OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Designing the Posters

I knew that I wanted the design of the posters to be typography based so that they were bold, eye-catching and would look good hung up on the wall. Therefore I looked at a range of posters which I found inspiring that featured only typography: 

The common link between all of the above posters which I found eye-catching was that they all used bold, san-serif, modern typefaces for their designs and a clean, minimal colour palette. Therefore this is something I wanted to incorporate in my design. 

I experimented with a range of bold, san-serif fonts: 

Helvetica

I first tried Helvetica as it is the obvious choice when choosing a classic, san-serif typeface that would look clean and modern on a poster. However I decided against using it in the final design as it is so overused, I didn't want to go with the safe and obvious choice. 

Azedo Bold

I found this font as a free download online. I liked the fun lowered crossbars and x-heights of the letters and think it creates a more unusual eye-catching design. However some of the letters such as the P and H's could become illegible from a distance, especially when foiled, therefore they wouldn't be suitable for the design of a poster. 

Gotham

This is a new font that I have recently discovered that I really like the look of. It seems quite friendly and laid back which is the tone of voice I want to convey. It is clean, modern and simple, but has some nice looking letter forms in it such as the G. It is a geometric, sans-serif digital typeface designed by American type designer Tobias Frere-Jones in 2000. Gotham's letterforms are inspired by a form of architectural signage that achieved popularity in the mid-twentieth century, and are especially popular throughout New York City. 

Futura

Futura is a narrower, typeface with pointed overshoots such as on the letter 'N'. I feel like this makes the typeface look slightly more aggressive and brash. Again, it is a geometric sans-serif typeface designed in 1927 by Paul Renner. I don't think I like it as much as Gotham for the design of the poster. 

ADAM.CG Pro Bold

ADAM.CG PRO - previously titled ADAM - is an all caps, sans-serif typeface inspired by Futura. Its sharp, clean appearance makes it a suitable typeface for headlines, posters, titles and captions. The typeface was designed by Shrenik Ganatra, a designer from Mumbai, India.

I prefer this typeface to Futura as I feel some of the letters like the S are more stylish and it doesn't looks as narrow. I'm still not a fan of the pointed overshoots on the N, as again as it emanates a more shouty vibe. 

For this reason I'm going to use Gotham on the design of my posters as it is a clean and modern, yet trendy typeface with a friendly feel to it.

As the design uses a simple and minimal approach, which allows the quotes to speak for themselves, I considered ways in which I could make the design more interesting. As Sheffield is known as the 'Steel City' I thought using foiling for the letters would be a subtle hint at Sheffield's heritage whilst adding an element of interest to the design. 

I researched a range of foiling to see what colour schemes were effective as foil and the glue to print it with is expensive so I couldn't afford to do too many experiments. 

I decided a Copper foil for Tonik's poster would be the most appropriate as Emily had mentioned in the interview that they were obsessed with copper foil as a studio, which was evident in their portfolio and online when you looked at images of their studio. Therefore I knew the design would be something that would appealed to them and something they would want to hang up on their wall. 

For Peter&Paul I felt silver foiling would be the most appropriate colour as it has a more more sophisticated feel and represented them effectively as a more established Design studio than Tonik or SideBySide, as they had been around for longer. 

For SideBySide I felt a dark navy/metallic black seemed the most appropriate colour for the foiling as they were a trendy design studio, run by a duo of young male designers, therefore I felt this colour scheme would appeal to them more. 

When it came to choosing stock I had to keep in mind that the interview was going to be printed on the back so I couldn't go too dark as it had to be legible to read and the contrast harsh enough. Ideally I would have liked SideBySide's interview to be printed on a black poster as black/blue foil on black paper gives a stunning effect as seen in the image above. However I would only have been able to print the interview using a specialist printer and white ink, and due to time constraints this was not possible. 

I went to Fred Aldous and chose a range of papers in muted greys and pewters at 270gsm thickness, a good weight for a poster.