DAI 323- Contrast

This is an example of good use of contrast in design. As you can tell the tone, shape and lack of color are what makes this image successful. The shape immediately tells you that the black type is in the shape of a bottle with liquid being poured out. While there is some randomness of the type, the size and boldness helps the important words stand out like, "love." The message is communicated clearly and done in an original way. This image is about as contrasty as it gets though because it's black type on a white background.



This is an example of poor use of contrast in design. The light blue type over green is very difficult to read. The lack of clarity is a result of poor contrast. The designer of this image had the right idea with the red type, but failed to notice that all the other type gets lost in the background and is very hard to decipher. It's understandable that the designer wanted to use the colors from the whipped cream can, but if the image was in black and white you'd realize that there was a huge contrast issue with the design.

DAI 323- Movement/ Motion

The first image is a representation of stimulated motion. The two dimensional image shows the motion of the type splashing into the water, but it is not actually occurring. The angles of the type falling into the water also contribute to the implied motion compared the type below, which is very static and aligned. The imbalance really emphasizes the weight of the type and makes them seem real like there is a friction against the water they're falling into. The straight lined boxes help with the the sense of direction. They lead the eyes from top to bottom and you automatically know what direction the type is moving.


In this image, the implied movement is shown through the stretching and folding of the type. The shape implies that the "ideas" are so big that it's squeezing itself out of the grey box. The lines are of the type are also at diagonals, which communicates that the type is not static like the type at the bottom. It shows that it has energy, almost enough that it can't fit on the page. In other words, it wants to think outside of the box and that really is the implied movement.

DAI 323- Depth Perception

Dimension/ Depth/ Space

Perspective and dimension are a very important part of graphic design. The Cars movie poster depicts many aspects of depth perception. Overlapping is one of the main features of this image. It creates layers in the image, which adds emphasis on what is front and center and puts it all into a flow pattern. Linear perspective is also very present in the image. The lines of the road converge together and get smaller in the distance. The linear perspective also gives us an idea of the relative height of the objects especially the mountains in the distance. Another thing although present in the texture gradient, which is noticeable on the road. It leads the eye up the image.

DAI 323- Week 8 Exercise

Color and Tone

The Spirit movie poster is a great example of the utilization of design elements, color and tone. Tone is one of the best tools at expressing and indicating dimension, which is very clear in this image. It helps define the intensity of darkness and lightness. While it isn’t a completely accurate representation of tone in nature, it does however create a very emotionally impacting picture. The tonality works well with the text on the lettering and immediately you know its purpose. It gives us a sense of reality and distance. It adds us in visualizing the space and knowing that it looks like a dark and grimy city.
Even though most of the image is monochromatic, it is important because of its lack of color. The tonal values we perceive in the image almost represent a world we know doesn’t exist, but we completely understand it. The color is not really needed because its just visual frosting on the image. The title being red was almost an aesthetic choice though because it jumps out on the image. Red is an emotional and active color. An example of this would be the girl in the red dress, in Schindler’s List, which was other wise a completely black and white film. It contrasts the rest of the image and has a strong hierarchy. Its relative brightness is emphasized and almost acts as the flash bulb of the image. You can see the title and you’ll remember it because of the color.

DAI 323- Movie Poster Design

Lines- The most important element in this movie poster is lines. The lines give movement and direction to the image to help us understand the context of the image. The stripes of the flag in the poster make something of the imagination visible. They express mood and have a huge amount of visual energy. Although lines rarely exist in nature, they can be used to express the juxtaposition of two tones. The stripes in the poster are basically a representation of the soldiers.



Tone- The most basic element of this movie poster is tone. The profile of the face with legs sticking out is the juxtaposition of tone. We see this shape in the image because there is a relative presence/ absence of light. As Dondis says, "We see what is dark because it abuts or overlaps what is light, and vice versa." We see the face because it is dark or we see the face because it is light around it.



Color- Color is in someways just an aesthetic of visual processing, but it can be very important as well. Generally speaking most movie posters use a lot of color with one of the elementary hues (yellow, red and blue)to act as almost a fill for the image. I found this poster to be very striking because of its careful use of color. All of the image is desaturated except for the eyes and the moth on the mouth. The saturation directs the eyes where to look and essentially is a very meaningful way of communicating information. Upon closer examination you can see a classic image on the moths back of the nude women forming a skull. Perception of color is one of the most emotional parts of the visual process.

DAI 323- Week 6 Exercise

Movie posters are a great example of advertising being that their sole purpose is to entice you to see a particular film. One of the biggest parts of visual message- making lies within the arrangement of the elements and how they're perceived. Take the Aristocrats poster for example. This does not follow the syntactical guidelines for visual literacy well and ends up being a very poor design. The interaction within the design is very difficult to understand and makes the "attraction and grouping" difficult to see. It's basically a cluster of red and blue words that don't have any correlation until close examination. The color use also makes the design fairly confusing in terms of delivering the message. The red and blue are more prominent in the image, but one would think the name of the movie would need to be the first thing to be perceived. It looks like there's an attempt at visual stress by breaking up the red and blue type, but it would have been more effective if the black type that was interpolated in was larger. I think it would have given a better visual hint of repetition and what the movie is about.


A great example of movie poster following syntactical guidelines would be The Cooler. The message being communicated is very clear and direct. The stress on the title almost hints that life has its ups and downs before you get the girl. Most of the elements have some of skewed positioning (stress) like the snake-eyed dice, which has a long- standing connection with the idea of treachery and betrayal. The movie poster additionally has great use of positive and negative. The copy at the bottom doesn't interfere with the visual message being shown. It is very clear in its use of "attraction and grouping" as well. The use of red on the girl and dice show that those two things will be related in the movie. The over all look tells you that the movie will most likely be taking place in Las Vegas since it's neon and glowing.

DAI 323- Week 5 Exercise

Love it or hate it, graffiti in the most basic sense is visual communication dating back to cave paintings. Although some see it as vandalism, it always communicates with the viewer. Graffiti doesn't necessarily have direct meaning other than the graffiti writers name and their culture, but can be very in your face. Graffiti styles can be very specific to areas such as Sao Paulo's "Pixação" is only seen there and is distinctive and cryptic. Graffiti is meant to be temporary, not tucked away in a gallery as it is an attempt to take back public space, which has been overwhelmed with advertising. This specific form of graffiti in the image follows a common characteristic in the traditional graffiti style called "bombing." The letters that are unclear to many, but spell out "adek" and "mq" in a bubble letter form, two prolific San Francisco graffiti writers. This style of graffiti is usually very quick and generally uses one or two colors with a quick- solid fill for letters allowing for quick recognition. The idea behind this visual communication is to get their name out there as much as possible and in anyway.