RobSog

How to design a movie poster: Part 1

I’ve been asked if I'd like to have a crack at a poster design and website for a new movie. Set in my current home town of Prague, The Wrong Mr Johnson is according to the director:

‘about misunderstanding, miscommunication, mismatches . . . observes the evolution of individuals who have preconceived ideas and prejudices who are then compelled to adapt their ideas and feelings because of things that happen to them’.

So now you know. I’ll post more about the film once I’ve seen a rough-cut, as it's still in post-production. Onto some typographic design geekery.

Photography or illustration
The stills photographs that will be used on the website  (courtesy of the irrepressible Phoenix) are as you would expect ‘top-notch’. Carl the director wanted to use an illustration for the poster, so Jan Kotík came up with a fantastic portrait of Klara Issova having a sneaky ciggy in-between takes. It's just so charming I was immediately hooked.

If the face fits . . .
Now to choose some type to reflect and reinforce the style of the image. As the film is ‘funny, surprising, playful and sexy’, I wanted a type combination that convey these same feelings. After trying a bunch of sans serifs for the title, I settled on Dax in it's compact cut. So why’s that?

Well the cap ‘J’ comes below the baseline for a bit of extra visual interest; it comes in a nice range of weights; I've always liked the ‘cut of it's jib’; it goes nicely with the illustration IMHO and it has a quirkiness that suits the subject matter.

To compliment our title font, I’ve gone for a Amor by local type design genius František Štorm. It’s got a certain fragility that I think works in harmony with the beefy display type. The italic is just delightful – even the diacriticals which are the bane of my life as a non-native Czech speaker.

So there’s a brief look at some ‘typographic design grammar’ – albeit one small part. Much easier than Czech, believe me . . .

Typography
San serif | Dax Compact by Hans Reichel | FontShop
Serif | Amor by František Štorm | StormType

What is design?

From Hackers and Painters, Paul Graham (Design and research, p.216–217):

Design begins by asking, who is this for and what do they need from it? A good architect, for example, does nor begin by creating a design he imposes on the users, but by studying the intended users and figuring our what they need.

Notice I said 'what they need', not 'what they want.' I don't mean to give the impression that working as a designer means working as a sort of a short order cook, making whatever the client tells you to. This varies from field to field in the arts, but I don't think there us any fields in which the best work is done by the people who just make exactly what the customers tell them to.

The customer is always right in the sense that the measure of good design is how well it works for the user. If you make a novel that bores everyone, or a chair that's horribly uncomfortable to sit it, then you've done a bad job, period. It's no defense to say that the novel of chair is deigned according to the most advanced theoretical principles.

Any yet, making what works for the user doesn't mean simply making what the user tells you to. Users don't know what all the choices are, and are often mistaken about what they really want. It's like being a doctor. You can't treat a patient's symptom. When a patient tells you his symptoms, you have to figure out what's actually wrong with him and treat that.

This focus on the user is a kind of axiom from which most of the practice of good design can be derived, and around which most design issues centre.

Crap creative crits

Sometimes you get feedback that's . . . well not very helpful.

Jumping on the bandwagon

I am, are you? iTunes back up for Mac users from Bandwagon.

SMAC farewell tour

Sad news. The infamous rockers SMAC are soon to kick off their farewell tour. So here's the official poster I knocked up for them. Rock on.