Tag: typography

Finalizing Serenity Park’s Marketing Campaign with Adobe Creative Suite

Posted on by Sarahs Magic

I really enjoy the feedback process of design, and I got some nice and thoughtful feedback from my peers on my Serenity Park campaign! I truly do love to photograph and talk about nature, so this project was very satisfying to create. I hoped the brand and tranquility theme would resonate well and across the pieces of collateral and, based on the feedback, it seems to have done so.

The first step of creating the marketing campaign was to define the concept and purpose of Serenity Park. I wanted to create a brand that conveyed a peaceful, natural escape for people to enjoy with various activities and landscapes. I created the name, logo, and tagline to encourage this concept. The logo needed to visually represent peace and nature, so using Adobe Illustrator, I designed the logo to include a tree and moon, both symbols of calm and natural beauty. I used the line and curvature tools to create a simple yet effective depiction of a pine tree. I made the moon with the ellipse tool and brought the two together. I made a black and white version of the logo with transparent backgrounds to accommodate the spacing and contrast needs of the pieces.

To bring the concept to life visually, I needed photography that evoked awe, inspiration, curiosity, and ultimately, desire for the park. I shot in Olympic National Park, Tolmie State Park, and Millersylvania State Park. Once I had my photographs I selected the best ones for variety, consistency, and clarity. Choosing the main image was the hardest part of selecting an image because it carries the entire campaign forward with the other images supporting.

For the typography, I wanted it to match the park’s theme of serenity while remaining clear and impactful. I established a hierarchy of text using the Futura font family, applying different styles (condensed medium for the logo, medium italic for the tagline, and bold for headings) to create visual distinction.

In designed the poster, brochure, print ad, and social media posts, I paid careful attention to scaling images and maintaining a clean layout that would guide the audience’s eyes toward the focal points—logo, tagline, and visuals—while balancing aesthetic and functional aspects. For the print ad, readability was prioritized, especially for older audiences who gravitate towards print more than younger folks. I used a clean layout with limited text to ensure the focus was on the descriptive blurb, call to action, and hashtag. For the Facebook and Instagram ads, I focused on the visual impact of the main photograph to capture attention, with minimal copy to drive engagement and clicking through to learn more. I designed the billboard to emphasize the call to action, using the bold style of the Futura font to ensure legibility for passing drivers. I designed each piece with its audience and context in mind, using large, readable fonts for print or using a striking visual focus for the social media pieces.

The first piece of feedback I received was for the poster: to add more descriptive text and try something other than the black background, perhaps making the background image opaque to feature the text box. To address this, I added the location address to the bottom of the poster. While there, I center aligned the descriptive blurb and found this looked better to my eye. Another piece of feedback I received was to diversify the photography a bit more. I liked this idea, so I also swapped out a picture of the trees on the poster with the photograph of the paddle board to mix up the different areas of the park being featured. I do think it makes the collateral a bit more dynamic to include varied photography. However, I did try a few different background styles, including making the background photograph gradually opaque to feature the text box, but ultimately, I think the black works best for clarity and contrast, which is important for a quickly read poster.

I was also advised to diversify the text weights and sizes a bit more. Visual hierarchy and variety of typography is so important for a marketing campaign to be effective. The only piece that I think that could benefit from this would be the on the print ad. So, I played around with the descriptive blurb and call to action text to try to get more differentiation and visual hierarchy. I landed on changing the blurb and call to action from Futura, Medium Italic to Futura Medium and then changed the descriptive blurb to Futura Bold. I think this achieved the effect.

Throughout the design process, from draft to final, I tried my best to emphasize consistency in messaging, a strong visual connection to nature, as well as visual impact, flow, and appropriate hierarchy throughout the pieces. I hope that, like the park, the marketing campaign gives one a sense of the simplicity of nature and the desire to take action towards that peace. It was really cool to be able to model my park from the gorgeous parks I visited to shoot the photography. I feel very fortunate to live in this visually stunning and peaceful region of the world that inspired Serenity Park.

BUNCH_S_FINAL_Layout_Continuity_Download
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Exploring InDesign Techniques to Elevate Our Print and Digital Designs

Posted on by Sarahs Magic

This week, we got to revise the print and digital pieces from our last posts based on peer feedback and further thoughts. First, let’s recap how I designed the pieces initially. I began the poster design by adding guidelines along the vertical and horizontal axes to apply the rule of thirds. I selected the images I thought had the most impact to feature at the top and bottom of the poster. I selected three other images that gave more insight and detail of the interior of the space to feature in the middle of the poster. I arranged the images this way to create balance and guide the viewer’s eye through the information. For both the poster and social media ads, I used Helvetica Neue, adjusting its weight and size to establish a clear hierarchy from the most important details to the least. I also ensured the font’s horizontal scale fit my desired spacing, creating a clean, bold look for the headings and easy-to-read styles for body text. I experimented extensively with font horizontal scale, font leading point, paragraph spacing before and after, as well as the alignment of the text boxes with the images until the layout felt visually appealing and impactful, while maintaining a focus on alignment, hierarchy, and limiting negative space.

For the social media ads and print invite, I limited the design to one main image to ensure the important information stood out in the smaller spaces without complicating the main visuals of the design. For the Facebook ad, I included the event details, as I’ve found that Facebook’s older demographic prefers more information, opposed to Instagram users who tend to click through or follow links for additional details.

I got some very nice and helpful feedback on my designs! Some feedback said my designs demonstrated a strong use of visual hierarchy and consistency, making it easy for viewers to navigate. It seems my font choices were effective, allowing variation between elements like bold and italics, particularly on the text-heavy poster. The bold white text on my Instagram post made the design pop and it was suggested to apply a similar technique to the poster, however, I have not done that as I would need to drastically re-scale and rearrange the posters elements to accommodate this feedback.

There were other areas for improvement noted in my feedback: creating more white space between the main photo and text, addressing the cramped feel, and adjusting the scale of the text to avoid overpowering the image on Facebook ad. There was also a suggestion to experiment with more varied imagery and design elements between the social media posts. I tried a few versions of the Facebook post with other images and decided to swap out the main image I first used for the other main image from the poster. Both images holistically show the arts center from an external view, so I find them more appropriate for overarching visuals than the images featured internal glimpses of the arts center. I didn’t want to add any more elements to the Facebook or Instagram ads to keep the attention of the scrolling audiences.

In adjusting my designs using the feedback, I started with the poster. I created more white space between the main photo and the title. While doing this, I realized the event details, which repeats the opening title of the poster, was situated too closely to the event title, so I swapped the immediate elements from above and below the central three images, which put the event details and quote further down the page. This prompted extensive scaling and font style tweaking within the event details and quote to create even more visual symmetry and alignment. Another feedback point I incorporated was to reduce the text size of the Facebook ad, so the picture doesn’t get overwhelmed. As I was doing this, I also noticed how the print invitation could use a little more space between the picture and text for visual ease and so I moved those text boxes to add in the space. I figured out how to hide the frame edges in InDesign to be able to visualize how the elements in the pieces interacted more clearly. This was a game changer for bringing the pieces to their final result!

Overall, I think the poster, print invitation, and Facebook ad look much more balanced now and easier to read. I found the InDesign options of showing and hiding the frame edges and guides to be really helpful in making sure the overall designs were spaced and balanced well. Please see the final pieces below. I’m excited to use what I’ve learned moving forward as I improve my InDesign skills!

Bunch_S_Final_Graphic_Design_ProjectDownload
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