Project #4: Poster Series — The Curly Hair Expo

The Project

The constraints for this assignment were pretty loose. We simply had to use the design knowledge we have gained up until this point to create a series of three posters based off a single (probably made up) event/festival.

I only had a couple of event ideas for this assignment. I knew that I wanted the event to be something that related to me in some way but I also wanted it to be unique in some way.

My first idea was to make some sort of ‘Pro Black’ event but in the end, I couldn’t think of many specific events that would occur at the festival nor unique/cool ideas to make the posters.

My other idea (which is the one I executed) was a Curly Hair Expo. I felt as though this idea was not only unique but also relatable to myself and many other people with curly hair. I also thought that these posters could be pretty interesting.

Sketching

Once I decided on the Curly Hair Expo idea, I began to sketch. I wanted the posters to be unique in not only content but also in layout and so I tried to show this in my sketches.

While I did attempt to create the graphics for the third idea, in the end I decided to fulfill the second idea. This was mainly because I felt as though this one wouldn't be as hard to execute as the third idea but would be much more complex than the first.

Collecting Information

After my initial sketches, my next step was to collect information/decide what the content of each poster would be. If I’m being honest, this step wasn;t completely finished until late into the poster but starting this early helped to get ideas flowing.

Initial Digital Iterations

As mentioned earlier, I began my digital iterations with the third set of sketches. The sketches were actually based off of images I found online (seen below).

As I began to trace the first of these images (I began with the one in the middle seen above), I realized how truly complex they were. The facial features were hard to execute and my tracings looked a little messy and ineffective. I finally ‘gave up’ and decided to attempt executing a different idea at a certain point. The image below is how my graphic was going at the moment that I ‘gave up.’

As mentioned earlier, I moved onto the second set of sketches after the first didn’t work out the way it was expected. The first step I took was to find images to use to create my graphics. The images I used can be seen below.

When tracing the first image, I decided to stay away from facial features (due to past experiences). For the second, I traced the single container once and then duplicated it (instead of attempting to retrace a second and third time). For the final image, I mainly used the structure of the donuts but played with the way they were placed and decorated (a little). For the most part, I used the colors of my color palette to fill in/color these graphics.

After this, I basically placed/ordered all of elements onto separate artboards to create my posters. My posters thus far are shown below.

Interim Critiques

During our in class post it critiques, the majority of the feedback that I recieved was:

1. I should be more consistent with the alignment of my text,
2. I should work on my use of negative space
3. I should redesign/tweak my textual hierarchy
4. I should work to adhere to a grid

Due to the fact that all but one of these critiques were something that I already knew I needed to work on (but didn’t really know where to go with it), there wasn’t much I could do in regard to fixing my posters besides fixing the alignment of my text on the second (yellow) poster.

Desk Critiques

During desk critiques, a few suggestions that were given to solve some of my ‘problems’ included:

1. Compile the different parts of my posters into chunks and move them around in that way
2. Try adding color to the first poster because not having color makes it look out of place
3. Play with the size of elements to utilize the 50' 5' 5" rule
4. Try creating an identity for the event, possibly through the use of a logo
5. Add details to the first poster to make it similar styles to the others

I took all of these critiques into account as I finalized my posters. The first thing I did was work on the hierarchy of the posters. I moved things around in chunks and played with sizes and in the end, I believe that it looked much cleaner. The second thing I worked on was a logo for the Expo. I decided to use the image I tried to use for the first poster iteration (the girl with her hand on her face) but leaving out the face details. After tracing and coloring the logo it was looking pretty good but after placing it on the poster, it seemed to attract too much attention and conflicted with the other graphics of the posters. Because of this, I decided to play with the colors. I also moved the arm around a bit to fit the name of the expo into the logo better. Below is the different iterations and the last one was what I eventually used.

Once I played around with the sizes and layout a bit, I was much more satisfied with the way that the posters turned out. The final posters can be seen below.

Final Critiques

The final critiques I got were to:

1. Work on text alignment and general alighnment to a grid
2. Make the logo smaller (because it was still competing with the rest of the poster)
3. Work on better utilizing white space

These are the final touches that I worked to make to my posters. The image below is my final product.

Final Thoughts

In the end, I think my poster series came out pretty well. With more time, I would have played with the white space a little more and would have worked to further utilize a grid of sorts. In the future I will definitely work to include a grid into my designs a lot earlier on so that it is always something thought about.