Film Poster Design

For my third and final assignment for this introduction to graphic design, I was asked to produce a film poster, either for an already existing film or a fictional one. It should be A4 in size, and include the title, a byline, a review quote and a main image, which could be a mixture of several images. We could also use Photoshop, InDesign or Illustrator to produce our posters.

It was also suggested however that they should not perhaps be conventional film posters, but should incorporate some of the design elements we had been learning about. Whilst researching not so conventional film posters, I particularly liked the posters of artist Olly Moss, of which some are shown below.

His posters are very clever in their composition, and incorporate iconic images from the films they are about. The use of iconic shapes and images was something I wanted to incorporate in my own poster.

First, however, I had to decide upon what to film to make a poster about, of which I narrowed down to a short list of five possibilities, namely "Big", "The Princess Bride", "Howl's Moving Castle", "The Wizard of Oz" and a fictional film based on the book "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies". Various posters of these can be seen below.

After looking at various possibilities for each one, and looking at images related to each theme, I decided upon creating a poster for Howl's Moving Castle. I felt that this film included several elements and shapes which I could utilise. Also, as I was researching, I looked at several posters for each of the films, some of which were created by fans, and as such for those more iconic films, such as the Wizard of Oz, I would be too influenced by what I had seen. Howl's Moving Castle's posters however mainly appeared to be created by taking stills from the film, thus allowing me to create something different from the original. 

Here is a brief summary of Howl's Moving Castle, taken from IMDB:

"A young woman named Sophie is cursed by the Witch of the Waste, turns into an old woman, and is unable to tell anyone of her plight. Unable to continue her job at her mother's hat shop, she goes to the ambulatory castle of the notorious wizard Howl and insinuates herself into his household. Sophie befriends Calcifer, the fire demon who powers the castle and who is bound to Howl by a contract, the terms of which Calcifer cannot reveal. They promise to help each other with their problems. Like Calcifer, Howl can also see through the Witch's spell, and he and Sophie fall in love. Sophie helps Howl confront his former teacher, and the Witch of the Waste."

From my own knowledge, I sketched some of the various major elements of the film, in order to decide on which one, as seen in Sketch 1.

Sketch 1 - Howl's Moving Castle Ideas

From my sketching, and inspired by the following image, I decided to focus on the character of Calcifer for my poster, whose role underpins the whole plot line, as his contract with Howl is the mystery that is revealed at the end. He hints at his connection throughout the film, that he has Howl's heart, and so I wanted my image to hint at this connection also, without being completely explicit. Sketch 2 shows my final design for the poster.

Sketch 2 - Final Poster Sketch

Some key features I wanted to incorporate was a feeling of layered paper, because I did not want it took look photographic, as it is an animated film. The centre of Calcifer also should be shaped like a human heart, and his character should be the focus of the poster.

Considering my design, I decided that Illustrator would be the best programme for me to use, especially due to it's Image Tracing tool, to enable to easily convert complex images to simpler designs, which eventually I would use a lot of in the creation of my poster.

Therefore the first thing I wanted to create was my portrayal of Calcifer, in particular it's heart core. In screenshot 1 you can see the original image, which was chosen for it's clean lines, and almost cartoon appearance. An image trace was carried out, and after experimentation, it was found that isolating just three of the colours worked best. 

Screenshot 1 - Original heart image

After this the colours were changed to yellow, as depicted in the image of him from the film, and very simple eyes were added. The eyes were kept simple so as to maintain a graphic, animation and 2D feel to the poster, as seen in screenshot 2.

Screenshot 2 - Yellow heart.

I decided next to create the rest of the flame body of Calcifer by using a similar method as creating the heart, by using image trace on a picture of a flame, and then adjusted as required. The original image can be seen in screenshot 3.

Screenshot 3 - Original image of fire

After changing the colours and shape of the resulting flame image, and layering it with the heart, I also added a drop shadows as I outlined in my original sketch. I also added a canvas texture to both images to emphasise the paper layering effect I wanted. I added some blurring, to make the core seem more flame like, and with some minor adjustments of rotation and opacity, it resulted in the image shown in screenshot 4.

