Week 8 - Tone and Color

Tone is used in this example to help focus the eye into the middle of the design where the information of the record appears and also give the effect of a spherical 3-d object. A large dynamic tonal range also not only offers the viewer a wide array of colors, but also helps fade in and out of different colors to create a smooth gradient of very different colors.  The tonal change from red to black at the outside of the circle fades the circle out into black and provides the illusion of the top of a 3-d sphere. This smooth transition is much more interesting than a simple sharp edge, offering more color information and different dimensional possibilities.

Tone is interacting with the center circle of the record and title by surrounding it and emphasizing it. The eye is guided toward the middle of the record because of tonal changes from complete black on the outside corners to complete white on the inside. Along with tonal changes, changes in color are also happening going form the outside in. Darker colors are used on the outside corners and the colors lighten as we move into the center circle. 

Graphic Design

1. Direction

The artist name and album title are rectangular blocks that give us both the horizontal and the vertical directions. I like the different directional elements that these two titles offer and they balance each other out very well as two objects perpendicular with each other. If both titles were either both vertical or both horizontal these design wouldn't be as successful because the two titles would no longer balance each other out and fill the correct spaces as they do now.

2. Texture


If you look closely, the white background of the image is not a plain white background, but a dusty off white color with the circular wear and tear marks of an old record sleeve from 1971. The designer included these wear and tear marks in the design to simulate that of a vintage record because the music enclosed in the cover was made with many vintage musical instruments and also contains many 1970's soul samples. Apart from its associations with the music, I think that this texture serves as a much more interesting backdrop to the text and image than would a plain color background and also gives the entire piece a bit more dimension to a design that would otherwise be overly flat. 

3. Dot

 The dot is used in this album cover to represent a profile photo of the artist in half-tone. Different sizes of dots and their relative locations are used to represent gradients and shading. I really like this style and the way the image is broken up into individual parts and we are still able to recognize this collection of dots as a cohesive piece. This half tone pattern is much more interesting and eye catching than a normal photograph because we are able to see this image not only as a whole but also able to see its individual parts.

Week 6- Design Success and Failure in Relation to Syntactical Guidelines

They syntactical guidelines have been put to good use in these music flyer for a local soul music party. The important pieces of information are stressed here including the name of the party, name of DJ, and name of club. It is also well balanced with a symmetrical layout of text and imagery. Grouping is also very well executed here using different color, fonts, and sizes differentiate and group like information. My overall perception of the flyer is also very hip and futuristic which I think I appeals to the appropriate crowd and accurately conveys the music played here. 

 

This flyer fails to follow many syntactical guidelines and is bad design. There is no use of stress or sharpening and it is hard differentiate the different information. The important information needs to contrast more with the other information. The flyer has balance but but it is too balanced and lacks attraction, mainly because there is no difference in font size, style and has no real title. Although the information is color coded it still feels scattered and like information should be close to each other.