Please check your folders to see your current grade. Keep in mind that I have not yet graded the posters, so if you haven’t finished your poster or artist statement, your grade will drop significantly.
Today we will finish outstanding assignments so we can finally begin outdoor photography next week!
This is our last week for the project. We will finish our projects and create a final blog post with the following: a PDF of the final project (that I will print), a PNG of the final project (that allows people to see what your project looks like), and an artist statement about the project that is a minimum of 150 words. Brian, Victoria, Jenna, and Beatrice all have good examples of what I am looking for.
If you are not sure what to write in your artist statement, here are some prompts to get you started:
Today’s essential question: How has Shepard Fairey used simple vector graphics to create powerful propaganda posters?
from artsy.net
“Expanding on the legacies of artists such as Keith Haring and Andy Warhol, Shepard Fairey’s practice disrupts the distinction between fine and commercial art. A major artist of the street art movement, Fairey rose to prominence in the early 1990s through the dispersion of posters, stickers, and murals, related to his Obey Giant campaign, which yielded an international cultural phenomenon. Fairey’s iconic poster of President Barack Obama was adopted as the official emblem associated with the presidential campaign and encapsulates a number of recurring concerns in the artist’s work, including propaganda, portraiture, and political power.”
You can learn more about Shepard Fairey on his official website.
The British artist Olly Moss does a great job creating simple, yet visually interesting vector movie posters. He also has represented copyrighted intellectual property in a way that uses all original artwork.
How might you create unique, original vector artwork for a band, musician, or movie?
Today’s essential question: How can I use visual hierarchy to draw attention to the most important parts of my poster?
What did you look at first? Why? The designer who created the above image used a technique called visual hierarchy to cause you to see certain parts of the design in a particular order.
Visual hierarchy refers to the arrangement of parts of a design in a way that implies importance. Visual hierarchy influences the order in which the human eye perceives what it sees. This order is created by the visual contrast between forms in a field of perception.
We will follow the evolution of a former student’s project to see the importance of using the rule of thirds and establishing a clear visual hierarchy.
Barry’s project was at a point where he couldn’t add anything else (there was already too much going on), but it still felt like it was missing something. If your project feels like this, there is a good chance that the layout is not following the rule of thirds, or that all of your design elements carry equal weight, so nothing stands out as being the focal point.
The easiest way to create a clear focal point is to make your focal point contrast with the other design elements (such as by making it the largest item or making it a different color from everything else) and to place it at one of the intersection of thirds.
Notice how Barry’s design, despite having lots of design elements, does not follow the rule of thirds by placing any of the design elements at the intersection points:
Barry explained how “Gravity Rush” was the most important element in his poster, and the cats were second. So we hid the paw prints (by clicking on the eyeball next to the paw print layers) to focus on the most important parts first.
Barry also made the top right cat and the words larger so they become the first thing the viewer sees, and adjusted the placement of the items so the cat’s face is at a natural focal point and looks towards the letters, guiding the viewer to do the same. He also made the bottom cat a bit smaller to make it clear that it was second in the visual hierarchy:
Notice how now there is a clear visual hierarchy with room for a simple background. We see the poster elements in the following order: 1) “gravity rush” 2) large cat 3) small cat.
SOTA Foundations 2 