Project 3: Development

The Strongman

A documention of the creation of the strongman. Created using Illustrator.

I started off once again by looking for reference images of strongmen and placed by my artboard for inspiration.

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Card size and fold

I initially decided on a much better card but felt there would not be ample content to fill the space, it would thus have been uneconomical to make such a big card.

The fold of the card is inspired from the invitation card by Renee Griffin which I mentioned in a previous post. The card folds at two places, one just under the caption and another across the rock. Only when the card is opened is the rock revealed. The inital top fold was after the full caption, however it was suggested to increase the factor of surprise and so I split the caption between folds which would hide the word ‘rock’ within the fold.

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Card size and colour

I had reduced the width of the card by half to a size that was much more comforatble. I then proceded to create circus bunting on the back of the card. I first experimented with diagonally hanging bunting but found it too messy and complicated. I settled with something more simple.

I used the same colours that were used in the front for the strongman, for the bunting, keeping colour palette small with bright warm colours. I knew I needed a cool colour of somesort and settled with a teal which I used for the flag just to create contrast.

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Typefaces

Choosing typefaces. I had three typefaces that I was looking at for the caption in the front page, the first was CabbagetownStd, the second was Ewert and the third (which I eventually used) was Carnivalee Freakshow. All three typefaces were circs themed and Carnivalee Freakshow was the best to me as it was bold enough and not too complicated. It also had small details like lines running through, giving a vintage feel to it.

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Selecting a typeface

I placed the wishing at the back of the card and used the typeface called League Gothic, although I initially wanted to use a typeface called Press Style.

Two images below: Press Style

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Image below: League Gothic

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As for the corporate text, I stuck to Avenir, playing with different weights, using Avenir Light and Avenir Heavy.screen-shot-2016-11-07-at-4-00-02-pm

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Borders

I wanted to add borders into the composition but scrapped the idea as it made the card too congested.

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Addition of borders

Project 2: Final

Zika. Don’t Leave it to Chance

Final Poster
Final Poster
Final poster mounted & on display
Final poster mounted & on display

This entire poster was created using Illustrator. The layout was inspired by tarot cards, an idea from Kristin Gissendanner, who also did a health poster resembling a tarot card. I decided to go the vintage route with a poster that focused on the structure of the virus and the result was a vintage scientific poster.

Project 2: Development II

The Tarot Card

Before I started creating my poster I looked at images of vintage posters  as well as of tarot cards for inspiration on layout and colour. I chose to use more than just tarot cards as inspiration. The posters of moons caught my attention as with the virus structure, it too is round.

References from the internet
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Taking inspiration from vintage posters(left)
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Playing with colour

The screenshots below were taken whilst creating the poster. I started with a layout that was symmetrical but slowly branched out to create a poster that was asymmetrical but still balanced.

I was quite interested in the vintage posters and maps of constellations and the moon. There was a particular poster where there were coordinates around the circumference of the central image and I really liked it (image just below). I tired to incorporate that into my poster as well as I felt it was similar to mapping out the radius of the virus structure, giving it a vintage yet scientific feel.

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I decided to go ahead with a border for the poster as with a tarot card (image below). The task now was to make sure the border had a purpose and was not just a simple line border.

Vintage tarot card
Vintage tarot card

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I tried to repeat and resonate the circular form throughout the poster using lines of various opacities, weights and colours. The different opacities would hopefully create depth and create hierarchy by not stealing the attention away from the main virus structure itself.
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Various compositions

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Project 2- Development I

Starting out

I decided to start this project by selecting which prevention or measurement I wanted to portray in my poster and I settled on the ‘safe sex’ portion as I found it to be an interesting of Zika, as opposed to Dengue. It was worth mentioning and creating awareness about. Being a science student, I am usually quite curious about what a virus looks like since it was part of my syllabus to study the structures of viruses. A quite Google left with me stunned with the images of a rather lovely virus structure. I was definite that I was to use the structure of Zika into my poster and base my design on it.

Zika virus structure
Zika virus structure
Zika virus structure

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Idea 1 (rejected)

My initial idea was based off astronomy posters by Stephen Di Donato, where each poster depicted a different planet. I liked the clean simple layout of the posters and the ample breathing space within each design.

Beyond Earth Posters by Stephen Di Donato
Beyond Earth Posters by Stephen Di Donato

Other inspirations (referenced for both ideas 1 & 2) that make sure of circular forms:

International Year of Astronomy 2010 by Simon C. Page
International Year of Astronomy 2010 by Simon C. Page
International Year of Astronomy by Simon C. Page

I had planned to place the Zika virus on the poster similar to the planet and place a graphic of a condom somewhere to link back to the preventional measure (see below). My design was too conservative (especially the text in columns) and I myself found it hard to come up with variations of the idea. People raised an issue with the slogan whereby the word ‘size’ would lead to an association being made with microcephaly. This concept was thus not good enough.

'Size does not matter'
‘Size does not matter’

 

Other compositions
Other compositions

 

 

 

 

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Work in progress
Work in progress
Work in progress
Work in progress

After the group sharing, I was now sure that the Zika virus structure was the right way to go. It was indeed a different way to show Zika as compared to showing an image of a mosquito. It was suggested I play with the circular form of the virus.

Particular emphasis was placed on the composition below where the circular shape of the virus was rather prominent. I was told to play on the circular shapes.

Idea 2

I referred back to the poster which I has used for my analysis for some inspiration and realized the use of a tarot card was ingenious, it was something novel, that’s for sure. I decided to go use vintage tarot cards as inspiration and also stumbled upon vintage astronomy posters which I also used for colour reference.

