Homework 6: Everyone Is Altered

I was blown away by how much retouching goes into the movie industry. I understood it was happening on a conceptual level, but not the nitty gritty details. I think it's heartbreaking: in many ways, an actor's own body and face become costumes he wears. This is especially true when you think about how faces and bodies can be swapped with (relative) ease. I thought it was wild that the unnamed actress who was "10 times more famous than Kim Kardashian" got a simple home video of her birthday retouched. A birthday home video not even for the public! I wonder how the mental health of these actors and actresses is, to be constantly seeing their beauty-worked images everywhere but in the mirror they see when they wake up. The pressure to always be young and beautiful must be at Mariana Trench-levels.

Homework 5: Cigarettes and Red Vines

Following Dustin Stanton's career was somewhat interesting. I enjoyed hearing his processes for the making of his movie posters, but I feel like he glossed over most of the challenges. I would have liked to hear more about them, especially as pearls of wisdom for prospective designers (not that I foresee myself going into that field). That being said, Dustin sounds like someone who is in love with his work, which is no doubt why he's as successful as he is, and why he tends to focus on the positives. I do think his advice to constantly be asking whether or not a design works for the product is good, as it keeps the vision for the design tight. I also liked how he likened a teaser trailer to a wedding invite, as I was unsure of the conceptual differences between a teaser and a full-fledged poster.

As a last note, It was eye-opening to read how he tried "a bunch of stuff" for There Will Be Blood, and then to see how many designs were at the end of the article. I'm sure those weren't even all of the initial designs! 

I'm not much of a moviegoer, so I don't have a huge repertoire of movie posters I remember, much less like. However, the movie poster for Dude, Where's My Car is taking up valuable space in my brain. It's as campy and cheesy as I remember the movie being! The designers made liberal use of the complimentary color combo blue and orange - something I noticed with a lot of other movie posters, by the way. In this poster, it's reflected on the middle horizontal line (in the background), the middle vertical line (with the women), and the very title of the movie. I think it was cute that they put the title in a speech bubble coming from Kutcher's head. 

However, I think the poster suffers from a lack of direction: what's the movie really about? Finding the characters' car, sure, but what's with the women? The dog? The steering wheel is still here, so is that the only relic left behind of the car when the movie kicks off? Did Scott's character steal it, since he's got this knowing grin? Also, the extreme camera angles on Kutcher and Scott combined with the inverted trapezoid shape of the frame gives the whole poster a funky, off-kilter feel. I already know immediately it's supposed to be a stoner movie (not that there's anything wrong with that).

In addition to making the Personal Plastic Recycler a more functional product, I tried to make its advertisement more functional too in terms of form, color, and typeface.