Cricket Premier League

The company, where I work now, organized a cricket tournament ‘OPL’ in the last weekend. 12 teams, representing various business groups, participated. ‘Throttlers’ is the team from my business group. They are the defending champions. Although they reached the finals, they lost the cup to the rivals by 3 runs.

Media Blitzkrieg

Two-three days before the match, all the teams except our ‘Throttlers,’ started a media war. Logos were created, posters were made, FaceBook fan pages were registered, Ringtones were offered for subscription and team videos with theme music were uploaded in YouTube. I was also told to be ready to design a poster, in-case we win.

But we lost the finals and became the “OPL Runner’s Up.” On Monday morning, I rushed to design a poster that exhibits a ‘never-say-die’ attitude.

Design Specifications

The mast head reads “We are second to none. Wait till 2012…” This clearly translated the idea that ‘Throttlers’ are in second place now; but will regain the cup in the very next chance.

The fonts used are Serena — for the mast head/ body copy, Rosewood Std. — for the logotype and Bernard MT Condensed — for the tagline. To create the ‘Throttlers’ wordmark, Victorian Style Photoshop Brush by DiaMara is used.

I hope you liked the poster.

Design Date: 13-June-2011

Let us play a game. Can you identify the movies from the following minimalistic posters?

Hint: This is a 2001 animated Hollywood movie that was a huge hit at the time

Hint: This is a 2010 Hindi movie that received critical acclaim

Hint: This 1984 Hollywood movie enjoys a cult status across the world.

Doors, Superman and the beach

Here are the answers (Click on the images for a larger view):

Monsters, Inc.
This poster refers to Boo’s door through which she enters the world of Mike and Sulley.

Udaan
This poster refers to the superman toy shared by the siblings Rohan and Arjun and also the fact that they have to address their father as “Sir.”

The Karate Kid
This poster refers to the iconic scene of Daniel Larusso practicing the Crane Pose on the beach.

Masters of minimalism

Neeraj Menon and Soumya Jain are the people behind these creations. They have uploaded all their minimalistic works at Zeroing Down — Less is more.

Neeraj Menon Twitter | Site | Contact Comic Artist, Pune, India

Soumya Jain Facebook | Twitter | Site | Contact Visual and Communication Designer, Jaipur, India

Let us have a free wheeling chat with Neeraj and Soumya.

Q. What is the idea behind the blog Zeroing Down — Less is more?

A. In a nutshell, our blog features minimal posters of pop culture icons. We started the blog with three ideas. One: to come up with minimal and suggestive artworks for popular stuff; two: to keep our creative cells alive; and three: to have fun!

Q. How did you come up with this fantastic ‘minimalsitic’ idea? How did you two guys become partners?

A. Neeraj: Soumya and I were at college together and we’ve worked together quite a bit. I think Soumya had stumbled upon these posters by someone. The simple hard-impact visual style really appealed to us. And we decided to make a whole series for all that inspires us.

Soumya: We both are movie buffs and college batch-mates. We had some common taste and we used to spend a lot of time just discussing and commenting on movies, games, music and design. Once we were having a random chat and suddenly this Idea was born!

Q. Why do you concentrate on film posters? Why not something like book covers (Eg. The Alchemist) or product labels (Eg. Aquafina Mineral Water)?

A. Initially the idea was to try and simplify everything from games, movies, people, music etc. And there a few games, TV shows on there too. But, being movie enthusiasts, we think it’s understandable that we have an abundance of movie posters.

Q. How do you execute a work? Is it a group activity?

A. We come up with ideas and execute them individually.

Ideas just strike you at an instant, and you have to put it in action immediately.

We do have a plan to put our heads together and come up with a bunch of posters where we both have a hand in.

Q. How do you determine that ‘this is the poster moment/scene’ that defines the movie?

A. It’s already there in our subconscious mind, when we see a movie thoroughly. Sometimes there can be more than one such moments or visuals and then we have to choose between those. If it is really difficult, we try to merge them into one.