The mention of tarot cards gives rise to the topic of luck, fate and chance. Hence, I settled on the slogan ‘Don’t Leave it to Chance’, meaning one should not take for granted that they would never be infected by Zika and instead take charge to prevent its spread whatever way they can. I placed a small portion of text in the poster, it was initially over 200 words but I was told by many people whom I showed my work-in-progress to, that that was too much. I had to thus cut the number of words to a mere 50 words. I guess posters are one of those things way the easier it is to read and digest the better, to send across a message as quickly as possible since not everything has the time to stand there and read every word.

 

Project 3: Research and Development

Developement

I had initially settled on an accordion fold for my card with graphics centred around the caption ‘Recovery is just around the corner’ which would be a play on the use of folds for this project. Another caption that I was thinking about was ‘On the road to recovery’ which would play in quite well with an accordion fold of an extending, winding road towards HDB estate symbolising home.

Below are some screenshots of my work in progress. The images surrounding the artboards are just some images I found that I liked and decided to use as inspiration one of which is from the game called Firewatch by Campo Santo. Most of my inspirations were landscaped based, so images like mountains, roads into a vanishing point.

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After the class sharing, I decided to scrap this idea and do something else. The relationship between the graphics and fold was not strong enough. I also didn’t feel for the graphics enough. I was not quite sure how to make the landscape amply interesting. The main comment I received for this design was that that it was too lonely, which I definitely agree with. An accordion fold might not have been the best fold as well as this. Overall I didn’t like the direction my design was taking.

Design Inspiration

Whilst looking for more material and inspiration, I happen to chance upon this design for an invitation card on Pinterest. The fold of the card and the graphics go hand in hand and compliment each other. Griffin has very cleverly chosen a fold that works for an object such as a grill. The card invites people to lift open the fold and the lid of the grill thereby revealing the contents in the grill as well as extra information on the event.

There is an element of surprise and fun with this invite since the user does not know what is inside and it’s a pleasant surprise of simple and yet elegant graphics of food arranged in an orderly manner that fit the overall composition.

Memorial Day Cookout Invitation by Renee Griffin
Memorial Day Cookout Invitation by Renee Griffin
Memorial Day Cookout Invitation by Renee Griffin
Memorial Day Cookout Invitation by Renee Griffin

The colour palette here is simple with warm colours used, yet it does not seem like nothing is lacking. I think a colour scheme as such is just perfect and does not over complicate the design.

With this design in mind and knowing now how important the interaction between graphics and the fold is, I knew that this was the direction I wanted to take with my new idea.

Project 3: Research

Card and Brochure Designs

Design 1

The design that intrigued me the most was one made by Origata Design Institute called the Fold IN Fold OUT. The folds are very unique, where the overlapping regions can be interchanged creating different compositions.

Fold IN Fold OUT

The blocks of colour stood out the most to me. Vibrant without looking gaudy. Geometric shapes used, the design is fairly simple and yet there is visual interest. Each shape is a particular colour. It is rather reminiscent of the De Stijl movement. Primary colours are used here together with green and white. The colours work really well together to create a clean simple design.

There is also a book to “Fold IN Fold OUT” that illustrates how the folds work.

Origata Design Institute
Origata Design Institute
Origata Design Institute
Origata Design Institute

Design 2

Simple fold (angled roll fold), diagonal line on the last page mimics the diagonal cuts of the brochure. Colour of each overlapping side also gives a sense of flow by using colours that get increasingly darker, e.g. white for the front page, light yellow for the middle page and for the last page, almost creates a gradient.

What stood out: choice of colour, mostly yellow with a hint of turquoise. When card is closed, the white cover becomes very prominent due to the difference in scale and contrasts the two small yellow triangles at the corner. The eye is drawn to the perpendicular line where the yellow meets white.

Design 3

Hilton Worldwide VIP Invitation for the London Olympics.  Die cuts usually capture ones’ attention quite a bit; anything that is not of a conventional shape would draw attention. In this case, the card is extremely detailed as well. Accordion.

Hilton Worldwide VIP Invitation for the London Olympics
Hilton Worldwide VIP Invitation for the London Olympics

The cityscape of London, which includes its iconic buildings and structures, has been cut out. The folding method here has been cleverly adopted to create depth. Opening up the card reveals the city layer by layer, encouraging the user to continue opening the card until the last page is reached thereby giving a sense of flow.

Design 4

 

Other Folds and resources

London: Panorama Pops by Sarah McMenemy
London: Panorama Pops by Sarah McMenemy
Open gate fold

Project 2- Visual Research 1B

SLOGAN DEVELOPMENT

Coming up with slogans was a challenge, to have something that was catchy and still short enough to fit into the 6 words.

Slogans should not be a phrase that is too straightforward, it should be succinct, catchy and leave the reader curious and earn to continue reading. Something too obvious would probably result in the reader reading the slogan, understanding it and moving on, leaving the rest of the poster unread. A slogan should intrigue a reader.

Below are the three slogans that I settled on after coming up with quite a few.

  • beat it before it bites
  • When size doesn’t matter
  • Zika don’t host a free lunch (preventive measure: insect repellant, prevention from being bitten)

Style of the poster(potential)

  • Movie poster (vintage, pop culture, famous movie posters)

Some examples:

  • Minimalistic (use of shapes etc.) 

Some examples:

new york dolls at the little hippodrome, 1975, Swissted

[Above] The Swissted project by Mike Joyce has many minimalistic posters made of geometric shapes, colour and type.

Poster designs by Ross Gunter
Poster designs by Ross Gunter
Poster by Ross Gunter
Poster by Ross Gunter