Postcard with 3D Graphic

Not sure this is an improvement...suggestions welcome!

I'm much happier with this version. As Lauren suggested, I diminished the opacity in the consecutive copies of the photograph. I made my name larger, changed fonts and cropped the bottom of the postcard.

It took me HOURS to get the hang of Photoshop, so here's a very simplified version of what I had wanted to create! It's meant to be a postcard-sized ad...

Web Advertisement: American Apparel

American Apparel's ad uses the "sex sells" dictum in a casual and ironic way. The ad has three sucessive panels in which the model's zipper has been pulled further and further down; the rest of the image remains static except that model's mouth is closed in the first two and open in the third. The tonal affinity between the model's pale hair and skin, and the light background prevents the image from becoming too "graphic" even as the zipper comes down (picture the same as if she had red hair and a tan), while still allowing the bathing suit to stand out (it is, after all, the product being sold...isn't it?) In each panel, the viewer's eye is drawn down the zipper (subtly contrasted in pink against the yellow bath suit) to the line formed by the model's legs leading to the company name in bold, sans-serif font. The two words, "American Apparel" at the bottom of each panel are balanced by the individual lenses of the model's glasses at the top. The position of the hands as they descend from panel to panel lead us through the visual story being told and create dynamic diagonal movement through the panels.

Subway Advertisement: PSA

The simple but clear design of this subway poster is perfectly suited to its purpose as a public service announcement/safety campaign. Obviously designed to complement the specific location where it would be used, the central figure in orange picks up on the colors of the actual benches below; the silvery-grey figures placed symmetrically around him blend with the actual train's mirrored walls so that we seem to be looking at an extension of the setting in which we are literally positioned. As befits a public advisory, the main message is big and bold in text just above its graphic illustration, politely but stringently admonishing us not to hold the subway doors, while the text below applies peer pressure to discourage the practice: "You delay the train and everyone on it." Due to its contrast with the rest of the ad as well as its centrality to the composition, we are compelled to look at the bright orange figure on the subway wall, and from that first glance we take in the campaign's message.

Magazine Advertisement: "Not Yet Rain"

This advertisement for a documentary film about the "hidden global health tragedy" of unsafe abortions effectively communicates both the subject of the film and spirit in which it was made. The earthy but intense orange and yellow hills evoke the landscape of Africa at sunset . A solitary figure (in black silhouette) carries a basket or pail on her head as she walks along the grass (also in black). Just above the figure's head, the title of the film appears in a large and bold "handwritten" font that serves to emphasize the grassroots nature of the film's subject. The title in the upper left is balanced by the producer's logo (standing out in white against a black background) in the bottom right. The text describing the film is simple and easy to read as it alternates between regular and bold text blocks in a sans-serif font.

Web Advertisement: Baby Ronald McDonald

Also drawing upon an iconic image, this ad for the opening of a new McDonald's location uses tonal affinity between the baby's skin color and the white blanket the makes up the image's background so that the red hair and lips, black eyes and eyebrows can POP out at the viewer. Our eyes move smoothly over the image in a circle starting in the upper left, down a wrinkle in the blanket to the red hair and the baby's face, then towards the bottom right and up another blanket wrinkle to the company logo. The yellow logo is the only element to have this color, so although it is small, it is distinctive. These yellow arches, repeated in the shape of the character's eyebrows, are so easily recognizable in so many parts of the world, that the simple design of the ad as well as the small scale of the logo underscore the ubiquity of the product.

Web Advertisement: "An Unlikely Weapon"

The viewer's eyes are drawn immediately to the image inside the red circle, the iconic photograph of a South Vietnamese General about to fire a bullet into the head of a Viet Cong soldier. The text below the photograph (in a newsprint-style font, supporting the film's journalistic subject matter) is centered below symmetrically arranged text blocks (excerpts of reviews) creating a solid pedestal on which the photographic image sits; its position within the poster's composition as well as the increased tone and brightness of the parts of the image inside the circle further enhance the already shocking and dramatic subject. The black/white/red color scheme creates intensity, while the red circle and red underlining of the films title appear as though some has come along with a red marker and fiercely altered the poster to make certain that we understand the gravity of the subject. Moreover, the red circle simulates a bullet hole (the effect of the gun as weapon) while the red underline reminds us that the film's subject is the "unlikely weapon": the photograph itself.