Submitted for no one’s approaval, another design example for the ds106 Minimalize Your Philosophy assignment:
Pick your favorite quote OR make up your own phrase which describes a philosophy that you try to live by. It can be about love, friendship, family, education, culture, health, charity, etc. Design a minimalist poster depicting the concept. Extra challenge: Try to include a unique element that makes it YOU. Don’t forget to explain your thought process. 🙂
Okay, I am not going to claim this one as MY philosophy, but I had this idea, and needed to make a poster, and this was the closest assignment I could find (yeah, I could create a new one, but we have plenty).
Today on our walk around the country roads near their home, friends Barbara and Bill pointed out some innocuous nondescript green plants on the roadside. They had been mowed down, but there were taller stalked nes in the adjacent field. “Have you hear of wild parsnip?” No, I’m kind of a city guy.
Well, as it turns out, wild parsnip creates these bright yellow flower heads
cc licensed ( BY SD ) flickr photo shared by wackybadger
but if you contact these plants at all, they will burn your skin and leave scars. It is labeled as a dangerous plant.
Can you think of a more clever evolutionary strategy to be left alone? Create attractive flowers but then easily poison anything that touches it.
SO I decided to make a poster of this.
In PhotoShop I used the image above, and simplified it by using Image=> Adjust-> POsterize which reduces the color set to a smaller number, and turn a photo into something more abstract like a print. I played with the slider and ended up on something like 11 levels.
In landscape orientation it did not look like a poster (nor did it leave room for words), so I rotated in 90 degrees.
The text “Survival Strategy” is Gil Sans Ultra Bold, because, it is big and thick. I used Layer=>Effects=>Stroke to put a 3 pixel outside edge to the letter, a good effect for making text stand out.
The lower text is Mistral, which I liked because it looks kind of hand drawn and more ominous. The black text was not really looking good on its own, so I used Layer=>Effects=>Outer Glow to put that yellowish haze around the letters.
Poster done!
Again, this IS NOT MY PHILOSOPHY! Just had fun with today’s learning moment.
Learn more about Wild Parsnip… I think it gives our Corn Overlords something to worry about
