Research Into Posters.

I decided to begin my research by looking into movie posters. Movie posters come in many shapes and forms and are an extremely important part of a films marketing by either showing off stars, indicating genres, attracting a target audience or simply creating some sort of image (be it obvious or not) for the film.

I was introduced to one of my favourite designers, Olly Moss, in my first year of university, and his work has stuck with me ever since. I decided, therefore, to initially look at his work, and additionally, how he has reformed and re-created movie posters from existing films. After gaining inspiration and further knowledge, I decided to put my findings into a small research presentation. 

On the opening page I used three very different pieces of fan-made poster art, simply to offer visual aids to the subject I was discussing. However, these posters are useful because they show different forms of poster-art. One of which uses photography from the movie Taxi Driver (1977) which an over layer of worn paper and dirt. The poster looks authentic and is definitely engaging through its use of black and white along with the solitary image of a lonely man. Moving on, we come to a poster for Scarface (1983), the acclaimed gangster flick. What I liked about this poster design was its use of iconography. It was obviously made after the film had already secured its popularity, allowing it to use such iconography and still be recognised. It features cocaine, a semi-automatic weapon and an alcoholic drink. Three things that are commonly used and seen within the film. The poster is plain, but the use of iconography is simple and effective. Lastly, we have an artistic hand-drrawn graphic poster. The art work is flamboyant and eye-catching, filling as many of the characters and as much action sequence references as possible to indicate genre and style.

I began to deconstruct some of Moss' creations, with a case study on his reworking of the original Star Wars trilogy posters. I loved the original posters and had always found them so fresh, original and engaging. They introduced characters well and implied their natures of good or evil clearly. Additionally, they were colourful, artistic, and definitely introduced the fantasy sci-fi genre clearly to an audience. Nonetheless, Moss' reworking of the material I found extremely imaginative, and undoubtedly original.

I found that Moss had managed to rework the films original posters by using simple recognisable images. By this point the films have gained mass popularity worldwide, making it easy to use iconography in order to be recognised as a product for that franchise. For example, in the reworking for the famous 'Empire Strikes Back' poster, Moss ingeniously uses the setting for the final, iconic and dramatic scene between Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker in order to create the visor for Bobba Fett's helmet. This uses effective iconography from the film in both setting, scene and character.

This is reiterated in the poster for 'Return of the Jedi' wherein the mask of Darth Vader, the formidable and popular villain of the franchise, is recreated through trees and branches, also giving a glimpse at one of the AT-ST machines, linking the chosen image to one of the popular scenes within this film. Once again, Moss uses iconography, re-introducing existing audiences to a setting and scene they enjoyed, and a character they loved, but in a new style. One of the important things I found about Moss' work on the Star Wars trilogy was that although all of his posters were extremely original and different from the existing work, he always used the same title fonts and typographies. This almost works as a homage to the previous and original work, and allows his new designs to, rather that be a reinvention, to be an extended piece of the franchises art-work.

After my case study on the work of Olly Moss, I began to focus more closely on existing posters and real marketing tools. I was introduced to a website in my second year at university studying New Media, wherein the cliché's of posters are discussed and explained. So I started with this. It was obvious that these repetitive styles and designs were genre based, but it frustrated me how unoriginal they were, and further, how it seems they are just money-making products, rather than real pieces of art.

The website discussed clichés within movie posters and gave evidence through pictures. I chose examples to use in my presentation, such as the red dress/romantic comedy combo. I found this posters so ineffective and definitely to familiar. They don't show any promise for the film, or anything behind the story or narrative, but simply indicate that it is another blockbuster film from the genre. From analysing the use of clichés in design work I quickly established certain genre traits to avoid, and felt inspired to be original and fresh with my own work. 

Although there have been plenty of poor movie posters, they have been balanced out with some truly impressive marketing posters over the years that most certainly have done their job properly. One of my personal favourite poster campaigns was presented early in 2008 preceding the highly anticipated sequel to Nolan's popular Batman Begins film which was released in 2005. The reason I loved this campaign so much is because it was so different, so stylistically unique, and so powerful. 

Nolan cleverly based his campaign not on the film in general, but specifically on the films villain. In superhero films so much depends on the villain; whether they are dangerous enough, threatening enough or enough of a challenge. The first poster indicated the emergence of almost every Batman fans favourite villain - the Joker. The Joker is such a big villain that he will certainly come with a bang, literally and metaphorically. The campaign introduced us skilfully to the Joker's tagline "why so serious?" which in itself exemplifies the characters sick, sinister and demented persona. He is immediately considered a formidable villain and an exciting character. Furthermore, through this campaign, Nolan introduces us to a character but just enough to excite us, leaving so much left to our imagination, also giving no indication of storyline. This is why the marketing for the film worked so well, and attracted such a large audience. 

I went on to explore posters specific to genre, looking mostly at teen drama's and teen romance. Both Garden State (2004) and (500) Days of Summer (2009) had similar posters revolving around a subject and blocks or pictures of memories, moments and faces. This method of design really captured how these films are about life, love and living. Finding yourself. This is something that really appealed to me as these posters were original and broke the rules. They simply were an expression of ones thoughts and ones memories.

By the end of my research, I had discovered a lot. I had looked into many genres, thought of design techniques which I liked and some that I didn't. I also learnt more about the purpose of a poster. Is it meant to promote the film? Create mystery? Tell a story? From my findings I realised that the answer to all these questions will always change depending on the film, but I also realised the kind of route I would want to take with my marketing. I would want it to be mysterious. New. Original. Ambiguous. Artistic. Humble.

Time for ideas.