With the new lockdown, our brief changed slightly for those who do not have the capabilities to complete it at home. There is now an option to complete a film poster, instead of an animation for the final task. I plan to stick to the original, however, the new addition has added another option to try out and experiment with. So, I would also like to try making, or designing a film poster for my show as well, and for this lesson, I learned about the techniques and aspects of a film poster, as a starting point.

I’ll begin by explaining some of the techniques, along with an example for each.

 

Scaling – The size of the things on the poster, in correlation to their relevance and importance. Often, the main character is the largest of all the characters on the poster, whilst the secondary characters are placed around them in size order of their importance to the story or main character.

 

 

Since Bumblebee is the biggest, we can tell that the story is centred around him (if you couldn’t guess from the title) and the girl who is below him an is second biggest is the secondary main character. Since there is a dramatic difference in size between Bumblebee and the other two characters, we can tell that he is much more powerful than them (it also relates to his actual size in the movie, since he is a giant alien robot that towers over human beings).

 

Framing – Grouping together elements with lines, position and colour. Framing also relates to camera techniques and angles, which could reflect certain messages within the film, or represent traits within a character, (e.g. low angle = powerful, strong etc.).

 

 

As you can see, in this poster, lots of characters are grouped together towards the left. They’re all looking in different directions and are scaled differently so that when put together, look aesthetically pleasing.

 

Negative space/Black space – This is when the designers purposefully leave blank areas in the poster in order to direct the focus of the viewer on one object, or towards a specific area. The horror genre leans heavily on this, because of the striking effect of having a singular or isolated object in a specific place on the poster.

 

 

The negative space here is beautifully applied and draws all of our attention to the floating figures in the centre. This creates an eerie, almost haunting effect, making us question what the film is about, and why there is a woman embracing a fish-man. The lack of information hooks the audience and makes them question why the couple is so important.

 

Holding devices – These are the shapes that exist on the poster containing other elements (people, shots, props etc.). Usually, it is a shape that relates to the film, like a pair of glasses if the main character has them, or a ring, like in Lotr in which the object is extremely significant.

 

 

Here is a clear example of holding devices. The poster uses the numbers as a clever way to showcase both a shot from the film and the title. The gradient from the top to bottom creates an easy path for our line of sight, and as our eyes flow from the top to the bottom, we notice all of the details and focus on the running figures and sunset. The poster is digestible and appealing to the eyes and does an excellent job of impacting the audience without even the whole shot being visible.

 

Now to move onto some of the graphic techniques that are seen on most, if not all movie posters.

 

Fonts – The fonts used for the title, names of the actors, taglines and other credits, are quite important. Often, companies will create their own custom font to include in the poster, and film, as preset ones, often don’t convey the appropriate tone of media.

 

 

It’s quite obvious that this poster is for a horror movie, but the perfect choice of font reinforces this even further. The title and tagline are both displayed in a gory, ripped up style, which immediately puts ideas of murder and violence into the viewer’s mind. The white also contrasts well with the rest of the poster, making the title almost jump out at you – but the tears and red splotches remove any connotations of cleanliness and purity, so the tainted white creates an even bigger ‘horror’ effect.

 

Colour – An absolutely massive part of any poster design, colour palettes are vital to give insight to what the media looks like, to grab the attention of the audience and to convey mood, atmosphere and sometimes key themes. Without the right colours, a poster could look boring or odd, or lose it’s meaning and therefore hold on the viewer.

 

 

I had to include a poster of one of my favourite films! The colours here are so beautiful and well thought out; the blue, yellow and red reflect Wonder Woman’s costume and allows her to be more of a silhouette. This makes her pop against the background which, paired with her stance, gives us the impression that she is mysterious, heroic and serious. The golden light in the middle also adds more attention to her and makes her seem almost godly. But the fact that she isn’t bathed in it, but against it could also signify that there is more to her than it seems and she may have a darker side, or a dark secret. This is also reflected at the bottom of the poster, where the red darkens significantly to make the golden letters stand out, because the darker colour balances out the poster (works with her dark figure) and feeds into that mysterious vibe. Overall, although the poster seems simple at first glance, there is a lot of symbolism, just from the colours alone.

 

Rule of thirds – A very popular technique that isn’t limited to just posters is the rule of thirds, where the frame is split into three segments, either by lines, shape, colour or contents. These show the viewers where their attention should be, and can be both horizontal and vertical. Using both directions together creates the golden ratio – which is the four points of focus.

 

 

Although it isn’t made obvious by any lines or shapes, this poster for the live-action remake of Aladdin is a  perfect example of the rule of thirds. To put it simply, the three main characters of the film are placed in the three separate sections of the poster, with Aladdin, the hero, and Jafar, the villain, in the middle (they are most important, the hero and the one opposing him). This makes the poster appealing to the eyes, and also puts our focus onto the lamp, which is the object that started the chain of events in the story. They were also quite careful not to overdo the symmetry, as some objects, like the moon, monkey and carpet, lean on one side, whilst others, like the rock on the right, and the genie, are made larger to balance this out.