Q. Which is the best work you have done till date?

A. Neeraj: It’s a tough call… I love most of them. If I need to pick one, I’d say Inglourious Basterds.

The idea of a film reel that looks like a bomb was a very happy accident. It is an apt one and is closer to the story.

Soumya: I too love most of them, like Transformers.

It is a very clever idea and very well executed.

House M.D. was more towards the concept — canes forming the shape of a pill. Kung Fu Panda was just brilliant! But, to pick out one, I am really happy how the Pac-Man poster came out.

Q. Which poster took the maximum time between idea and execution?

A. Neeraj: The Matrix Reloaded poster.

The idea was simple — The architect’s room. Pulling it off was very difficult.

Soumya: For me, it was The Nightmare Before Christmas.

The idea was there since the first time I saw the movie. But for execution, I have to take several screenshots from the movie as a reference for the illustration.

Q. For me, the poster of Inception is very obvious; but the poster for Monsters, Inc. is very clever and subtle. Why is such a drastic change in style?

A. Neeraj: Ah! There, you’ve hit on the key difference between Soumya and my visualization style. His style is more graphic in nature, while I’m illustrative. Most of Soumya’s posters tinker with the idea of the subject. I tinker with the visual. Now you can spend some time guessing which posters are done by whom.

Q. Are all the posters created by you in software? Have you used any downloaded images from the movie websites?

A. Neeraj: Soumya and my posters contain artwork created entirely by us. A few of our guest contributors have chosen to use photographs for their art.

Soumya: Yes, all of them are digitally executed. We personally make it a point not to use any images for the posters.

Q. What is the font used in the posters? Is there any secret formula to fix the background color of a poster?

A. We use Helvetica Neue font. The background color formula for a poster is a patented secret!

Q. Do you have plans to extent the minimalistic ideas to areas other than movie posters?

A. Yes, definitely. We had such plans since the beginning. We plan to do posters on popular games, public figures, music bands, designs…

Our Favorite Poster — Kung Fu Panda

Did you see a fat tummy and a pair of low-waist shorts?

One More Website featuring Minimalistic Movie Posters

Matt Owen maintains a blog ‘BrichHut’ for Minimalistic Movie Posters. Click to visit.

On 11-Apr-2010, IISc Alumni Cell is organising ‘Science & Technology Run’ or better known as ‘SnT Run.’ I got a chance to do the branding work. I have handled the branding of SnT Run of 2008. People liked the banners and posters very much: especially the ‘shoelace’ one. Read the full story here.

So here I am, trying to outrun myself.

I am doing three separate designs for SnT Run 2010. They are:

1. Logo Design
2. Poster Design for publicity
3. Banner design for the event

In this post, I am explaining only about the item 2: ‘Poster Design for publicity.’

Initial Ideas

I exactly know what I am NOT going to do this year. I am not going to use the imagery of a robot running. I am not going to use shoelaces. Although the run happens in the green campus of IISc, I am thinking about a race track. I am thinking about the markings on the turf. Then I have a view of somebody running towards the camera. He is running to me as if there is not much time left for the event. Wait, can ‘he’ be the date on which the SnT Run is happening?

The setting of the stage

This photo is taken by Sanja Gjenero (Lusi) from Croatia. Thank you Sanja for allowing me to use this photo.

Applying Gaussian Blur to a feathered selection showing depth
3D rendering of ’11 April 2010’ in SolidWorks 

Arranging the numerals and alphabets and applying blur

Adding shadows and applying blur

Adding the SnT Run logo on to the turf

The idea was that the date of SnT Run is approaching, so don’t be an onlooker, be a part and so ‘Better run…’

This is the finished poster. Click to enlarge.

Environment friendly posters are Green!

‘Run for science, run for environment’ is selected as this year’s SnT Run theme. Nowadays whenever people think of environment or eco-friendliness, the ‘green’ colour fills their imagination. So I am told to come up with a green version of the poster.

