Kristin Becker's DTC Classes at WSU

“Daffodils” by William Wordsworth
Design by Melissa

The design of this broadside by Melissa brings a sense of playfulness and warmth to the poem by William Wordsworth. The poem is about a field of daffodils and the way the narrator remembers the daffodils as happy beings dancing in a never-ending field. The mood of the text is cheery, uplifting and reminiscent, in a sense that a grown person gains contentment when remembering a specific event.

The bright yellow color is representative of the yellow daffodils as well as being known as a “happy” color, which references the mood of the poem. The complementary blue color that Melissa is using for the title and her hand-made font makes the broadside colors intriguing. The blue may also be representative of the narrator commenting on his frame of mind right before seeing the daffodils, when he describes himself as, “wander[ing] lonely as a cloud” the blue looks like the hue of the sky on a sunny day.

The size of the print would work better if the body text were larger, bolder or in someway easier to read. When close up, the text is not very hard to read but seeing the same font in the same size, for multiple paragraphs can make people want to skip over portions of the poem. The visual hierarchy in order from most eye catching to least goes: title, author and then body. In theory the idea of using the hand generated font seems like a good idea, but because the font is so large in scale compared to the body, it detracts from the focus of the poem.

The body could visually relate to the title and author more if the large portion of text was a more playful and organic font. Although the display level text does relate to the text because the long stems look similar to the long thick stems of daffodils, using a readable yet youthful digital font may have united the body and headlines more. On the other hand, I could see that using a basic, serious font for the body working since the poem is about a grown person remembering pleasant past times. The poem is serious but happy and illustrating that contrast in textual juxtaposition would be kind of difficult if both fonts were playful.

The complementary colors attract my attention from a distance. The size of the title is a good size, so that even far away the playful font draws me in and makes me wonder what the poster is about. It was a good idea to place a darker yellow text box around the main body is helpful to create space within the broadside, but I think a larger size would be better and more engaging to onlookers. Leaving some negative space around the body of the text is also helpful to readers especially since there is a lot of small text used. The alignment of the text being on the left hand side while the body is positioned in the middle is visually interesting, but I wonder if it would be more eye catching keeping the text with the box on the left hand side. Keeping the original line breaks of the poem may have been important to preserve the original feeling of the poem, but offering viewers more space with tracking or leading may help readers to not be overwhelmed by the amount of text to read.

This text is a Christmas carol (a song often sung to spread the spirit of Christmas during the holiday season) entitled “It’s The Most Wonderful Time of the Year”. The mood that is being conveyed is happy, cheerful, and artistic. It is casual while still remaining structured graphically. From far away, it appears calm, easy, INVITING. The broadside attracts my attention from a distance because at first, the cool, calm, color of the background which strongly invites me in closer to observe it. As I approach the broadside, I start to notice there is similarity between the framed background and the typeface incorporated into the title of the piece.

Designed by Hannah Croskrey

Because of this the broadside holds my attention as I come closer and closer to it. I am intrigued by the contrast of the typefaces chosen in the title. The cold, harsh, bold, black typeface in the title intrigues my eye. However, the typeface Hannah has created is thin and colorful. Despite this, I feel they work harmoniously together because of their geometric nature. They are both free of organic curves. The softer angles of the typeface Hannah created compliment the word it is spelling out: “wonderful”. I believe this makes the broadside very strong, especially up close when it is legible.

The large part of the broadside that is most eye-catching (especially at a distance) is the blurred illustration-like close up imagery of the typeface Hannah created. I love how this ties into her typeface and the title. I think it adds to what might be a broadside that doesn’t give enough credit to her created typeface, and makes it more than just a font that is part of the title. I am curious as to if someone not in this class, knowing what she did to create her typeface hands-on, would understand the connection between the graphic background she created to frame her text and typeface. I like how her text is illustrative (though subtle) in regards to what her text is about. We talked earlier in the semester about how elements or components of her text remind us of the Christmas season/holiday. The red, for obvious reasons, as well as the wood and nails having correlation to Santa’s workshop and making toys. Maybe how from a distance the nails in the typeface appear like lights which are obviously crucial to the holiday season. Also the simple matching colors of the typefaces of the actual text along with parts of the title unify the text and make it stand out (but not too much) against the background. The title is still the focal point while the text is small and understated. I think her hierarchy of her entire broadside works extremely well with drawing people in from far away as well as working to keep people engaged up close.

The chosen type styles are definitely appropriate for the text. The type style used for display level text could be a bit bigger, however, I understand for the paper proportion she chose why she decided to use the size she did for her title/display level text. The typeface she created and employed for her display level text was appropriate, especially with her use of eye-grabbing color and distinct character. But, when seeing the broadside from a distance it can be tough to make out the typeface Hannah created at the display level text. However you can make out the other display level text she employed as it is thicker and bolder.

