Assignment 2:Reflections on feedback

The feedback from my tutor was mostly good. I did at least remember that I had learning objectives this time! The main criticism really was that my finished pieces were not much like posters. As the assignment was to create three posters, this seems to be quite a fundamental flaw! My tutor said that my first poster would make a good editorial illustration, and we agreed that my second poster was more like a book spread. The final poster was quite poster-ish, but could also be simplified. She asked me to imagine each poster juxtaposed with other posters on other themes, and how well they would communicate. The main point really is to simplify. 

I think my tutor is too nice to me. She seemed reluctant to offer criticism and my feedback form was really positive. I needed to prod her a bit to get to the nub of the poster issue. It’s good to get balanced feedback and I appreciate the encouragement, but I do also want to learn and improve. 

I’ve never really dealt much with posters. The feedback has prompted me to think more about what they are and the job they do. They need to catch the attention of passers by and be quick to scan, interesting enough to merit a second look, and memorable enough to stick in people’s minds. Posters are like visual headlines, grabbing the attention and making the viewer want to know more. I think this is hard to achieve, especially given all the prior research we do in the context of a course unit. Knowing too much is a disadvantage as it can lead, me at least, in the direction of complexity. All of that must be set aside for the one attention-grabbing word or phrase or picture. It is said that a picture can tell a thousand words, but can a poster? How do we distill all that we’ve learnt about something into one simple image?