Here is the first of my ancillary tasks, a poster for my film.
In this poster, I decided to include the films two primary characters, Rachael and Michael. Michael is to the right, with his arms open. Compositionally, his arms are open towards Rachael, suggesting that he is open and accepting of her which in turn codes the audience expectations of the film to believe that they may be close friends or a couple, which is true of the film.
I created a whiteboard graphic as well as a few extra bits and pieces such as the 'skool sux' graphic and added all the smudges and pen marks on the board myself with the Photoshop brush tool. I then cut Rachael's picture down and added an effect that made it look as if she had been drawn on the board. Because of Michael's stance, it is suggested that he drew her and is proud of that. I did all of this because I wanted the audience to get some knowledge of the setting of the film, and thought that adding in this whiteboard with the graphics I have included would give that.
To follow conventions of the format, I included the title of the film with the consistent graphic I have used throughout production, and added the two primary actors names below it in a similar font which gives a uniformity to the poster and adds to the whole 'school' feel. I then made a credit block, which can be seen at the bottom. I used a font that was as close to the industry standard as I could find and used all appropriate formatting for the block. I then included an age rating and the logo of the production company (Dawson Woods Films) in the bottom left and right corners, respectively. These are all techniques used in professional designing of posters, and in turn they add a professional look to my poster.
The primary way my research factored into this design was from the poster from 'The Office'. The poster I deconstructed followed a simple style, showcasing primary characters on a white background and leaving most of the work up to the audience's imagination, which is something I have tried to imitate in this poster. I believe, by having Rachael look drawn, and Michael looking as he does, it looks to the audience like he has drawn her.
One of the biggest problems I had whilst making this poster was cutting the people out of their photos. For most of the photos, the background was a yellow wall which made it difficult to cut. It would have been far easier to do this if I had used a white backdrop, as it is much easier to differentiate between a white background and a person in a picture. Using the yellow background left some of the characters outlines quite difficult to define and it required some very finicky erasing and cutting to fix this, which I believe could have been avoided had I used a white background.
I created a whiteboard graphic as well as a few extra bits and pieces such as the 'skool sux' graphic and added all the smudges and pen marks on the board myself with the Photoshop brush tool. I then cut Rachael's picture down and added an effect that made it look as if she had been drawn on the board. Because of Michael's stance, it is suggested that he drew her and is proud of that. I did all of this because I wanted the audience to get some knowledge of the setting of the film, and thought that adding in this whiteboard with the graphics I have included would give that.
To follow conventions of the format, I included the title of the film with the consistent graphic I have used throughout production, and added the two primary actors names below it in a similar font which gives a uniformity to the poster and adds to the whole 'school' feel. I then made a credit block, which can be seen at the bottom. I used a font that was as close to the industry standard as I could find and used all appropriate formatting for the block. I then included an age rating and the logo of the production company (Dawson Woods Films) in the bottom left and right corners, respectively. These are all techniques used in professional designing of posters, and in turn they add a professional look to my poster.
The primary way my research factored into this design was from the poster from 'The Office'. The poster I deconstructed followed a simple style, showcasing primary characters on a white background and leaving most of the work up to the audience's imagination, which is something I have tried to imitate in this poster. I believe, by having Rachael look drawn, and Michael looking as he does, it looks to the audience like he has drawn her.
One of the biggest problems I had whilst making this poster was cutting the people out of their photos. For most of the photos, the background was a yellow wall which made it difficult to cut. It would have been far easier to do this if I had used a white backdrop, as it is much easier to differentiate between a white background and a person in a picture. Using the yellow background left some of the characters outlines quite difficult to define and it required some very finicky erasing and cutting to fix this, which I believe could have been avoided had I used a white background.
