goal as well, creating files that can easily be transferred, and made ready for print, should our client decide to use them.
Our local FedEx offers the following sizes for poster print: 18"x 24", 24" x 36", 35" x 48"; these are good examples of file sizes to begin working with for poster printing because you want to start with a large file size, rather than a small graphic that would need to be blown up.
Also, print bleeds are another important factor that should influence design, this means enough border must be left for cutting to size after print. If you have your graphics or text situated to close to the edges, it could be cut off when you go to print.
http://thenextweb.com/dd/2012/08/10/25-beautiful-modern-poster-designs-inspiration/
Weber, H. (2012). 25 beautiful and modern poster designs for your inspiration . Retrieved from http://thenextweb.com/dd/2012/08/10/25-beautiful-modern-poster-designs-inspiration/
June Springs Multimedia Corp. (2012). Guidelines to design a great effective poster. Retrieved from http://www.junespringmultimedia.com/blog/2012/09/04/guidelines-to-design-a-great-effective-poster/
I really like the “Built to Spill” poster. Although I wish it had more written text to provide the viewer more details of the event (just because I do not exactly know what it is for), I love how the oil is literally spilling into the water, and the majority of the poster is looking at what’s happening under the water rather than what we see above the water. The “Dirty Harry” poster you posted, Cat, definitely shows a great use of negative space with the smoking gun and the face. Very cool! “Chemtrail” also effectively uses negative space to create a funky looking picture. My favorite one (simply because of the colors and cool design) is the “Design Festival” poster. The design says it all and caught my attention right away simply because I was drawn to the bleeding colors. Although I like the color scheme on the “Things I Like” poster, the way the colors were used interchangibly between letters overwhelmed me a bit. I didn’t know where to look first and my eyes were fighting to try and look at everyone at once. The images are very cool but I think they could have done a better job of creating a focal point rather than the entire poster being more or less the focal point.
ReplyDeleteTo go back to earlier in your post, Cat, you bring up the book and how the authors mention that we as designers have to think about “fit to print”. I love a lot of these posters but many of them seem like if they were to be printed by someone other than the designer, such as the client, they could lose some of the design because it is right on the edges of the paper. Some of the posters are designed, I can see, to purposely run off the page but others include text that runs very close to the side. Just a thought I had while looking at all of them. Very cool website!
Very cool website, Cat! Thanks for sharing it with us. I personally enjoyed the last poster on the page, advertising the circus. Although the designer uses wild, vibrant colors (that I may not have ever thought about using together) in the word "Circus," it seems to work because in a circus one would expect to see some crazy, playful colors like that. There's also typically a lot of action in a circus, from trapeze displays to fire throwers, so the "movement" that the artist creates within the word "Circus" is very appropriate. It almost looks as if the word is reverberating, with all the overlapping lines that seem to create an optical illusion. I didn't notice at first that the word "Circus" appears twice, one right-side up and the other upside-down. The designer really had to select his/her colors carefully because it is only because of the high contrast between the red and blue (warm and cool) colors that the word "Circus" is even legible at all! If the word "circus" were in another cool color, it might blend more into the background and be harder to read. The diagonal yellow stripes that appear on top of the letters are reminiscent of the stripes one might see on circus tents. I would never think to use text in a vertical fashion, as this artist did, but it seems to add interest. Overall, I think the designer captured the whole circus feel very effectively.
ReplyDeleteSome of the other posters, however, were confusing to me, as I did not feel I had enough contextual information to fully understand them or what they were advertising/announcing. So, as standalone posters, I do not think they would be effectively understood by viewers. Some of them seem to communicate better than others. Of course, most of them are eye-catching, but what good do eye-catching posters do if they cannot be understood? These posters seem to be more like artwork (rather than educational materials) that require viewers to look closely at them for a long time to extract some sort of interpretation. (And these interpretations seem like they would vary greatly.)
In regards to Britney's observation about a lot of the images seeming to run of the page, I think that if the designer wants images to extend to the edge of the poster that is to be printed, they should extend the images past the actual border of the poster, and into the "bleed" border/area, so that way it ensures that the image will definitely go to the edges. Then the extra part of the image that goes past the edge is just cut off. If we try to size images within our editing programs so that they fit exactly within the parameters of the poster, when the poster gets printed, it's not guaranteed that there won't be any minor hairline of whitespace if the cutting isn't exact. Does that make any sense? I feel like I didn't explain that well. Also, I could be way off on all that, but that was just my take on it.
