Film Festival

I'm having trouble with this image...I scanned it from HOW magazine. Photoshop says the image is 701 X 342 pixels but it turns out teeny tiny and I can't scale it bigger. Suggestions?

I wanted to share it because I like the copy and the style. It's a series of posters from the Cincinnati Film Festival in 2007. What you're not seeing in the small image is "Confess your love for film" on all three posters. From lef to right, they say: My cell phone is still on; I laugh even when I don't get it; I like to sit in the dark with strangers. I don't entirely understand the first one (maybe the films are shown in a more casual environment?). They just seem kind of quirky and whimsical. The color choice is interesting too.

Book Design

The Anatomy of Design by Heller and Ilic was included in the 2009 International Design Annual put out by HOW magazine. This book was given an "editorial merit." I had actually just gotten the book for myself because it looked so interesting. I'll bring it to class so people can thumb through it.

There is a design (or set of designs) on the right page. Then on the left foldout page, the design is broken down into a number of elements. You can't see it very well in this picture but they've broken this design into "painted sticks, stones and ropes typography," "diptych, triptych, etc," and "burning holes." Each of these elements is broken out and examples of that same element are given in the corresponding row. I'm amazed at how many of the elements show up in other designs and there are some interesting/weird ones: numbers becoming letters; chain link fence; potato type; lots of things piled up neatly; are these my hands?; and many more.

The idea is to explore the influences and inspirations for modern design. It's a brilliant concept and is nicely executed, using the metaphor of how we study anatomy. The introduction has a brief description of the history we've been studying so far. It drew my attention because it's kind of interactive which I've always been drawn to. I could spend hours looking through it. Can't wait for a snowy weekend!

Aaarrggghhhh! Plus Some Graphic Design

I've been trying unsuccessfully to find an interesting blog template I can download so I'll have more options than these boring blogger ones. Stayed up late trying to download one of the free ones online but got frustrated -- couldn't figure out the html. I made this header in Illustrator but it doesn't fit very well. More tinkering later.

I do have some samples of graphic designs. I was shopping at Rebecca's - cute little store in downtown Champaign that's unfortunately closing. Here are some products from a company called Pacifica. Their website is nicely done if you want to click on the link. AND their soap smells good! I apologize for the fuzzy images - cell phone.

The images are of packaging for soaps and lotions. My sense is that their function is to lure you into taking a smell and to interest you in what's inside the box. Looking at the boxes, it's almost like the designers were trying to make visual what the product smells like. That's one of the things that attracted me to this packaging is that all the packages were different -- just like all the scents are different. They each have their own personality. The way the designers were able to create very different packages that all had a similar aesthetic is pretty interesting.

I'd say the commonality in the styles is that they're modern, geometric, with highly saturated colors. They also seem to reference some of the art from the art deco period. I don't recognize the type but it works with the product name because it's light and simple - like a day lying in a hammock on the beach smelling good because you just took a shower with this soap. I would describe the design as bold, fresh, playful, and trendy. Worked for me - I bought two bars!

GDS 131 Post

I saw this billboard when I was rushing to class at Parkland one day and thought it was pretty clever. I had no idea it was actually a billboard for Parkland College until I went back today to take a picture of it. The design is contemporary but references some of the typographic work that Herb Lubalin did in the 60's and 70's. He was able to mess around with type in ways never dreamed of until the development of phototypesetting in the 50's allowed designers to use type in more creative, interesting ways.

It's a little difficult to see in this picture (cell phone quality!) but there are two font colors. "You" and "matter" are in black and the rest is in green. Kind of clever, huh? You do.....matter. Really.