The type style used for the main text seemed very appropriate. It is a serif, more formal type style which seems more classic and traditional which definitely compliments her text. It is very easy to read and there was no hyphenation issues. The only aspect of I don’t understand is the way in which it was decided to capitalize, not capitalize, and when to create a line break as it seems a little bit uneven. From a short distance however, the body of the text seems to have a great shape. It was only when I was up close that I began to question these things (i.e. some lines being over short). In regards to her type style for her text, I love overall its integration still with her typeface because of her chosen background. Her digital typefaces she chose to use still are blended with the background image of her created typeface so that even though she doesn’t use it often in her broadside, it is still prevalent and connected to her entire text. I also like how you can’t tell until you step up closer how the text that is not red is actually a very deep, dark, olive green. This means the entire text is either red and green which are obviously Christmas colors. This means the viewer might have more context for what they are reading once they actually START reading and notice the text is dark green instead of black. I appreciate how she still employed the two very prominent colors of Christmas without hitting the reader over the head with it and making it appear very cliché and generic.

I wish this broadside could be a bit bigger or larger. From far away it is hard to catch my attention. I believe she used the proportions of the 11×17 wisely and effectively. However, the size of her typefaces utilized in her title are hard to see or notice from far away. It is the image of her background (still technically her typeface) that draws me in from afar. I feel if she were to blow up her broadside just a bit larger in order to make her text size larger while keeping the same proportions, I feel her broadside would be more effective from a distance. I like the framing of her text, especially the leading between her typefaces in the title of her text. The leading in her main text is effective as well as it is large enough that even though the type is small, it is still legible, easy, and natural to read and follow the text. I think the tracking of the last four letters in the word ‘wonderful’ could be adjusted to be closer together. I also like her marking of sections are separated by a line space. I think it breaks up her text nicely and evenly in chunks of the song (even though I am not quite sure how she decided when to break). I like the center alignment of her text and how it complements the framing on the page. It reminds me of how I would view a carol book if I was a carol singer singing this song. The letterspacing of the “it’s the most” and “time of the year” in the title of this broadside I like because it balances out the boldness of the letters and also appears like it is almost mounting the principal point in the title which to me is the illustrative typeface.

Evan Matthews Broadside

After reading and observing Evans broadside I get the feeling he is trying to show of futuristic and space exploration. The text is an excerpt from an article about how Elon Musk has been working to advance technology to create a self sustaining colony on Mars and the ways he is working through it. Futuristic technology advancement into space travel is the meaning being portrayed by the text. The font Evan design as the display level text is very geometric and slanted   and the body of the text is set up with a different bold space age font. These elements help give off the mood of being desolate and futuristic.

Understanding the visual hierarchy presented by the broadside, I can see that the use of text placement and size shows what is more important to the viewer. This broadside attracts my eye from a distance because of the large display level type at the top in a white contrasting color to the rest of the dark composition. The main character of the article is enlarged the most within the title of the article and the rest of the tittle is smaller on two lines at the height of the type of the main character. From a far the title is the only thing that captures my attention because the body text is all the same font weight with slight distinctions of paragraphs with indentations. Looking at the broadside close up I was interested to read what the text was because the visual element was fluid throughout.

The chosen type styles are appropriate for the text as display level and for the type style. The display level is more of a decorative text that holds more meaning because if the sharp edges of the same width, long rectangular geometric type. This type of font would not be very legible when put into a large body of text like the excerpt from the article. The display level type is balancing on the line between decorative and modular because of the rectangular rounded, bold, italic style. The running text lines are very long which make it slightly difficult to follow the next line. The orientation of the running text is set up in four pretty even paragraphs but are very long sentences spanning across the whole page. A conceptual reason of why this is hard to read would be the dark gray and black running type are similar so the eye blends the text and the background together.

The spacial aspects of the type in relation to the mood, visual hierarchy, and chosen type styles have an important factor of the overall design of the broadside. The size and scale of the text at the top doesn’t leave much room for white space to naturally frame the title like how the author is frame with white space. In the running text the alignment is flush left with an indentation indicating a new paragraph. This flush left makes the text easier to read but the long lines are distracting for readability. The line spacing, leading, of the running text is very condensed and close. The letter spacing, tracking, is also very close together making the paragraphs seem more dense and tense which help convey the mood of technological advancement.

