MP3 - Comps

Rule of Thirds In-Class Exercise

1. All of the elements lie outside of the dead center of the poster. The lighthouse bring the viewers eye to the top and far left of the poster which then lead the eye to look at all of the text. Besides the lighthouse and the text, the skate-boarder drawers the viewers eye to the bottom of the poster with a centered location in the bottom right box of the rule of thirds.  

2. The flowers at the far upper right hand corner is the main focal point of the poster which helps lead the eye below it to find the text in the final square of the rule of thirds grid. The headline is also not dead center, even though it is is center of the bottom row, it is just to the left of the body text.

3. The main headline at the top of the page is what the eye leads to first, but it is off centered and aligned left. Where the text ends, is almost square with the woman's face at the bottom of the poster which is also off-centered. Having the design set up as this, and not centered on the page creates a lot of white-space that works well and leads the eyes in the proper directions around the poster.

1. The visual center is the same as the center of the poster in this example, but the eyes are immediately looking at the man falling to the bottom left, followed by the text that is the the bottom right of the center. The eyes also move to the top of the page where the building is placed.

2. This example also consists of the center as the visual center of the design. The eyes are drawn to the beginning and the end of the title though, which is placed above the center of the design, followed by the image of the swan. The visual points of the swan consist of the head and the tail that bring the eyes to the bottom left and right of the center of the design.  

3. The visual center of this design falls between the end of the text and the center of the image. The visual points are placed at the beginning of the headline, as well as the bottom of the image. 

Reading Homework March 17, Due MArch 24 - Elements of Type. Style (179 - 197)

• What is Unicode? What is included in it? What are some of it's standards?

Unicode was the first version of the standard set of character with the size of 2^16 (65,536 characters). This came out in the late 1980's and was published in the beginning of the 1990's. Unicode allows for different languages to be deciphered through text so that people are able to read it in other languages than Latin and English. Unicode consists of 100,507 characters, 137,468 are set aside for private use, and consists of roughly 874,000 free for future allocation. (Bringhurst 181). 

• Give an example of a manual, random, and programmed variation in type. What is the difference?

Manual - The normal practice with foundry type; Petica, Sophia, and Zapf Renaisance all belong to the same tradition in their ordinary PostScript.

Random - This is when the designer chose variants themselves. It is an old and distinguished method which was mastered early on by Francesce Griffo, Claude Garamound, and Simon de Colines.

Programmed - Programmed variation includes the interaction of the craftsman's skills and texture of materials. Griffo and Colines letterforms were cut with care, but when passed on multiple times, there were small unplanned variations that occurred. 

(Bringhurst 188-189)

• What is the difference between a bitmapped and Postscript/TrueType font?

Bitmapped fonts are defined by simple addition and subtraction, "this pixel one, that pixel off, these pixels on, those pixels off" (Bringhurst 182). PostScript splines ("a flexible strip that will bend under tension") are cubic, whereas TrueType splines are quadratic. 

• How does printing influence type? List several way working with the printer can help type's appearance.

Printing has many influences on type and a designers work. There are many different aspects that the design team must look at and agree upon together before printing the final work. Thinking of the final printing process, it has to be known what type of paper the designer wants the copy to be on, coated or uncoated. It is also necessary to know the final dimensions of the work and how it will truly look when printed rather than just on the screen. The font size and leading are also important to think about when looking into the future at the printing process. When looking at the printing process, it is necessary to look at the type of ink as well, along with the stroke weight of the letters whether they be standard fonts form the computer system, or hand drawn fonts.  (Bringhurst 194-185).

• In the last page of the chapter, it says "One good typeface is better and more useful than fifty thousand poor ones. Here as always, good means several things." Explain this statement (without directly copying from the book).

The quote that can be found on the last page is talking about how this one font can work really well if it is designed to the best of it's ability. If this font is strong and legible, along with readable, then there are many reasons as to why it should be used. The font is clean and easy on the eye without many mishaps that may have happened through the print process. If multiple fonts are used, there is the great possibility that too many were used and they all begin to blend together and they become old and boring after a while because they don't appear to be as strong seeing as though they are using each other to stand out and work together. This one strong font stands out the most and allows itself to work well given many different forms of it; bold, semi-bold, italics, small-caps. The font is allowed to be enlarged or made smaller at any given point and can be used for both headlines and body type (Bringhurst 197). 

MP3 - Process Book 1

In-Class Poster Assignment - 3/17/14

Investigate poster design - how are designs held together without filling all white space? How does the grid help? What alignment techniques seem to help? Choose at least 5 poster designs that you think are EXCEPTIONAL and disect them. Draw their grid, speak about their alignment, use of white space, how they handle heirarchy etc. 

Poster #1)
"De Dood Is Blind"

This first poster holds the design together by the use of the same two colors throughout the design. While black is the main color, red is used as an accent color to highlight the important pieces of information. The grid that is used is 4 columns by 5 rows, and the white space is very prominent with no pictures being used at all, but the text itself creates a lot of contrast that allows for a strong hierarchy and leads the viewer to look at the title first, followed by a subtitle that includes the accent color red, which then helps lead the viewer to the text at the bottom that also consists of text written in red. Because the text is so large, it works very well with the white space and makes the design seem like there isn't anything missing. All of the text is also held together by the right alignment; the headline is right aligned, as well as the subtitle, and the information at the bottom of the poster. 


Poster #2)
"Kings of Leon"

The second poster is much more colorful than the first poster, but there is still white, or negative, space that is seen within the design, and there is a grid that is followed of 4 columns by 8 rows. The text is working around the picture of the man playing the guitar, but is all aligned within their own small boxes of the grid either being right aligned or center aligned. The poster is held together really well by having all of the text in the same color, which is white in this case, even though all of the boxes are different colors. The most important information is bolded or italicized within the poster, followed by text in much small sizes that include other information that isn't as important. The poster itself is very interesting and keeps the viewer interested while still getting the message across. 


Poster #3)
"The Elephant in the Room"

The third poster is almost all white space, but it works well because the image is incorporated within the headline. Hierarchy within this design is really strong and the white space aids in leading the viewer of what to see first, second, and third. The headline is seen first given the size, but the white space surrounding it helps lead to the text within the bottom of the poster followed by the small logo that is also being used. The headline, logo, and body text follow a grid of 4 columns by 7 rows. The poster is also held together by the color of the body text that is incorporated from colors within the image of the headline. The text also works well together because it is all right aligned and keeps the page neat, which works hand-in-hand with the white space. 

MP2 - Process Book Final

MP2FNL - AB

MP2 - Comps