Strength.org Advertisement
This bit of local advertising for a relief organization (ShareOurStrength) caught my eye while eating out after church one afternoon. In particular I was struck by the typography, which generally seems to be quite nice. But what really caught my eye is that at first glance it almost reads “Buy Help”. Ironically that drew me in and caused me to read the rest of the ad because I wondered whether it was a mistake or intentional. Even after now reading the ad thoroughly and going to the site (a sign of a successful poster in this case, no?), I am still not honestly sure. Seems to work well nonetheless.
Another bit that struck me was the logo in the bottom left corner. While this is not the first time I have seen the concept, I believe this one is probably the best executed. Often designers creating this effect use the same face on both sides to give the icon a lot of nice symmetry. In the case of an eaten apple core, however, I think that the designer's lack of symmetry helps it a great deal. What it is remains very clear, and it still feels very stable (harder to achieve without symmetry). Also, just think about it: How often to we eat apples while leaving perfect proportions on all sides?
The typography of the logo is also worth noting. Ordinarily I'm very against this much variety amongst so little text, or even amongst the text throughout an entire poster. In this case, however, it seems to work very well. The use of color corresponds well to the rest of their ad campaigns (or perhaps that's the other way around?), and despite the changing weights it still feels like a very cohesive whole.
This brings me to the last bit I'd like to analyze, which is the color of the ad as a whole. Orange is not a common color in advertising. When it is used, it is either a) trying to be very in your face, such as with a toy advertisement or b) very very subtle, such as with, say, a pumpkin scented candle label. The color pictured here strikes me as neither. To me it resides in a very happy medium between an energetic, fast food feel (appropriate considering it was in a restaurant and concerns food) and an amount of subtlety and trustworthiness required for an aid organization. Orange is a hard color to pull off, and I believe this designer did it well.
Note: My apologies for the blurred imagery. It was taken with a friend's iPhone and it seems clarity was not his foremost concern. I tried for a better image the following week but the campaign had been removed by then.
I have to agree with caleb. However, it does seem that the use of orange was used to an attention grabber. To me it is not subtle but rather catches the eye and and then draws the viewer in with the smaller lettering and graphics. The poster is nicely done. The use of positive and negative space really creates a neat image. What I like about it is that at first all you see is the apple core and then the faces come into focus. This seems very appropriate because they are using food to get your attention, which is often a huge concern to the average american, and then bring the real issue into focus-the hungry children. Even though I never saw the campaign myself, I felt a strong reaction to the posters caleb posted. Overall, this seems like a successful idea to me.
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