Subliminal Poster Drafts

Poster 1

Poster 2

I have created two poster drafts that are different in contrast, and feel that to find which one is the best I should ask around for opinions.

After gathering opinions, I feel the best option is to combine both the font and writing of the left one with the picture of the right one, as the right one is apparently clearer and therefor easier to understand. I feel I agree with this opinion as well.

Final Poster

This is my final poster after all the criticisms. I believe this is the best one due to being clear in editing and having matching font that several people agreed to have.

Evaluation

With my poster I had went through three different drafts, with the same image, the first being more flushed colour with a hint of low key lighting.  I used low key lighting as I felt it was the usual trope with composition used for every kind of horror poster. I used the 'Faded' font for the title, the 'Displacement' for the tag line and release date, and the 'SF Script' font for the credit block as I had concluded from my research that that was the closest font for credit blocks. The reason I went with these fonts are because the faded font was good to show the lack of focus and disorientation, a huge association to what the film is mainly about, the displacement font seemed more bold and clear and easier to stand out for the most important things such as release date, and the SF Script font because it's used for scripts. The 'eyes' section of the tag line being the colour red is an anchorage for the main theme of the film, as it relates to the main character not being able to open his eyes to the truth, being more metaphorical rather than literal and at the same time a double entendre. It also puts more emphasis on the direct address which is used on the tagline, as it states 'open your eyes', which portrays the audience as the main character. This is also what I tried to do with the costume, as having the protagonist's face not be revealed would take away the need for star factor, whilst at the same time making the audience be able to see themselves within the protagonist, and pretend they're him. I also put the tagline right underneath the title but slightly to the right as I feel it's the only space that doesn't look out of place, as it isn't too far from the title and is close enough to be recognisable as well.

At the same time, I had created the positioning of the graphic showing the bandaged man as I believed it revealed who the main character was without actually explaining anything. Having the bandaged protagonist partially shown would both raise questions with the audience which might entice them to see the film, and also give a metaphorical approach as you can only see 'one half' of him, as the poster shows with not showing his full face. I had also made sure to give a facial expression of loneliness, defeat, and being lost by using the eye, giving it a more distant look so it would show how the main character's general overall state of mental being is without actually having to write it out to the audience. One other major aspect I had to heavily decide on was making the poster landscape instead of portrait, and this decision was heavily influenced by looking at other posters being made landscape rather than portrait. I believe having the poster landscape would give a wider perspective to the audience and more space to portray graphics and give positioning. A big factor for the inspiration of making it landscape is the film "Gravity's" poster, which used the landscape format to make the entire poster seem more lonely, as it simply shows an astronaught in space This same style of portraying the poster followed through throughout every draft I did. The faded background beyond the protagonist also would increase the sense of loneliness, whilst at the same time making everything seem out of place, and out of reach. At the same time, this makes the main character a focal point which I indeed wanted, as he's the most important factor on the poster. The focal point didn't allow for any props to be used in the background, though, as focusing on two things would ruin the style of the poster and instead make it lose some of it's meaning.

The second draft I done focused more on the horror aspects, as from my original audience feedback I received I was told that the previous font "Dex's Jobs" I had put on my blog was more suitable for the horror movie trope and style. Originally I didn't use the font because I felt it was too out of place on the lighter background, so on this background I instead increased the red saturation to try and relate it more to horror and do it in a certain way so it doesn't effect the composition of the font too. I feel the heavily implied use of crimson red relates to a sense of macabre in the poster, which would make the poster appeal more as a horror as it might get lost on the target audience of young adults. I relayed this to different people for my audience feedback who still stayed under the target audience category whilst doing the same ones too, finding that they prefer the original picture with the second picture's font. They felt the font was enough to relate it to horror whilst the original picture seemed to match the film's premise. I then went on to try and mix both together and make them work.

I then changed the font, using the faded font previously used for the title on the first one as the tag line, and Dex's Jobs as the title. The displacement used before was used as the release date again. I used this font and shown it to the previous people, and they agreed it was good standard. I left it at this, mainly because it doesn't use too many effects to be hard to understand, and not too few to make it look bland and boring. I feel this poster makes it sickly, and the dark eye I use post-production make the character look even more sick. I feel this poster portrays the horror due to the red outline on the font, and at the same time the film respectively.