Friday, March 18, 2016

Crash Course in Visual Design

EQ: How do graphic artists capture our attention? How can we use these tools to create propaganda?


While you are not graphic designers, per se, knowing how key visual arts concepts are used (particularly to communicate) is an important part of understanding the media. Before you begin to design and create your propaganda posters, we're going to discuss how visual artists and writers work together (often in ad or marketing departments) to design effective materials.


We will be working with Ms. Lawson's 10th grade class on our propaganda poster designs. So relax, if you don't know how to use Adobe Illustrator or have been dreading this project. You will have help--but you also need to do your part and come up with a "message for the masses".


For discussion: please think about what you know about design. Take a moment, then share what you know with a neighbor. Talk for a minute or two about the main things you remember from other arts classes (probably from middle school) or from your own training or previous projects you have completed that involve graphic design.
Then, take a look at these two images:



What stands out as important? Let's discuss.

In the lab you will have 3 separate tasks.
#1: Please view and read the following article by Steven Bradley from "Smashing Magazine" on Design Principles. Identify and explain the following concepts (to be collected at end of class today!):
  • Dominance
  • How to establish dominance
  • The dominant element
  • Focal Point
  • Levels of Dominance: dominant, subdominant, subordinate
  • Visual Hierarchy
  • Inverted Pyramid (handy info for writers!)
#2: Check out one of the poster sites below and view some graphic design/poster examples/models. As you view, look specifically for examples of dominance, focal point, visual hierarchy, size, contrast, color, symmetry, style, grouping, unity, and similarity (see graphic above). See if you can identify these elements working to create an effective graphic design.
#3: When you have completed tasks 1 & 2, please use the graphic organizer (see handouts) to design a poster idea for your propaganda poster project.
Use what you learned today about the principles of design and hierarchy to sketch a mock up of your idea. Include key words or phrases that you would want on your poster. What color, style, contrast, etc. would you want for your poster?


How to do this:
  • identify a current, modern-day issue that you feel passionate about
  • What images come to your mind when you think of this issue? (jot these in the note section)
  • What words or phrases do you think of?
  • Can you connect a song, poem, person, celebrity, symbol, or popular culture item to the issue?
  • What colors, shapes, lines, graphic elements (see above) might be connected to this issue?
Then: Create and design! Spend your time in the lab to work on your idea.

By the end of class today, please turn in your homework (see previous class), your notes on Steven Bradley's article (see above), and, if you are done, your rough sketch idea for your poster.


HOMEWORK: None.

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