Well, well look who decided to come back. That would be me, for those of you that forgot I existed. But hey that’s okay, I just took at 10 month break.
Today I want to talk designing. Forget about the web, developing and the tedious chore of coding thousands of lines of CSS. Let’s talk the meat and potatoes of the designing world, print. (Bad holiday dinner pun?)
I would like to talk about something that I have noticed over the past few weeks. That thing, get ready for another bad joke, is lighting. (Told ya) Through the process of good lighting you can really make your work shine. (Man I am full of it today. I’ll try to stop it.)
Lighting can create a lot of depth in a piece of work. It can also create mood and atmosphere. Take for example the new hit game Left 4 Dead and the popular Team Fortress 2. Although not print work but rather interactive products they both have two distinct looks. On one hand we have Left 4 Dead (now L4D) with it’s gritty and dark lighting. Also if you turn on the film grain it gives it a horror movie feel. This creates a tense, scary and uneasy atmosphere. On the other hand we have Team Fortress 2 (now TF2) which has a light-hearted cartoon look for comical purposes. It had been made “realistic” like L4D then it would take on a much more graphic and violent feel. The developer Valve did not want this atmosphere to be created with TF2 so they opted for bright colors and “Pixar looking character models”.Now take this in the graphic design field. If I was to create a low light, grainy and washed out poster for a movie people would automatically (generally speaking) assume it was going to be a suspense/horror flick. Take the flip side and create a poster with the looks of TF2 and people will automatically (generally speaking) associate it with a light-hearted, animated movie. All this can make or break a design. Good lighting and the right looks will determine what the viewers first association of the business or item is.
Got all of that information wrapped around your brain? Then let’s move on.
The second part I want to talk about that is associated with lighting is how it can create either a realistic or flat look.
Good lighting, along with color, saturation and contrast, can give many different levels of realism. Compare the looks of TF2 and L4D and you get my point.
Ok this is going to sound either awful, crazy, dumb, wierd and all kinds of other words associated with the former ones. I am going to have to put a “To Be Continued” on this post. You see I have had the sudden urge to create and my focus is now off of the post and topic. So stay tuned and I will finish up where I left off.
Have a good one. Also if I don’t see you before then, have a Merry Christmas. Hopefully I will finish this up before then because I am getting a new computer for Christmas (high-end) thanks to some wonderful parents. Bye, bai, buy.