POSTER DESIGN - WITH ANNOTATIONS

POSTER REVIEWS

As I made a number of different posters I decided to take my designs to a social media website where people could leave their opinions and views in a comment below, stating which their favourite design was and why. Below are images of print screens I have taken from my iPhone from Facebook, they consists of the comments from my friends and family.
VOTING POLL:

• Design 1 - 2 VOTES
• Design 2 - 1 VOTE
• Design 3 - 21 VOTES

As you can see design 3 won 21/24 votes. Comments I got for design three are:
"its more engaging and interesting than the other two".

"The third one as it is the most elusive, yet more telling. I also think that it attracts the attention of the audience more than the other two, while showing more technical ability in this creation". 

"I think number 3, the walking up the steps emphasises the title, One Way Road. He looks like he is walking into the unknown, Also think the date on the date of the jacket makes a bold statement".

"number three stands out and is a better picture". 

Taking into consideration all the comments I got from this Facebook post I went with the majority vote and made design number three my final design. 

 

POSTER DESIGNS

In this post there any many images, some photographs and some edited versions of the photographs that I have transformed into film poster options for my film "One Way Road". 

To the left is the first image which I thought could be used as a possible main image for my film poster. I could see potential in this image as the character and settings were both shown and there is also a numerous amount of space to place other conventions of a film poster on top of the image, such as billing block, title, etc. I also liked this picture purely for the colouring in the sky, which I knew I could edit to make look incredible and eye catching to an audience. To the right is the finished piece using that photograph for the main image. Firstly, to edit the image I enhanced brightness of the image to get a clear view of the character and the setting surrounding him. Secondly I played around with the saturation to get the orange and yellow look in the sky, to bring out the warmth and positivity in the image and to enhance the colour blue of the jacket worn by the character to highlight a possible symbolic code. To give the poster an authentic and vintage look I added a filter to the image which gave it the flecked look (name of filter - Film Grain). And finally I added my finishing touches to my film poster, the other conventions such as its film title, billing block and key actors names. I originally had black font for the entire poster but I felt that the black looked too harsh on a washed out coloured background therefore I changed the film title and actors name to a medium grey and the billing block and release date for a light grey, (fonts used - "Colour me Purple" and "You Are Loved").  I really enjoy looking at this film poster as the train track setting is dull however the use of the colour of the jacket and lit up sky really enhances on the positivity that the film brings to its audience. 

To the left is the second photograph which I thought had potential to be the main image for my film poster. Once again I liked that the photo gave off a great feel and atmosphere for the genre as both a character and setting is shown, also I felt I could play with the colours once again, enhancing the colour in the sky. This image also has a greater amount of space to insert other conventions of a film poster. To begin with I edited the image by enhancing the brightness so that the setting and character was clear to the audience, as the original image was taken whilst the sun was setting therefore the lighting was naturally dark. I also played around with the saturation, as you can see the colours look very blue and grey which is the after effect of changing the saturation to cold. I then added a filter which enhanced all of the colours so that the sky looked spectacular with oranges and pinks and the train track setting cold and blue. The purpose of the two contrasting themes (warm and cold) represents the storyline of the film, the struggles of a young man which leads to him having the aspiration to achieve a family members wishes after a death, the coldness representing the death and the warmth to represent the growth of this character. I used the same fonts as I did for my first film poster design as I felt it gave a true representation of the genre ("Colour me Purple" and "You Are Loved"), however I did change up the colours. For the title and actors names  I felt that the colour needed to be black on this image to stand out and attract the eye on top of the enhanced blue sky. The title was also written horizontally like the poster before, however I felt to use the space more wisely, so I transformed the look of the poster and wrote the title vertically to give it a different effect. I then decided that the release date and billing block should be written in white to be seen clearly in the bottom third of the film poster. I really like this design for its simplicity, the simple title layout, the simple but effective and creative main image (for colour purposes) and also the plain and simple way which the release date is presented "May 26". 

This is the last image which I felt had potential to become the main image for a film poster, as I felt that it represented the loneliness of the character however  allowed you to feel that you were going to be on the journey with this character. I also liked the angle that this photograph was taken as its from a low angle, giving the audience the impression that this character is of power or going to be of power. Firstly I straightened the image up, so that the character really was the main focus point in this image. What I done next was gave the photo a vignette effect (the look of a black rounded frame around the image). I really liked this effect as it gave the look of a tunnel, representing and going back to the title of "One Way Road". Afterwards I really wanted to be creative with this image as it thought it had the most potential, therefore I looked up some more filters and found "Posterize" which gave the image a drawn/artistic look. I absoltely love this filter as it enhances on the colours blues, greys and blacks only, which I really like for the simplicity it creates. I also feel that this filter gives the impression that it is an inspirational  film as the image looks sketched as such, which makes me think of a true life story which has been written for awareness to the audience (A draw my life feel to it). The vignette effect made the focal point of the image an oval shape, therefore I inserted a black rectangle at the bottom of the poster to allow more space for the billing block to be read in the bottom third. The shape of the image which the vignette effect gave made it so easy for actors names, film title, slogan etc placements. The top two corners were perfect spaces to insert the actors names (written in Colour me Purple). Since there wasn't much space in the top third of the poster I felt I had to squash everything into the bottom third, however I absolutely love how it looks, the film title, slogan and billing block all positioned together. I also love this poster as it is the only one out of the three which has a slogan "DIE TODAY, LIVE TOMORROW" which I feel is so effective and intriguing to the audience. Both Colour me Purple and You Are Loved were used as fonts for this poster also. There is one other aspect which makes this poster my favourite, which is the positioning of the release date. The film being related around sport made me think of this symbolic code, the release date actually represents the look of a sports jacket, when a players number and surname is written, therefore I have to say that my final poster ended up being my favourite. 