Desaturated image
 

‘Feathered’ track

Adding original image in the background

Adding a green layer on top of the feathered track only

Changing the opacity of the green layer and applying ‘Overlay’ blending mode

This is the finished green poster. Click to enlarge.

I will be writing about the other two designs (logo and banner) soon.

More Photos of SnT Run 2010 are uploaded here.

Software: Photoshop, SolidWorks
Design Date: 07-Feb-2010

Thus ‘dpe’ was born. ‘dpe’ means ‘Design | Participate | Excel.’ I made plans for a teaser kind of series ads to generate interest among the students.

Following are the three posters that were circulated as e-mails, one poster a day.

Notice the transition of background color and the change in the point of view of the box. ‘Provocative’ wordings like ‘We are second to none’ and ‘You are not a designer till you take part in this competition’ are coined and used. The box is open in the third poster only. The box and the alphabets are 3D modelled in SolidWorks software. We received quite a good number of responses for the first contest.

Software: SolidWorks, Photoshop
Design Date: 10-Nov-2009

This was one of the requirements I received from my friend describing the image to be put on a poster announcing the registration for a Soccer League.

As always, I designed three posters.

Corner Flag

This poster conveys the idea of soccer in a subtle manner. Apart from the logo, no football is featured in the visual. Fortunately, my friend too liked this poster very much. So it got printed in more numbers. I received some positive comments from my friends. This success shows that deviating from the requirements and creating something fresh (and green!) will always be liked by others.

‘Boy band’

Three silhouetted players are walking towards the camera dribbling the ball – just like a slow motion visual from a music video of a boy band. Vibrant colours and a subtle motion blur to the ‘Are you ready?’ caption… also went into this poster.

“Goal!”

A conventional, but a brilliant ‘save’ scene. Again vibrant colors… In this poster too, I added a motion blur to the ‘Are you ready?’ caption.

Acknowledgements
The following images are used to realize these posters:

• ‘Soccer’ by Admane Samir, Algiers, Algeria.
• ‘Football field’ and ‘Goalkeeper’ by Rawku5, Germany.
• ‘Training’ by Gabriella Fabbri, Italy.

Software: Photoshop
Design Date: 17-Sep-2009

‘Voices’ is a student magazine in my college with the slogan ‘Raise your voice, let yourself be heard!’ I got a chance to design posters that ask students to be a part of the magazine.

One of my earlier attempts of poster design for this same magazine can be found here.

‘Up’

Image Courtesy: Richard Sweet, London, UK

‘Mute’

Image Courtesy: Dimitris Kritsotakis, Athens, Greece

‘Voice’

Image Courtesy: Ingrid Müller, Porto Alegre, Brazil

Software: Adobe Photoshop CS3
Design date: 18-Aug-2009

Results of general elections in India are announced a few days back. This time, many of the candidates used the latest technologies like blogs, twitter, Orkut groups, Flash banner ads in websites, SMS campaigning… Also we saw a lot of public service ads urging citizens to use their fundamental right to vote.

In my college, this year’s Students’ Council Elections were held on 16-May-2009. I got the opportunity to design a series of posters to inform students about the election. Time frame for executing the work was very short.

Design Thoughts
Three posters are planned: One, a general poster about the election and important dates; second, a poster about Soap Box event of the candidates and third; a ‘Vote Now’ poster.

I didn’t want to depict a ballot box, people or other often repeated images for the work. A few months ago, I have used an image – ‘Leader’ taken by Sanja Gjenero from Zagreb, Croatia. Sanja has other images too in the same series. I selected three images – ‘Parliament,’ ‘Public Speaking’ and ‘Yes/No.’ Thus the ‘Let us…’ series happened.

And then…
The posters stood out in the notice boards owing to the bright and the riot of colors in a white background. The contrast of the posters was very high compared to the other posters and this became the differentiator. I am not claiming that the students’ turnout on the voting day is only because of the posters.