Some other decisions made that factor into the overall composition of the final broadside that work well are the choices of color and texture. The darker gray background with a thick black border are very suffocating and desolate which to me are adjectives I associate with space because you can’t breathe without oxygen in space and it is very quite. The use of positive and negative space could have been portrayed better by breaking up the text into multiple columns and creating more negative space since it was a larger amount of text. Overall this broadside was well designed and it gave off the correct feeling the text gave.

Sandra used the text “The Star Thrower” for her broadside. This text is about a boy who is throwing starfish back into the ocean to save them from the heat of the sun. When an older man came up to the boy and told him that he was making no difference due to the short distance he was throwing them, the boy smiled and threw one farther into the ocean. He then replied with “It made a difference to that one”. With the whole story based around a beach setting, Sandra used an ocean display to put behind her typeface. In addition to this, she made the words go along what looked like to be waves. Therefore, it made a terrific visual example of the ocean. Not only was it visually appealing, but the words were still easy to read as well. Making this broadside an overall terrific composition. It gave off the mood of relaxation due to the hues of blue and the watercolor-like appearance. It also made me have a desire to go vacation on the beach and watch the waves roll in.

The Star Thrower – Broadside by Sandra Albertson

It’s easy to say that the visual hierarchy in this broadside is both the title and the author’s name. Since the title is on top, it’s the first thing the reader sees. Not only is it the first thing they see, but the font is bigger and more unique than the rest of the text. The same can be said for the author’s name. After reading through the story, one would naturally want to know who wrote it. Therefore, putting the author’s name at the bottom and in the same unique font as the title, it makes the whole broadside flow together. In addition to the title and author, Sandra decided to bold some words that were more important in the story. “Starfish” and “Old man” are just two examples. She seemed to highlight the words that were more important to the story. She also made them in all caps and a serif font, which stood out from the rest of the story that is not in caps and in a sans-serif font. By doing this, the reader is more drawn to these specific words, which help understand the story that is being told.

When looking at this broadside from a distance, my eyes are immediately drawn to the title. But when I work my way down and see the words aren’t in a straight line, I am intrigued and want to go up closer to the broadside to see what it says. Even though I see the title, the display of the main text is what would entice me to go in and read more. After approaching the broadside, it still kept my attention. My eyes wondered from letter to letter as I followed the “waves” of words. Even though there aren’t may “big parts” of the text, it still is stimulating due to the title and author with the larger texts and the mix of bolder serif fonts (which I mentioned earlier).

I think the type styles for this text are appropriate. The alphabet that Sandra made is very subtle and relaxing, which reminds me of a beach and the sand. I think the fact that she used a sans-serif font is also appropriate for the title since it usually gives off a more casual vibe. I also think by trowing in a serif “the” in the title was appropriate as well. Although the text takes place on the beach, it is still a story and therefore needs something like a serif font to make it look more professional. There’s something about serif fonts that scream books and old stories to me. She also did a nice job incorporating both sans-serif and serif fonts into the main bulk of the text. It’s easy on the eyes and isn’t too distracting. Since she made the sentences go in a wave pattern, she would have needed to use more simple fonts, or it would have been too much to look at (not to mention it would have taken away from her designed alphabet). The text of the story is easy to read because of this. I was able to follow along easily and was not distracted by the way the text was displayed. That’s a very hard thing to do, and I think Sandra pulled it off beautifully. The lines stretch almost to the end of the page, which i think goes along nicely with her background. If the lines were shorter, then I probably would have had a hard time following the story and would have gotten lost in the text. The line spacing is fairly even, even though the way she displays the sentences are not traditional. The letter spacing is also even throughout the text. Even while examining her  title, I could see that the letters were spaced in accordance with one another. Kerning is the same as the tracking. Even and precise throughout. You can tell what the beginning of a paragraph is since she had indents throughout the text. The indents were noticeable, but subtle enough to not disrupt the wave-like display.

The broadside has a texture of water due to the fact that she used a good amount of blues that all blend in together. This also helped create positive and negative space. The blue colors being the positive space, and the lack of color at the top of the page being the negative space. By doing this, she was able to make the title stand out more. Also, by adding a lighter blue to the bottom, the author’s name stands out too. This creates an equal balance of colors and does a great job highlighting the important parts of the broadside. Overall, I really enjoyed viewing this design. The mix of colors, style of text, and the waves of sentences made me feel as though I was in the story myself.

