Captains Log #6: Words! Less is More
It may be hard to believe, but illegible online ramblings are not my only speciality; I’m also a graphic designer for my local Students’ Union.
In this role I am generally responsible for drumming up the visuals for marketing material: leaflets, flyers, menus and of course, posters. What I have found, in my few short weeks since starting, is that the elements required to make the kinds of posters I am tasked with are very different, but also very similar.
Film posters are almost all featuring a core image, usually containing the cast, with a big popping title, often supplemented with a tagline and rounded off with a complimenting colour scheme. The posters I have made for cheap student drinks, student delegate elections and student housing fairs are hardly as exciting, but they certainly have the same simple goal: to promote and sell something.
Me and Mr James Cameron are both trying to convince our audience to participate in what we’re advertising. Big blue aliens and epic maritime disasters may be more thrilling projects than hot drinks competitions and litter campaigns, but we both need to get our message across. The mutual links? Text, and hardly any of it.
I’m sure you are all aware of the phrase “Less is more”? Good! Because that statement is definitely applicable to movie posters. All posters in fact. These advertisements are almost always going to be seen on the move, at a glance or when passing by. That gives us a very short window in which to plant our message, and so it only makes sense to have the vital info in as few words as possible. Fewer words, bigger font, jobs a good’un.
It’s obviously not as simple as that, and there will be varying factors to consider within all areas of poster design when writing the text, but short impactful text will always be more successfully taken in by hundreds of busy commuters than a deep and descriptive blurb. For me, there is also the added respect or admiration for the person or team behind such successful advertising, because I like that kind of thing!
A perfect example of such simple and yet successful advertising (and also one of my personal favourites) is the State branding for Kentucky, a place that has become world renowned for both it’s bourbon and it’s local horse derby:
Unbridled Spirit.
How perfect is that?! The entire state of Kentucky, along with its pride and its heritage, all summed up in two simple and beautiful words! I certainly hope whoever drummed that one up got a gift card or a warm handshake or something.
Captain Jakk.