From the feedback, I got the impression that I goofed up in the body copy. All the dates were very confusing to the people. I think a small formatting may have done the trick. See what I mean:

Thanks a lot for all your feedback. Thank you Sanja, for the great images. You saved the day! More information on the students’ council elections are available at ‘Voices’ website.

Software: Photoshop
Design Date: 12-May-2009

Need more information about FreeAgent|Go? Visit these pages in Seagate website.

What do you think? Feel free to drop a comment below…

Seagate and IBNMS (Indian Blog & New Media Society) are organizing a contest. All the above designs are done as an entry to this contest and not in the capacity as an advertising campaign. antzFx.com may not necessarily share the views expressed in the designs. Images from Seagate.com; free stock images by ImageBazaar.com, BarunPatro.com and Octa Dan (Romania); free icons by DezinerFolio.com are used.  All images, trade marks and logos used are the property of respective owners. Any commercial use of these designs as such requires permission from the respective owners.

After the contest, this page shall be modified to include the thought process behind the above designs with detailed illustration. So, leave your comments and check back later.

IBNMS announced the names of the winners on 04-Apr. My name didn’t figure in the list. I would like to thank all the people who commented about my work.
As promised, here is the story about the creation of the above five ads.

Design brief
I downloaded a datasheet about FreeAgent|Go from Seagate website. This document is nicely written and explains the features of the product in simple sentences. This document formed the basis for all the ad designs and I relied on it for the Seagate logo and product logo. From the website, screenshots of all the color variations of the product is also captured.

Layout
Initially I planned for only three ads. Later I was able to conjure up two more ads making a total of five designs. All the ads have a basic layout as shown below.

1.    Product name layer: This layer has the Seagate and FreeAgent|Go logos.
2.    Mast head layer: This layer handles the text that is first noticed by a viewer. Yanone Kaffeesatz font, 36 and 24 points. The quotation marks are in 150 points.
3.    Body Copy Layer: An explanatory note is given in this layer. Also, a note about the work being a contest entry is also given. Yanone Kaffeesatz font, 18 points.
4.    Foreground photo layer: The overall color pattern of the ad is based on the color of the product featured in this layer. In three of the ads, an image of a boy in yellow T-shirt is also present in this layer.
5.    Base layer: This layer flaunts a diagonal stripe and carries a tone similar to that of the product in each ad.
6.    Background photo layer: This layer features the prominent background of each ad.

Ad 1: Fumbling for wires
500GB is the data capacity of this cute device. My hard disk has a lot of heavy PSD, TIF and AVI files. Enter the image of a marketing guy in a movie based industry like advertising. Setting up a presentation is a headache and I do have considerable experience in that. The desktop dock accessory hopefully reduces the complexity. A simple search in imagebazaar.com resulted in a good image in muted tones that exactly matches the color of the featured product.

Ad 2: Entertainment needs
These days, youngsters store a lot of files and any amount of memory space is not enough for them. Bulk of their storage space is consumed by music, films, photos and other files. These are represented by icons (icON stage) made by dezinerFolio. I found a ‘Smiling Portrait’ of a youth by Barun Patro, India. Incidentally, the boy’s T-shirt color matched with the font color of a part of the product name. The background image of a laptop, some papers and a cup of coffee is downloaded from imagebazaar.com.

Now I think that this image is not apt. The photo of a tabletop with some text book and papers, may have been a good choice.

Ad 3: More is not enough
Now I remember the green TDK 1.44MB floppy disk I proudly owned in 1997 when I was studying for Electronics Engineering. We are now talking about Terra Bytes! 500GB means what? A simple calculation showed that it means more than 700 CDs or more than a 100 DVDs. These thoughts led to the ‘disc burning’ ad. The image is again from imagebazaar.com and it perfectly matched with the tone of the ad.

Ad 4: Go out of the dialog box!
How can I represent a fast data transfer speed? My initial attempt was the following version that used of the ‘Motion Blur’ filter in Photoshop.

