Poster design workshop

One of the workshops for the FMP module entailed developing three different poster designs for movies of our choice. This workshop challenged our composition techniques and ability to create dynamic and interesting illustrated posters. I chose to design posters for the three The Lord of the Rings films. (1)

First, I experimented with various compositions that played around with the content of the images. A few of the techniques I used were straight angles, perspective, and layered depth. I believe these experiments were successful in creating unique compositions that featured a range of illustrations to represent characters, locations and objects from all three of the films.

Next, I chose the three poster designs that I wanted to illustrate and produced pencil roughs of each. The first one is for the first film and depicts a hand reaching for the Ring of Power with the iconic title opposite. This is an effective composition because it utilises negative space wisely and incorporates elements of the Golden Ratio of design into the poster.

The second one is for the second film and shows a broad variety of locations featured in the film and portrays this section of the journey of the characters. The title next to the river flows into the image and seems as if it is a part of the world. This is an effective composition because it uses straight angles and layers to give a sense of depth to the illustration.

The third one is for the third film and portrays the Eye of Sauron above his tower of Barad-Dur in Mordor, with part of the title beside it as a teaser. This is an effective composition because it uses perspective to show the vast scale of the tower in an angle that is both eye-catching and connected to the narrative.

After producing rough sketches of the designs I liked, I inked them and digitally cleaned them up to make the posters look more professional. These designs were still black and white at this stage, but the plan was to make them coloured and close to real film posters. Even with just the bold outline, the illustrations are made to stand out more with higher definition.

I believe these posters mostly work well in a digital format, however the negative space affects the overall impact of each image. Coloured backgrounds would work to retain the atmosphere and depth of these poster designs, while further ensuring the images are eye-catching to viewers.

Finally, I added colour to the elements of the first design to see how it would look. While I still believe it would benefit from a coloured background, the addition of this simple colour already gives life to the image. I believe that this particular design is more effective in black and white, while the others may have been the ones to need colour.

This workshop was useful in teaching me more unusual composition styles and how to frame elements in a visual space. This is important when developing panels for a comic/graphic novel to create dynamic sequences that don't become dulled with the same angles and positioning of elements. I believe what I learned from this workshop will be beneficial in helping me with my Final Major Project.

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(1) The Lord of the Rings. (2001-2003). [Film series] New Zealand, United States: Peter Jackson, New Line Cinema.