Session 8 – Looking At Test Photographs And Learning About Being An Art director – 07/12/11

We began our session by finalising plans for the residential that we are going on as part of our campaign 09/12/11 – 11/12/11. We discussed the update from Niall, the photographer and Aaron, the illustrator on feedback that we gave on the illustrations from last week’s session.

We were introduced to Jonathan Barnbrook, who is a well known graphic designer of one of the evolution poster’s we looked at for inspiration for this campaign. 

Jonathan talked to us about:

- Looking at what a poster is

- Gave us a break-down of what a graphic designer is – somebody who organises information for people to understand it and put across what’s important

- He is a less commercial graphic designer

- One person’s directive thought creates a poster

He talked us through some examples of good and bad posters:

Obama ‘hope’ poster:
- Simple
- Example of a good poster
- Expressing the spirit

Briton wants you poster:
- Appeals to patriotism
- Addresses the viewer directly
- Simple

Labour isn't working poster:
- Got direct statement
- Says action

New labour, new danger poster:
- Bad example
- You remember it for the wrong reasons

Use spades, not ships poster:
- Clever

Anatomy of Murder film poster:
- Simple
- Makes you want to investigate more

Jaws film poster:
- Sums everything up in the poster

American Beauty film poster:
- Simplicity helps
- Great poster

Gun evolution poster:
- Cliché
- “If you use violence, the only person you are going to kill is yourself in the end.”

Osama Bin Laden and Ronald McDonald poster:
- Humour makes people think, and raises a smile
- KGI poster
- Two extremes

Things to consider when creating a poster:
- Keep it simple and do lots of promotion
- "If everything is shouting, then nobody can hear.”
- They should “inform and condense”
- A good poster stays around for a long time
- It has got to attract attention!
- Simplify your poster – make sure you know what you are trying to say
- Simple elements, don’t try to complicate

We had a questions and answers session with Jonathon and learnt about what being an art director involves:



Jonathan also gave us some feedback on our poster:

We looked at the test photographs that Niall’s assistant, Ryan took with a few members of the group last week.

Here is the feedback we all gave:

General feedback
- Interested in having a muted background.
- Need a lot of pavement – for the evolution line to stand on
- Need a building in the background
- Want it to be duller

Image 019
- Like the scene
- Not sure about the building in the background
- The colours are decent

Image 028
- Looks decent
- Like the pavement/space
- Building looks decent

Image 044
- It would be better if it was from the side angle, with the pavement in the foreground

Image 055
- Liked the ‘no more war’ graffiti

Image 057
- Like the long pathway
- Like the background
- The colours in the green leaves, etc are vibrant and look good