But it didn’t convey the point. After getting a few feedbacks from my friends, I re-designed it and this is the version I submitted for the competition.

The dialog box and background is taken from my own laptop PC.

Ad 5: Wallet, Mobile phone and Seagate FreeAgent|Go
Do you ever step out of your room without your mobile phone? Portability of the Seagate product is addressed in this ad. The ‘blurred’ mobile phone in the background is a Sony Ericsson set and the photo is taken by Octa Dan, Romania.

The color of its centre button matches with the featured product. Well, you should look closely!

That’s all. I hope you enjoyed this post.

Software: Adobe Photoshop
Design date: 10-Mar-2009

Dear reader, we wish you a happy and prosperous New Year 2009! May all your dreams come true…

When a stranger calls…
“Hello, we need to design a poster. Will you help us?”
“Oh… Sure. When is the deadline?”
“Today afternoon. Don’t worry, it is very simple. I have thought about the whole thing. You just place the logo below a photo and give a nice caption. That’s all. It will hardly take 10 minutes for an ‘expert’ like you in Photoshop. What do you say?”
“…”

Typically, this is how a work comes to me. 90% chance is that I reject that work. First, I need to think and invent an idea. Second, that needs time. Third, if you have already decided what to do, then why come to me?

But the person who contacted for the Poster design work surprised me.
“I have committed a deadline. But don’t worry, take your time. Three days, you say? OK, no problem. Please do whatever you want to make the poster a popular one.”
Since then, he has become one of my friends.

Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore is celebrating its Centenary Year. In connection with this, IISc Alumni Association organized a Science & Technology Run on 7th December 2008 inside the campus. I just landed on the job to design a promotional poster for the event. This will appear in newspapers and the posters will be sent to different institutions in Bangalore, I am told.

Run IISc, run…
In the given time, I submitted four designs. Two of them were selected.
Yes, the graphic alone can project the message of ‘Science and Technology Run’ very clearly. Because of its ‘too-obvious’ nature, I didn’t want to send this to the concerned people. But the heading was perfect – ‘Science & technology runs in Bangalore.’ After much thought, I pressed the ‘send’ button. The graphic is created by Rodolfo Clix.

This design was very simple and became very popular. The basic idea came from the word ‘race,’ then ‘seat belt,’ then ‘fasten the seat belt’ and finally arriving at ‘fasten the lace and go’ since we are dealing with a run rather than a car race. Later this poster was converted into banners and a wonderful stage backdrop by the event management people. The simple lace and the white background were the USPs. This graphic is created by Zsuzsanna Kilián.

‘Be there’ was the tagline I gave in all the posters. If the tagline was a white text placed on a dark band, the effect would have been more compared to the present design.

Not so lucky

This design was not selected for the campaign because of reasons unknown to me. I was trying to add a down to earth feeling to the poster. A playing child in a village setting led to the very famous ‘Catch me if you can…’ I understand that Sören Rudolph took this photo in Kenya.

This design also was not so lucky like the ‘Strings.’ A pair of used running shoes is lying on the floor. The photo was looking natural. ‘Make them run…’ was thus born. These Puma Mostros belong to Simon Cataudo.

The Event
Almost 1500 people participated in IISc Science and Technology Run on 07-Dec-2008 and it was a great success.
You can see some photos of this event at:
IISc Centenary Gallery
Accounts of the event are available at:
Croakers’ diaries!
IISc Life

Acknowledgements
Following are the people whose work I used in the designs.
‘Running technology (Gump)’ by Rodolfo Clix, Sao Paulo, Brazil
‘Strings’ by Zsuzsanna Kilián, Budapest, Hungary
‘Running Child’ by Sören Rudolph, Wernigerode, Sachsen-Anhalt, Germany
‘Running shoes’ by Simon Cataudo,  Newcastle upon Tyne, Tyne & Wear, Great Britain

Software: Adobe Photoshop CS3
Design date: 23-Nov-2008