Poster #1 (open for the season). It was suggested that I bleed the background image (a sheet of vintage paper), which would mean that I would lose the torn edges. However, I like the torn edges, which I used on all but one of the seven posters I created for the historical society in 2014 for uniformity. Hopefully, the torn edges help the reader think of an historical document. I decided to keep the torn edges just for this one poster for additional comments. I changed the header font to a vintage-looking font, Subway Novella, as requested.
Poster #2 ( pumpkin festival). I made major changes to this poster, including substituting a different background image of vintage paper (sans torn edges) so that there is a bleed. I used the same vintage-looking font, Subway Novella, for the header. I moved around images and text, but kept the same body font.. By the way, the little boy in his Superman costume is my brother; I colorized a black and white photo.
Poster #3 (Jack Frost Festival). The historical society praised this poster, but my classmates were concerned about readability, and I agree. It was suggested I reduce the opacity of the background image (frost on a window pane) so that the text was darker and more readable; I have done this. I tried to move the border to the edge of the paper, as suggested, but I couldn't understand how that would work. If the paper began to slip on the printer, this border might disappear.
As always, I welcome your comments. And now I think I will go to bed.
Virginia, I may have mentioned this earlier to you, not sure. If so, sorry to be repetitive:
ReplyDeleteSince you have labeled all 3 as Project 5, it means that we are looking at a series of posters - which happens often when the client is interested in retaining a certain "brand" design. The challenge for us designers is to repeat some design decisions, while keeping the brand looking fresh.
Here, I believe I am not seeing a series - but instead 3 separate designs done as separate projects. And because of that, they have almost nothing in common with each other. So... this will be a problem when they sit in your portfolio side by side - just like we see here. If it's a series, then some rethinking needs to happen. And.... they should be a series, retaining a certain similarity between them. Either a font, or a color, or a design approach needs to be consistently applied.
An easy fix would be to use the same background or edge treatment. In my opinion, the first poster contains a background that says "Historic" - and if you were to pull that into the other posters... voila, you have a series. You should feel free to shift the color of that background - to compliment the different events and support the different images you are using. But... it's a distinctive page element, and we'll recognize it even with the color shift.
Give this some thought - and obviously it will mean some reworking of the posters... but it will be worth it in the long run.
Your other choice is NOT to have them appear as part of a series... but I don't want to assume you'll abandon this idea... because having the series in your book is a good idea.
Virginia, I love the changes you made to your first poster. The vintage background paper with the edges showing is very effective, plus your new font choice elicits "vintage" much more than your prior fonts.
ReplyDeleteI also like Coni's idea of using the first poster's background image on the subsequent posters. You could still keep the same color schemes by adjusting the hue in photoshop for each of them.
I'm still impressed with your colorized image of your brother. Before you mentioned it was colorized, I was sure it was a color photo. Nice job!