Title Design

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sauvin
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Re: Title Design

Post by sauvin » Mon Aug 08, 2016 8:14 am

I’m no graphics artist or designer by any means, in any way, shape, form, nightmare or alternate dimension. There seems to be quite a bit about graphic design to know, especially if you’re in advertising of any sort: if you’ve ever read anything by Marshall McLuhan (“the medium is the message”) and his academic disciples, you’ll have a pretty good idea that sometimes this particular kind of shape in tandem with that general colour scheme supposedly sends a message to the subconscious, bypassing the conscious mind entirely, with something that’s usually themed around sex, death and occasionally something really finger-lickin’ good to eat.

Being a complete moron in things graphic, it’s still not hard to see a few strong similarities and dissimilarities between the Swedish and the American cover art.

Both are dark overall, the Swedish version quite a bit more so because the foreground character is backlit to such a degree that you can only guess this is either a woman or a child by the shapes of the fingers. The backlighting almost has the effect of imbuing this darkened character with a bluish white halo, and he (she?) has his (her?) hands up, as if pressing against a pane of glass – this person is either on the outside wanting in, or on the inside wanting to escape, and the head is slightly tilted in a way that suggests dejection.

In the American version, the face is brightly enough lit with a pukey kind of bluish light that you can clearly see he or she is very, very young, might be eleven or twelve, might be at most in his or her very early twenties. It’s clear he (she?) has long, black hair, full black eyebrows, eyes dark enough to pass for black in that light, and has maybe a suggestion of kohl or bruising under the eyes. This character is looking to his (her?) left, and slightly downwards; with the eyebrows looking almost raised, but the rest of the facial expression seeming to convey despondence, the overall effect is one of very mild surprise (or maybe wariness) against a backdrop of emotional exhaustion. Oh, and that ain’t concord grape juice leaking down the chin from his (her?) mouth.

There’s another character, behind him (her?) and a bit to his (her?) right, deep enough into the background shadows it’s virtually impossible to say anything about that person except that he (she?) is standing, maybe, with maybe his (her?) right hand on a hip and maybe a left hand extended (as if asking for something), and that this person’s head (tilted a bit forward, maybe) might be blond.

The Swedish cover has more dark than light, in terms of surface area, but the top half overall is brighter than the bottom half which is deeply and nearly totally dark. The light/dark contrast is much simpler and starker than the American cover, and the cover is overall darker. The American cover might be “lighter” than the Swedish, but it can’t really be called “light”. It has a lot more detail – parts of an open-throated shirt or sweater of some kind are clearly visible, as is a collarbone – but the light/dark contrast doesn’t separate itself into distinct areas. There appears to be some scattered background light, but Eli seems to have some kind of weak bluish white light source a couple of yards above his (her?) head, and a bit forward. The light is a bit before him (her?), maybe, but also above: out of reach. The whole effect is that the light areas and dark areas just generally seem to blur into each other.

The Swedish title is in a pristine white, in a font with clean, simple shapes and lines. It’s almost an imperative. The American title’s white isn’t nearly so pure, it’s a little dingy, in fact, and the tops of the lettres forming the word “LET” seem to have begun fading into the background (or, alternatively, the title has mostly but not entirely emerged from the background). This isn’t a clearly stated imperative, it’s almost more like a wish or a plea in the subjunctive.

In other words, at 3 in the AM, the Swedish version seems to be saying “It might be horrible, but it’s simple!”, where the American version is almost saying “It ain’t simple, it’s just unremittingly depressing!”
Fais tomber les barrières entre nous qui sommes tous des frères

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