Project Two Deliverable. Reflection

DELIVERABLE- Line Posters

Activating and arranging graphic space in the posters was a bit of a struggle for me in the beginning. I had a hard time getting started with these. Creating an interesting composition while making the photo, line study, and typography interact meaningfully was a big obstacle. Once I got around to it, iterations started flowing and I feel like I was able to push the posters to the place they need to be. In the Paseo poster I arranged the graphic elements in a grid like fashion; a non mathematical, orderless grid that is. I sliced the photo and the line study into strips. I placed them in an alternating pattern then began to delete information. The play between positive and negative space began to play more, creating visual interest. The composition progressively becomes more solidified as your eye moves down the composition reinforcing the cohesion of the overall composition with its visual elements. Formally the juxtaposition of the photograph and line study is a comparison. The windows of the building mimic the blocks of black in the line study. Conceptually, the photo of the government housing juxtaposed with a progressive line study is interesting. There is this interesting play between a seemingly low place in society and a progressive line study. The Paseo area doesn't have that great of a reputation today. There is a lot of crime. Although some might feel like the neighborhood will always be stuck in this cycle of violence and crime, I feel like there is hope and potential for progression towards a safer community. The process from line study to the final poster was lengthy. The basic line study was manipulated by introducing vertical lines making it a complex line study. The line study was cropped and paired with a photo I took of a low income housing unit off of Paseo. The majority of the process was spend on the integration of typography. After finding a typeface that worked the question was Bold or Light. After deciding to give the type the same treatment as the composition (cutting of blocks) I printed out a bunch of "paseos." The analogue process of cutting and pasting the altered type was quick and efficient. The iterations were then translated into illustrator. After that it was just a matter of finding the right placement and alignment.
 

The Troost poster took a while to get where it is now. I arranged the space by filling the entire frame with the pairing side by side. Integrating the type was lengthy process as well. Finally I decided on having the text hand written. One of the lines in the poster acts as a baseline. Formally the juxtaposition is along the lines of continuation. Parts of the line study line up with the blinds and others line up with the negative space. The pairing is composed of some droopy blinds and a curvilinear line study. Conceptually the juxtaposition speaks to the hardships of the majority of neighborhoods on Troost. The strong black and white image of the broken blinds gives a powerful message in itself being damaged but the point of pairing it with the curvilinear line study was not only for continuation but for concept. The wave like structure seemed like a good way to portray the ups and downs of a lot of families in the troubled neighborhoods. The lines created by the blinds start to ascend on the right side. So reading the image left to right gives a glimpse of a community trying to move forward. There has been a lot of communal groups and businesses trying to tie the neighborhoods of Troost together to become more of a community that is safer and better for all.  The process in line studies was a warped one. The line study started out as a basic line study that was moved into a complex line study. The basic line study was manipulated in the scanner. Then it was projected on multiple surfaces to create new lines and angles. This was paired with an photograph I took in a neighborhood off of Troost. The pairing was put into illustrator and vectored. The photo was put back into its photographic nature while the line study was left as a manipulated vector. The type was a toss up. The decision between a typeface and a handwritten text was a tough one. After deciding that the san serifed informative typefaces weren't working, I moved on to some humanistic type. It was easy for these to look cheesy. I wrote TROOST in my own handwriting a bunch and played with tagging and graffiti like text. I then scanned them and vectored the text.
 

The West Bottoms poster is powerful in its simplicity. The poster has a lot of white space. Centering the image and line study was more of an aesthetic choice than anything. The typography is what creates a lot of visual interest in the poster. I feel with out the shift of the text the poster would become static and therefore boring. Formally the juxtaposition between the smoke stack and the random line study was a comparison. The width of the line study was almost identical to the width of the smoke stack. the emphasis in white space in the line study directly correlated to the emphasis of the open sky in the framing of the photo. Conceptually the juxtaposition between the smoke stack and the random line study had a lot to do with the white space. The negative space allows the viewer to breathe. Theres an open airy feel to the simplicity of the composition. This mimics the open, deserted feel of the west bottoms. The smoke stack speaks to the factory like setting of the west bottoms.  The west bottoms is an industrial place that has lost a lot of its boom but has recently found hope for progress. The revitalization of the west bottoms has been on investors minds for a while. The san serif typeface is used for its clean, industrial look. The process in this poster wasn't all that complex. The sky was cut out of the photo and the bounding box was removed from the line study. Once again a lot of process was spent on type. More specifically the placement of type. The way it is in the final poster is the most dynamic and interesting choice. The type is aligned with the rings in the smoke stack.
All in all I am proud of my work. I feel like I can truly say I spent a lot of time pushing this project more than I did the last. Consequently the work turned out stronger. Although I would have liked to play around with color more the Black and White images are more powerful.