Amy Koller’s Broadside PDF

The broadside that I was chosen to critique is Amy Koller’s of the song “Sleigh Ride”. At first glance, the broadside is very visually appealing and balanced. All of the text is centered throughout and feels organized. The words “sleigh bells” and “sleigh ride” are written in Amy’s designed font, which I feel was very successful. Amy’s typeface is the one that sticks out the most to me and gives the broadside a sense of identity. Having the typeface all capital letters helps capture attention as well and makes the broadside work from a distance. The letter spacing in “sleigh ride” is somewhat large which helps it work as display level text. There is one other typeface used for the rest of the poster and I think it does a great job of complimenting the designed font. The size of type varies much throughout the poster, and it seems to go from small to large, leading up to “sleigh ride”. As you read through the broadside from top to bottom, the different font sizes seem to work well with the song. Sleigh ride is written five times on the poster and each time is at a different size or position. This pattern gives the broadside a sense of unity. The second largest text pieces are “come on it’s lovely weather for a” and “these wonderful things are the things we remember through our lives”. These might be second in hierarchical order because they are important parts of the song that add a lot of feeling and therefore should be easy to read. Line spacing feels fairly normal throughout, but some lines are closer together than others. I wonder if the designer did this on purpose or if everything is supposed to be even.

Photo of Broadside on Ivory Paper

There are two colors used in the broadside and they seem to be translucent red and green. Then there is a rectangle in the middle where they overlap and make a brown-ish color. The brown color somewhat encompasses the word “RIDE” and makes it stand out more. When the actual broadside was printed on ivory paper, the red color turns into more of an orange, which slightly confuses the Christmas color scheme. I am not sure that faded colors are the best choice for such a cheery subject and maybe she could use a more saturated red so that it still appears red on ivory paper. I do enjoy the choice of ivory paper because it adds an old-timey Christmas feel to the song as opposed to being printed on clean white paper. There are also subtle snowflake designs along the sides of the poster, filling in space and keeping things balanced. I think the snowflakes do a great job of contributing to the theme as well as concluding the overall design. The type seems to be carefully chosen and arranged in order to embody the spirit of the text. Without the snowflake designs, a similar message would get across, but the snowflakes make it more obviously holiday related. Overall, Amy uses a sort of typographic poetry to capture the essence of “Sleigh Ride” and I think she did a wonderful job.

I have been paired with Brian for this broadside critique.

Designed by Brian
DTC 338.02

1. The text is an excerpt from The Eberron Campaign Setting by Keith Baker. It is a guide to the fictional game, Dungeons and Dragons. The text discusses the first level ‘Infusion List’ and lists off the enhancements, skills, magic, and weapons that are available and provides a description of each and the bonus that come with. The mood of this text is more serious, appealing to fighting and violence and the magical qualities the game possesses.

2. The Broadside uses visual hierarchy to draw in the eye. The first thing my eye saw was the text reading ‘Artificer’ in Brian’s custom designed typeface. Although it is placed at 90 degrees to the left, it is set at a large size and utilizes quite a bit of space. Brian’s custom designed typeface provides contrast from the rest of the broadside, as it is the biggest element within it. The next element I was drawn to was the ‘Infusion List’ title, which is also in Brian’s custom designed typeface, placed in a smaller size, but still big enough to stand as a title. Next I see the ‘First Level:’ text which stands as a subtitle and introduces the first level of enhancements weapons, and magical powers. Brian does a good job at using visual hierarchy and this is apparent through his use of the same typeface in different sizes. He uses a large, dark typeface for each subsection, such as ‘Armor Enhancement, Lesser:, or ‘Energy Alteration’. Underneath he uses a light weight version of the same typeface for the description of each. By placing these two versions of the same typeface together, Brian creates great contrast.

I would say this broadside needs more oomph to catch my attention. Although he utilizes visual hierarchy well within the page, it does not grab my attention and looks rather plain. I think using color would benefit his design.

3. As I discussed before, I agree with Brian’s display typeface choice. I think it is good that he found a typeface with different versions and he modified them to work for his chosen text. I would say the descriptions for each subsection are a little light and are hard to read from a distance. Maybe he could play around with this by adding a stroke.

4. I have already discussed the size/scale and marking of sections above. I would say he could work on the leading (line spacing). Personally, I would put more of a space after each section and its description to use white space as an assumed line break. This would help to break up the text and would provide more of an optimal reading setting. I like the tracking (letter spacing) settings he used, especially in the subsection texts. It gives enough space to stand as a title or plane, but does not make it harder to read.

5. I definitely think that Brian could have used color in his design. Maybe he could have used colors that reflected the book and game? I think that would help to tie in the whole concept, as well as attract the eye to the broadside. I looked at a picture of the book and it was filled with lots of color and texture. If he included some of those elements in the background, people who play the game and have read the book would recognize the same theme used and would probably be attracted to it more! To me, it looks more like a handout than a broadside poster, but with a few adjustments, such as color and texture, I think the whole concept could be enhanced.