Barth the Mule
Gig Poster Project
In the beginning, I was presented with the opportunity to make a mockup of a gig poster. We were told the title could have nothing to do with the actual image, and that the image needed to communicate the type of music that the imaginary band would preform.
While brainstorming what kind of band would be represented and what to actually make for the poster, heavy metal rock came to mind. Personally, I don't have a lot of history listening to heavy metal and intense music, which made the prospect of making a poster for such a band even more intriguing and exciting for me.
When looking through other professional posters for bands like my imaginary band, inspiration kept coming. I knew going into it I wanted to make a contrast of something innocent with something more severe and intense. In the sketches made, several options came to mind. After brainstorming and sketching out ideas, I narrowed it down to making an innocent teddy bear with a bear skull on its face.
Once the sketches were made, I was able to use them as reference in creating the skull. After creating the skill, the issue of the bear came up. At first I was going to use the shape builder tool to create the bear, but after several failed attempts I realized while I knew the shape of a teddy bear, I couldn't get the proportions or size right.
This was my first project with illustrator where I had to go back and create follow up sketches after beginning the digital version. For some reason in the past it just seemed that once the sketches were done, the rest of the work would be accomplished digitally only. I never even thought to going back to the pen. I hope to learn from this and continue to work with all the tools I have been given, not placing them in boxes they don't need to go into.
I wanted the bear skull to be more harshly detailed compared to the bear and looked at several photos of actual bear skulls. While in theory doing so should be fairly easy, actually figuring what kind of detail was much harder. I knew from the initial sketch where I wanted the shading to be on the skull, but making the shading simple gray blobs didn't seem dramatic enough. Several options were considered and tried, using charcoal brush for the outside of the gray, making the shading black, making sharp edges breaking into the shadow, making the broken more rounded by using a brush with tapered ends.
It wasn't until speaking to one of my classmates that the choice was made on which to use. While looking through the options, she pointe out the swirled look, saying it seemed to match and compliment the fur more. While considering how to make the bear and the skull contrast, I hadn't thought of making them match in different certain ways. After she mentioned that, I wanted the fur to be even more similar in a sense to the detail on the skull.
Colors were changed, the bear enlarged, and the fur was edited to match the skull's detail. The inspiration of a bear with a skull was beginning to transform from a thought into an actual design.
The next most transformative advice I was given for this was to change the color of the shading of the skull. Something hadn't been working with it, it looked too severely different, but once it was suggested to change the shading and to also make the skull's white darker and the black lighter, it transformed so much.
Once the final critiques were given and changes made, it still wasn't quite there. The image was still rather plain, the text bland and didn't match the image or idea behind it, there was too much unused space in the background, the book seemed almost random rather than intentional. The beginning idea had been to create a gig poster for a heavy metal screaming band, but the the poster appeared more cartoony and soft. After thought and investigation, experiments were made and decided on.
While the text on the book was meant to look like an actual book title and spine, the background text was changed and added to to give it the rebellious and intense feeling of the music I wanted to represent. Using three layers and types of text over one another it gave it that slightly crazed feel I was hoping to communicate for this band. The book was given rips in the pages and darker stains on the cover and back to continue with the dangerous and crazy idea. Highlight were given to the skull and the fur to give it harsher and more attractive detailing. The colors were carefully selected for these changes. The first thing I wanted the viewer to notice was the skull, so I gave the skull the brightest color in the entire image through the highlights. Placing the tile of the band and giving it the second lightest color in the image naturally attracts the eye from the skull to the name. The third place I want the eyes to wander was info on the place and date of the band, so I gave the title on the book the darkest color of the three. When choosing the highlight color for the fur, while I wanted to add detail I didn't want it to too severely distract from the three main subjects I wanted to attract the guide the eye through, so the contrast of highlights to the fur was the least contrasting element added to the image.
I learned so much from this project, the importance of using all the tools that are available to use, trying new ideas and seeing how they would look, finding someone you can work with and brainstorm ideas with, and going back to the beginning inspiration. As I continued to edit this image, I seemed to drift farther from the focus on creating a poster for a rebellious and slightly crazed heavy rock band. It's good to get the base down and the subject put together, but it is also important to remember the emotion and theme we want to communicate. Going back to the reason behind the creation is so important.
After this project, I'm even more excited to see what is possible to create when using this program. I know I have a lot to learn, but I know that I have grown and learned a great deal from this project as well.