 

Eyelines and expressions – This one is pretty self-explanatory – the expressions and articulation of the characters help convey their emotions and moods. For example, if a character is looking up, they seem heroic, large expressions create a sense of power, and characters facing each other/on the same eyeline show conflict.

 

 

In this poster, we can see the main character in a basic pose facing us. Her expression and face are what draws you in, looking serious, dangerous and a little mysterious too. We already know this character to be Maleficent, and being able to see her in live-action form is enough to capture the viewer’s attention. So, her face and eyes particularly are focused on to give us some insight as to what kind of character she will be/is.

 

Sometimes, if a movie is popular enough, these guidelines and conventions could be turned on their head, or scrapped completely. One instance is with Avengers Endgame, which used the knowledge of the previous film (a bit hit) to discard all the normal techniques, reducing their posters to just character profile shots with small logos and colour highlights. They even used the character deaths for a catch them all approach, using black and white to show who didn’t survive. These techniques were really effective and can be credited to how well known the Avengers franchise is.

I’ve included some other posters I like and want to analyse, so that I can see all of the above techniques working together and what kind of impressions different combinations make.

 

 

To start off, I decided on this poster, because whilst I was looking at the different ones on the internet, this one grabbed my attention straight away. The line pattern around the man resembles an optical illusion and it draws all of my attention to him. The holding device is circular to reflect the moon, which we think of because of the text, the man, and the colours. Everything is dark, pretty much only black and white, simple and minimalistic, which makes us think of space and the loneliness of being away from Earth. The font is simplistic and matches well with the aesthetic of the poster, and the composition is clever, utilising the rule of thirds in a really subtle way (we are drawn to the two thirds on the right). Instead of overloading the poster with other characters or props from the film, we have just negative space around the circle, which again, mirrors the idea of space and the dark vacuum that the astronaut will probably enter. It’s effective because it conveys the idea and tone of the movie and leaves a lot of room for questions and curiosity.

 

 

Next, I went to the other side of the scale, to animated movies! This poster for Coco uses a lot of the classic techniques, such as the rule of thirds which I spotted straight away. The two characters in the middle occupy one third each, leading to the centre, and the dog is in the middle third. Since one of the characters is taller, the bridge of petals is placed on the other third to balance everything out and make it all more appealing to look at. The bridge also creates a natural pathline for our line of vision; our eyes start at the front with the three main characters and then flow towards the midground and background of the composition, leading to the secondary characters, and eventually the world of Dia de Los Muertos. I also love the colour palette, blue and orange are complimentary and they stand out the most, making the bridge and the background contact beautifully. We also have detailing in pink, blue and red, which is the colour scheme used for the title as well, and creates a really festive atmosphere, giving us insight as to what the mood of the film will be like.

 

 

I also went with one of the posters for Avengers Endgame since I wanted to analyse the unconventional methods they used. Again, you have to have knowledge of the previous film to understand the poster, with the Avengers logo taking up all the space, and fading away. Since the logo represents the Avengers and its turning into dust, it makes the audience question is they will even succeed at all, or if they all perish like the ending of Infinity War. The title of the film is quite small, which is unconventional, but since the logo is quite well known, it tells the audience which film it is straight away, so they can afford to do this. They have placed it on the arrow, however, which is where our focus is directed since it is still intact. This arrow gives us hope because it is pointed to the right and isn’t yet fading away, implying that there is still a chance to save everyone in the future. As for the colour palette, the whole posted is disaturated and grey to show how dire a situation the heroes are in, but there is a light peeping just over the arrow, again giving us some idea of a chance of the massive dilemma being solved.

 

 

Another poster which really grabbed my attention was this one for The Shining. I think, again, the linework similar to the poster from Moon is what works so effectively at making the poster stand out. Using the rule of thirds, everything is either in the middle or in all three thirds, making the poster very symmetrical. However, this is more unsettling than anything, because it works in combination with the characters and the terrifying colour pallette. Only black, white and red is used for the poster, which of course immediately creates a connotation of blood and murder, and gives the whole poster a strong horror vibe. One thing that really jumps out is the title, which uses a very upfront and clear font, almost like it’s reaching out of the screen (making us think the man above will be coming for us). His expression is really sinister, and since he’s facing the front, it makes us feel like he is looking at us, which achieves that unsettling feeling that horror wants to create. At the bottom, we see a deep red carpet and a little boy on his toy. Somehow, this commonplace shot of a young child doing something fun and innocent, only adds to the murderous effect, because of the colours and the position; he is facing away from us, which makes us feel uneasy for his safety, and we question how he linked to the man, and why he is a part of such a terrifying situation.