I agree with Raleigh that some of the posters were confusing to me. I think that some of the posters were trying to be more “artsy” than informative. However, I still found them all interesting and creative!
ReplyDeleteI also really liked the oil rig poster. The colors are visually appealing and I love how the drips are going into the water. The Audi poster captured my attention immediately. I like the simplicity and the use of negative space. It looks like the car is coming right at me and the logo on the car is centered and noticeable without being too in-your-face. It looks like the car is moving towards me because of the word “Audio” peaking through the windshield. I personally don’t think there’s anything to change with this poster because even if I hadn’t heard of the company, I have learned right away what they are selling and what their logo looks like. Everything important is either in the words or image.
I also find the Chemtrail poster to be interesting. At first glance I thought it was a poster for mountains, but then when I saw the planes and realized what the term “chemtrail” was referring too, I thought the gasses were creative. They are definitely getting the point across that they think the planes are leaving off an enormous amount of pollution. Also, I feel like they did a great job with the colors of the gases. The only thing I wonder about the poster is what’s the little white thing on the bottom right? I did have to look up what “chemtrail” was referring to. I’m not sure if this is a widely known term, but if it isn’t, some textual support would have helped me figure out this poster sooner. This could be added in a smaller font under the CHEMTRAIL title.
I found the "Save Trees Save Earth" to be interesting. The colors are blended so well. It reminds me of the artist Bob Ross who used to be on PBS that would take colors and shade them into something amazing. I really like how the circle is divided. I am not sure what the triangles stand for, but still interesting. I find this poster to be very modern.
ReplyDeleteThe "Things I Like" poster is appealing to me because of the colors that are used. Even though most of the pictures would not normally be that color, the colors used in the fonts tie everything in nicely. The reminds me of something from the 80's.
The Action Time poster really gets my attention because of the way the text is designed. To me it appears as if the text is falling off of a cliff, which is also emphasized by the text going off of the poster. I also find this to be pretty modern.
The Built to Spill poster did a nice job of conveying a message. I was able to understand the message even without a whole lot of text, which to me is the one of the most important aspects of a poster.
Great post, Cat.
ReplyDelete"A Neue Hope" does an amazing job using negative space; I love it!
The "Things I Like" poster appeals to me because of the muted and consistent color scheme and fonts. The pictures stay true to the theme, and as Shaun mentioned, the modification of the images to fit the theme ties all the content together without overwhelming the viewer.
"Action Time" really tickles my brain. The use of negative space expertly used to bring a 3D element to the poster in a simplistic manner.
Finally, the "Vintage Audi" achieves simplicity with two objects, yet tells a complete message. Placing the car in the foreground brings the attention forward, while the lettering in the background fills in any knowledge gaps for those not familiar with the model.
To Katie and Raleigh's observation that some posters were more artsy than informative, I think that's where the "modern" spin comes in. "Modern", or contemporary, can take on so many definitions and styles, but at its core, I believe modern aims to bend the rules. Many times this strive to break the norm flops, or irritates our brains to the point where viewers write it off as too oddball. Has anyone watched modern/contemporary dance? Moral: sometimes there's a message or purpose, and sometimes there is just stuff; no rhyme or reason, just stuff for the sake of stuff. To each their own though, and thus we have audience analyses.
I thought this was a good website and it was interesting to see all of the different poster examples. My favorite one was the vintage audi poster. I liked how it was simple, conveyed what the company did, and if you did not know what the symbol as it was written in text. The Enter 36 champers is a good example of lettering. I feel that the lettering on the record contributes to the vintage feel. I think the last poster is a poor example of lettering because it is too difficult to read. The run for your life and the dirty harry poster as examples of negative space.
ReplyDeleteAgreeing with some of the previous posts. Some of the posters look good but I struggled to understand what their message was. Maybe, the point of the poster was just to get the companies name out. Unless you know what the objective of the poster was and where it was distributed it is hard to accurately say weather the poster's message was appropriately conveyed.
While looking through all of these poster examples, I struggled to figure out what the website's qualifications were for modern designs.