Create movie poster to captivate women who like action movies, or anybody that likes action movies in general. In addition, it’s meant to target a mature audience, 18+ because of the graphics displayed.

Upon researching, I found that John Wick and Atomic Blonde would most likely be my biggest competitors. This is due to the fact that both movies are based on the action movie genre. In spite of this, i’ve stumbled upon an article by the webdesignerdepot staff and looked at the elements of a good movie poster.

The main thing that separates my movie poster from my first competitor, John Wick, is my target market. John Wick’s target is more generic as it is just another male protagonist action movie film. My movie poster is to target a more specific audience, women. Because I was able to define a more specific target, it gives me an edge because I know the audience i’m trying to reel in.

Atomic Blonde, however, is after a similar target audience because they have a strong female protagonist in an action film. Because of this, I knew that my design had to be extremely different in order to compete. One of the main elements that the WDD staff talks about in making a great movie poster, is having something to interest the audience. This was the main element that I was looking for when creating my movie poster. The poster doesn’t tell you to much about the movie and is shrouded in mystery. This makes the people who see the movie poster more intrigued and more inclined to watch it, consequently. Furthermore my tagline, “To die by the hands of death is the beauty of life” helps in that process by allowing the audience to take an interest of the female character because it makes them ponder what she is capable of. This is where my poster has the advantage over Atomic Blonde, which does not have a tagline.

In addition, another important element of making a great movie poster is having a great sense of style. My movie poster is relies only on the colors black and white. With this style, I was hoping to achieve a classic style, giving it a sophisticated look by showing the contrast that is going on. This is where my design is stronger than the poster for John Wick, as the colors in the background are just bland with blue and purple. The style of the poster doesn’t really give an idea of what the movie is like.

Result: 

A unique poster that is very ambiguous but its ambiguity allows it to intrigue people and provide them greater incentive to watch the movie out of curiosity.

Research References

7 Elements of a Great Movie Poster Design. (2018, February 07). Retrieved from https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2011/02/7-elements-of-a-great-movie-poster-design/

Why I applied a layer mask

I applied layer masks on my poster so that I would be able to isolate objects and put them together into one art piece. I did this with the bullet, which I had to mask over its shadows in the original image to isolate it and then put it in the poster. I did the same thing with the bullet hole so then I could place it on my poster. I also applied a layer mask around the hat of the original image then overlaid it in the same spot so it would overlap the bullet hole and make it look as though it’s underneath.

Why I applied a layer style effect

I applied some layer style effects, in particular I used bevel and emboss on some of the bullets to give it a slicker look and to match the shadows of the image with the woman. With this, it gives

the poster a good lighting and unites the pieces of the poster together as a whole.

Why I applied a smart filter

I applied the smart filters on 2 bullet, to blur them out. This allows me to achieve an effect where it looks as though the bullets are traveling at a very quick velocity. I only did this on 2 of the bullets because I didn’t want to overdo it with the effect and make it redundant.

Which Tools I used to select

The primary tool I used was the quick selection tool because the images I used had very good color contrasts to help differentiate the parts of the image. However, the bullet was less easy and so I had to use the pen tool to be more precise to mask out the shadows in the original image.

How I knew the images would have the best resolution

On the website I used to find my images, it provided a filter in which I made sure the dimensions would fit the criteria for the project. For example, I used the filter to make sure the main picture for my cover art would be at least 8.5 x 14 inches and that the orientation of the image would be vertical.

Image Sources

Woman - https://pixabay.com/en/black-white-film-noir-hat-band-3786986/

Bullet Hole -https://pixabay.com/en/space-junk-space-debris-margin-11648/

Bullets - https://pixabay.com/en/bullet-ammo-ammunition-shell-brass-1138906/