Film Poster Fonts

These three images have been cropped from film poster of a very similar genre of One Way Road (sports drama). I shall use these images to analyse and design my own font for One Way Roads poster title. 

I have discovered that all fonts used on all three film posters are written in a clear, Sanserif font (excluding "Stomp The Yard"). I have also noticed that no extravagant colours are used, and that white and gold shades are most popular. 

 Coach Carter's font has an urban and distressed look, this portrays a film they may consist of an urban struggle which has been resolved through the use of sport. The Fighter uses a large and bold, this portrays a fierce storyline with fierce action and emotion. And lastly, Stomp The Yard uses a gold shade with a varsity like font. This represents the plot and character of a college student. 

When designing my own font for One Way Road I want to include elements of both Coach Carter's and The Fighter's choice of fonts. I really like the urban design from Coach Carter as I could use this to represent my characters tough upbringing and background, however I also wish to use the boldness of The Fighter's font as that could also represent the fight and fierce action of the events which the character in One Way Road experiences. 

EDITED PHOTOS

Out of the many photographs I took I chose to select three to work with for my film poster. Below shows the editing process for each picture and how I ended up with a finalised photograph which I could possibly use for my final poster design. The reasons I chose these three images is because I liked the idea of my image not consisting of direct mode of address to portray the messaging of "turning his back on his past". 

                              

For this image I started by increasing the overall contrast and decreasing the overall brightness of the picture to give it a dark atmosphere. After adjusting the brightness and contrast I added a vignette effect to give the photograph a black and closed in boarder.

"In photography and optics, vignetting (/vɪnˈjɛtɪŋ/; French: "vignette") is a reduction of an image's brightness or saturation at the periphery compared to the image center." 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vignetting

After adding the vignette effect I then added another filter which is called "Posterize" this effect allows the photograph to look sketched and artistic. I like the idea of the "Posterize" effect because it portrays the message that the character has to over come his past life and draw a new path for himself. 

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I really like this image purely for the fact the character is looking into the sunset, portraying "looking for a better path". For this image I just simply adjusted the brightness and contrast to enhance the colours in the image, this effect allowed me to enhance the colours in the sunset and brighten up the image as a whole. 

                   

              

And finally, I really liked this image as once again the same message portrayed from image 2 is given, "looking for a better path". Instead of adjusting the images brightness and contrast I adjusted the hue and saturation. This also enhanced the colours in the sunset to make the image look more appealing. I also added the film grain in light filter, this gives the image a distressed effect, I thought that the distressed look worked well with the genre of the film because the urban scene is brought to attention. I also did some research into film posters of a similar genre, containing a heroic figure and plot, for example; Blade and Harry Potter. As seen in the image below there is a lack of direct mode of address used for this genre, therefore I felt that using the three chosen images as possibilities could work with stereotypical film posters of a similar storyline and character. 

I also researched into film posters of my specific chosen genre (Sports/Drama), and I discovered a similarity that direct mode of address wasn't present on many posters, as seen from the images below of posters for "Stomp the Yard", "Rocky" and "The Blind Side". 

IMAGES

Above is a collage I made of shots I have taken for my film poster, many of which are for possible use whereas some are not. Edited versions will be up shortly. 

EDITING

In our lesson we went out and took some pictures around the school to then practice editing them using iPhoto. This was so that when it comes to editing our photos for our film posters we had experience using the editing software. 

Above you can see the difference in picture due to editing. For this picture I added a cold effect, taking away the oranges and browns from the shed, creating an eerie look. I also increased the contrast and brightness to enhance the shadows on the shed. 

For this picture I increased the warmness, taking away the blue sky and creating a warm, late afternoon look with a light orange sky. I also increased the brightness and contrast to once again, enhance the shadows. 

                            

For this picture I decided to increase the contrast to darken the fence. I also played around with the effect for this picture and decided to use black and white to give it an old look. I also considered blurring out the outside to give it an eerie and uncomfortable feel. 

Overall, after this practice I feel very comfortable with editing with this new program we've been introduced to, and because of this I've decided to edit my images for my film poster with iPhoto.