Screenshot 4 - Calcifer and various hands

Screenshot 4 also highlights the images of hands I tried with the poster. Although different from my initial sketch, I decided upon the hands on the right in screenshot 4, which eventually became like that shown in screenshot 5. This was because I liked the composition of the hands coming from the bottom left, as it appeared more intimate, putting the viewer in the position of those whose hands they were. Also, as I knew I would be simplifying the image to utilise only a few colours, the shadows between the fingers in that particular image would ensure that it would still be clear that they were hands. Screenshot 5 shows the result of an image trace using 16 colours for that particular image, with the background removed.

Screenshot 5 - Calcifer and decided upon hands

Again, as outlined in my initial sketch, I then set about creating a background made of black feathers. I wanted to use this background, as the monster which Howl turns into during the film, and which is also a repeated element, is  similar to a big black bird. Hence the black feathers. The original image which the feathers were taken from is shown below (which happened to be a detail from a skirt), and the result of an image trace producing an image in shades of grey is shown in screenshot 6. This particular image trace was chosen in the end after experimentation, and although contrast was required between Calcifer, the hands and the background, if left in as the photo, the result was too disjointed, and the background appeared at odds with the main image. With the result in screenshot 6 however, contrast was still there, however the whole poster was more cohesive.

Screenshot 6 - Image with poster background

In my initial sketch I wanted the hands to be white, however I also wanted to maintain the detail of highlights and shadows on the hands, and therefore decided to convert the image to a black and white one. The easiest way for me to do this was to take the hand image, transfer to Photoshop, make the adjustments required, including with the black and white colourisation, also brightness and contrast adjustments, and then transfer back into Illustrator as seen in screenshots 7 and 8. In addition, the hands were also given a canvas texture and a drop shadow in order to make them appear more paper-like as well, as seen in screenshot 8.

Screenshot 7 - Hand image made black and white

Screenshot 8 - Final image and background

All that was left then was all the text to put on the poster, and as I discovered, it was not as easy as I first thought. I initially tried having the title on one line, as I originally sketched, at the top of the page rather than the bottom, what with the change in layout of my poster from the change of position of my hands image. This is shown in screenshot 9.

Screenshot 9 - Initial title attempt

I did not like the result though, as I felt that the title had too little impact, and in the end decided upon the layout shown in screenshot 10. The text was adjusted to ensure that both lines of text were the same length, as the emphasised alignment highlighted the titular character of Howl within the film. The typeface used was Trajan Pro, a roman based type, which is very clear and all caps. I think it works with this particular film poster, as although a fantasy film, Howl's Moving Castle is set in a world akin to Victorian Britain, and the classical typeface reflects that. It was made white as well, to stand out against the black background, and to ensure that the focus was on the image of Calcifer, being the only thing in colour on the poster.

Screenshot 10 - New layout of title

I also wanted to add the director's name near the title as well however, especially because that is one of the major selling points of the film, as Hayao Miyazaki (the director) is arguably one of the best well known Japanese animation directors. To reflect his nationality and also the origin of the films production, his name was put in columns, to the left of the title as shown in screenshot 11. Again, the same font was used to ensure continuity, but there was a stark contrast with orientation. Also, being placed in the top left corner, the major selling point of the film was put in a position which one would read first in the traditional sense of reading left to right, top to bottom. The gridlines shown in screenshot 11 also ensured that the text was carefully aligned.

Screenshot 11 - Poster with title and director

The by-line, or line which sold the film, was decided to be "From the Academy award-winning director of 'Spirited Away'". Not only does this highlight the director's apparent expertise but also names another successful film, suggesting to the viewer, "if you've watched 'Spirited Away', or heard good things about it, then you will probably like this too." The same font, Trajan Pro was used again, and it lined up exactly underneath the text of the title and director. Contrast was added within the sentence to the words 'Academy' and 'Spirited Away' by putting in capitals and bold, to highlight the main points of the by line, as shown in screenshot 12.

Screenshot 12 - Finished poster with some of the grid lines

The review quote was placed, rather small, in the bottom left corner. I did not want to detract from the main image, namely that of Calcifer, by crowding it with too much, or too large text, hence the reasoning for it's position. It was written in black to stand out against the white and grey hand. Also, the font of the actual quote was Imprint MT Shadow, in comparison with the Trajan Pro type used for the person's, who was being quoted, name and profession. This was to indicate the difference of source from the rest of the text on the poster.

The final poster can be seen below, one smaller version and one huge one!

