CONTEXT PRACTICAL: PROMOTIONAL POSTER

Due to the fast approaching christmas holidays, I had to start promoting my event so that people had an idea about it before they left, as I would only have two days to promote it again after the christmas break aside form social media.

The idea for the poster is to create a comparison between two artists that show how similar they are even though they are year / decades apart. Reinforcing that the progression of pop music is somewhat regressive.

To create my design I decided to use two comparative artists that I had mentioned in my essay as a start which were madonna and Lady Gaga. I collated a selection of images of them both that adopted similar styles which can be seen on my Pinterest board — here. I wanted to keep the designs black and white for the time being as I haven't chosen a colour scheme that I want to use yet. From my research into exhibition design I collated these ideas as influence for the posters below.

Design 

1. First idea was to Overlay the images to show the two artists within each other to visually draw the comparisons into one image.

Initially I layered the images experimenting with layout and opacity levels to create the style, however I felt the comparisons were not very clear. I then decided to incorporate a shape, in this case the letter R which refers to remix to break up the images.

With this experiment I felt that this really worked well, keeping the design subtle but still striking.

I then started to add the exhibition information, but on reflection of the design, the image of madonna was a little too subtle and I felt I could experiment with the design further.

2. My next idea was to create a physical Divide between the two images to show the comparison between the artists.

However in the development stage I felt that this could be done more effectively buy hand. So I decided to move forward with another concept as I felt the digital manipulation was a little too clinical.

3. For my final idea I wanted to take on a more hands on approach and create collage, ripping and replacing the artists faces together to reinforce the idea of a remix.

I started off experimenting with different images that looked similar and placing them on the page, however it was quite hard trying to get the faces to look some what normal.

Then I created this design buy again ripping and replacing the images on top of each other, and this design was most striking to me. The image of madonna of lady gaga looks like she is wearing a mask and reinforces the idea of imitation and stealing the identity of the ones before. I felt out of all my developments this was the strongest design and started to develop it further.

I started experimented with type and layout to ensure the title and all the right information was in the right place but wasn't taking away from the design. From the designs  I felt that the last one worked best but I also asked my peers for some feed back and they informed me that it needed some sort of colour to stand out and work amongst the other media in uni.

I decided to choose red due it's vibrant tone and also because it's replicates a lot of connotations that would work well with music, such as passion, enjoyment and pleasure. Which also link to the themes within my dissertation.

Distribution

I printed 20 colour copies and distributed them around university, in each department to see. However this didn't cover a lot of the uni.

I then decided to create a contrasting poster on red stock to show variation and also to break up the designs and posted these designs around also.

Overview

All thought I had to make some design decision in a quick turn around I think they came out strong and effectively and I am really pleased with the outcome. With these decisions made in a quick time I must ensure that it fits in with the rest of the brand of my exhibition.