Final Film Poster Design - Small

Final Film Poster Design - Large

The final film poster I think looks quite good. I think it is a good representation of what I initially sketched, with some minor changes in layout. The core of the poster, the character of Calcifer, I think is recognisable as him, and although to those who have not seen the film, they might not be able to see the heart shape, I do think it is quite clear to those who have, and know the secret of Calcifer's power. This too I think fulfills what I originally wanted to achieve, hinting at something without being too explicit. It might be considered a little conventional in layout, with a central image, and text at the top and bottom, I however feel that in this case, the relative simplicity in layout allows the image to be the focus. The text itself is not uniform or simple, but uses contrasting sizes, orientations, spacing and thickness to provide interest. One element which perhaps does not work as well as the others however, is the review quote in the bottom left corner. This was decided upon after lots of experimentation to find the best position for it, and was needed to fulfill the initial brief. I feel though that perhaps the poster works best without that element at all, as shown below.

Final Film Poster - without review quote

In addition, the background perhaps does not translate exactly as feathers up close, but regardless, it does provide an interesting texture and background.

As a whole, I think it is a clear representation of an iconic character from Howl's Moving Castle, and works to promote the film in a different way from that already done.

Logo Design

The second assignment for my introduction to graphic design, was the production of a logo for a fictional company. Due to my appreciation of Harry Potter, I decided upon designing a new logo for the main bank within the world of Harry Potter, namely Gringotts. The pictures below are some of the pictures associated with Gringotts, namely various logos for the company and different iconic representations of the building's appearance.

As can be seen from the above pictures, Gringotts, within the world of Harry Potter, is considered a rather old, and traditional institution, as reflected by it's traditional, imposing architecture, and it's traditional, and almost heraldry, style of logos. Many real world banks are also companies with a relatively long history and a large info structure, but many of their logos are more modern, clean and simple in style, as shown in the examples below.

From looking at these logos, and other modern banking ones, it inspired me to create a logo for Gringotts that was less heritage inspired, but simpler and cleaner, or as I liked to think of it, what logo would Gringotts have if it tried to enter the "muggle" market. Some elements I had to consider was how the logo would look when it was made smaller and also in black and white. Many logos also incorporate the text within the logo, and it is often not just an image, highlighting the importance of typography within the final logo. One of the first decisions I made about the logo, was that although I wanted the logo to look simple and graphic, I also, at the same time, wanted to reflect the traditional style that is clearly important to Gringott's image. Thus, I decided that a Roman typeface would work well, similar to that within Well's Fargo's logo, another bank which uses it's heritage as a selling point for their services, as seen below.

I then started sketching, and this was actually where most of the designing took place instead of whilst working Illustrator. The initial idea was to try incorporating the recognisable shape of pillars into the logo, for which Gringotts is known, as shown in Sketch 1.

Sketch 1 - Initial ideas

Also seen in Sketch 1 is a list of words generally associated with Gringotts. These words, as well as inspection of the first Gringotts logo shown on this post, led me to take one element of said logo, namely a key, to try and incorporate into my version of Gringott's logo. My attempts to sketch this is shown in Sketches 2 and 3.

Sketch 2 - "Key" ideas... no pun intended

Sketch 3 - Including the decided upon concept for the logo.

The concept that was decided upon for the logo was the sketch in a box shown in the top-left corner of Sketch 3. Utilising a key I felt worked very well, because the goblin's within Gringotts are known for carrying huge rings of keys, and whilst they might not necessarily know for their mortgage rates or saving account benefits, they are known for being incredibly secure, as in, impossible for even the most powerful wizards to break into. Also, this particular design was chosen, as I felt it incorporated the text the best into the image. They were not two separate elements, but the image was part of the text and vice versa. In addition to this, the teeth of the key, whilst representing the two 't's within the name also echoed the shape of the pillars. Also shown in Sketch 3 were various designs for the head of the key, and it was decided in the end that the initial design of three circles would be used, as it was cleanest and would also translate the best when made smaller. All that remained was for the logo to be transferred and created using Illustrator.

At first it was made by creating identical ellipses, with no fill, which were then manoeuvred into place and a shaft was created upon which sat the text. The typeface chosen was Charlemagne Std Bold, because of it's roman based lettering, but clear and bold style. Screenshot 1 shows these initial steps.

Screenshot 1 - Initial stages of creation

Also seen in screenshot 1, on the bottom right of the art board, was an experimentation of something to put within the circles of the head. This was simply created by creating a smaller circle and then changing the line style to a floral one. In the end however, I decided that the logo looked better without it, as when made smaller, the design would be too detailed in order to keep it's clarity. What can also be seen in screenshot 1 is the colour chosen for the key, a dark yellow/gold. This was to invoke a feeling of old gold, thus representing Gringott's age and wealth. The text was kept as a simple black, as I think that was the colour which looked best against the dark yellow, and was clear and bold.

The logo was initially creating using lines, not shapes, however in order to experiment with potentially using gradients, I later went on to create a complex shape by creating the outline of the circles by using two circles for each one, and rounded rectangles, and combining with the Pathfinder tools. However, after experimentation a gradient was decided not to be used, as unless it was particularly marked, it would not translate well to black and white, or even perhaps when the logo was made smaller. In addition, the teeth of the key were adapted to not have blunt ending, but tapered ones, which looked more 'finished', and less harsh and blunt. The final logo can be seen below.

Gringotts Logo Design

Overall, I think the logo works well. In particular, I feel that the initial concept, the combination of the text into the key, is very strong. It also successfully fulfils my own created brief of creating something simpler and cleaner for the Gringotts brand. Some potential drawbacks of the logo is the ability of the image and text to work separately, as they are integral to each other for complete understanding. Although, the image alone could become more recognisable if the company was to become well known. Also, the space around the logo is important, as it has the potential to look cramped if there isn't enough space, as can be seen as the logo is compared to the Screenshot 2 of the finished logo, including all the space on the art board.

Screenshot 2 - Final Logo

Album Cover Design

My first assignment, as part of an introduction to graphic design, was designing an album cover. However, the various elements were decided randomly, which will be discussed later, thus enabling me to focus on design principles and familiarising myself more with the tools of Photoshop.

The band name was generated by the title of a random Wikipedia article, the title of the album was the last four to five words of a random quote, and the photograph was selected as a random interesting Flickr photo. For my album cover the following were selected:

Band Name - "prohibition".

Album Title - "wake up in despair".

Photo - as seen in screenshot 1.

Screenshot 1 - Original Picture

The main elements which I liked in this photo was the line running through the photo, and the eye shaped object on the left hand side. In order to focus on these elements, the photo was enlarged and rotated, so that the line was more vertical and placed further left, so it was not as centralised, creating a more interesting composition, by dividing the space.

In addition the texture, another interesting element of the original photo, was enhanced by sharpening the edges and a tint was added to make the photo appear even more abstract. The red was chosen to produce an almost eerie feeling, and was also inspired the red patches present in the original, to produce the image shown in screenshot 2.

Screenshot 2 - Adjusted Image

What next needed to be placed however was the text, including the band name and album title. The vertical line in the image inspired the placing of text in a vertical orientation. What was important was that it was still easy to read, so the whole text wasn't rotated, but instead was written in columns, as shown in screenshot 3.

Screenshot 3 - First attempt with typography

The typography chosen was Franklin Gothic Book, and was chosen because it was simple, graphic, modern and understated so it wouldn't detract from the image, and also help to enhance the modern, abstract feel of the image. The band name was placed down the right hand side, centralised vertically (as ensured by the grid lines). The same type was also used for the album title, to help the text feel cohesive, although contrast was also added by the smaller size of the album title, and that it was all in lower case in contrast to the band's name all in upper case.

The initial thought was that the album's title would appear almost like tear streaks underneath the eye. Once placed however, the text was hard to read, as seen in screenshot 3, and so instead the text was placed horizontally in three lines with varying lengths, to echo the circular shape of the eye, thus highlighting the contrast between the circular eye and the vertical bisecting line. This was achieved by using the typography tools to stretch the text. Grid lines were also used to ensure the bottom of the band name and album title were aligned, as seen in screenshot 4.

Screenshot 4 - Almost finished album cover

 After some final tweaks, including adjustments of brightness and adding a drop shadow to enhance the band's name against the slightly dark background, it resulted in the final album cover design, as shown below.

Final album cover design

The final album cover design, in the end, I think is an interesting piece, and is different to many other album covers, especially in regards to the position of the typography. Many album covers have the band name and title in close proximity to each other, whereas there is a big divide in this design. It is good in the sense that it is different, however one draw back might be that at first glance, one might not be too sure that it was an album cover. The image however I think works, especially the textures, and it makes the viewer question what they are actually seeing.