{"id":99,"date":"2005-05-29T23:59:54","date_gmt":"2005-05-29T21:59:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/archives\/2005\/05\/29\/the-postcard-design\/"},"modified":"2008-04-25T02:25:16","modified_gmt":"2008-04-25T00:25:16","slug":"the-postcard-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/archives\/2005\/05\/29\/the-postcard-design\/","title":{"rendered":"The Postcard Design"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"detail I made two postcards just for fun. Sometimes, when I have spare time, I create stuff<\/a>, because I simply enjoy it, even though I\u2019m much more comfortable with the paper and pencil.<\/p>\n

Anyway, inspired by the examples of famous Mr. Moll<\/a> and encouraged by a few people who already saw those postcards, I\u2019ll explain how I created them. You don\u2019t have to read the whole article just to see the final products \u2013 here are red<\/a> and blue<\/a> variants. Still interested? <\/p>\n

Goals<\/h3>\n

My goal was to create a positive message reusing the well known phrase \u201cFree Your Mind\u201d. I was thinking about something energizing and powerful, yet subtle and airy. I associated it with an outdoor sport activities, such as diving into the water or the high jump. What intrigues me in these activities is the moment at the peak of the jump when the athlete\u2019s body goes up and eventually slows down to stop for a millisecond or two, just before it starts falling down again. That moment is usually crucial for the overall performance and as such, I used it as my primary metaphor.<\/p>\n

Jumpin\u2019 athlete<\/h3>\n

\"detail By nature, human body releases huge amounts of mood elevating hormone called endorphin (also known as the hormone of happiness) into the bloodstream during the exercise or any other intense physical activity. Similar effect of lower intensity is also experienced when we watch various athletes perform their routines to perfection. When watching sports, people can see the energy and power in the most material way \u2013 the athlete\u2019s performance. I wanted to communicate the power and energy of the human body in a perfect moment.<\/p>\n

The sunburst<\/h3>\n

Imagine an athlete who jumped high above the ground. She had to be somewhere in the air. Up there in the sky, there\u2019s always the sun. By the instinct when we look up, we expect to see the sunlight. From our perspective, if we see something in the sky nearly in the same height or higher than the sun, we know<\/em> it\u2019s up there in the air. Subconsciously, we determine that the jumping guy or girl covering the sun must have been jumping pretty high. And that was my secondary metaphor.<\/p>\n

Additionally, the sunburst effect draws more focus to the athletes.<\/p>\n

Making a sunburst effect<\/h3>\n

To make a sunburst, download easy to use Fireworks sunburst script<\/a> or follow the sunburst tutorial in Illustrator<\/a> (via Moll\u2019s<\/a> Stupmed<\/a> article) or Jason Beaird\u2019s<\/a> Taper-In Star<\/a> article.<\/p>\n

Basically, there are two vector objects \u2013 one is punch-out of the circle and a star which is filled with solid color. Behind it, there is a second object, another circle with the radial gradient. The edge color of the gradient is equal to that of the top object. Central color of the bottom object is of the same hue and saturation, but with a slightly increased luminosity (increment it by 10-20 units, until you\u2019re satisfied). At the end, lower the opacity of the top object to around 30% and you\u2019re done.<\/p>\n

About the models<\/h3>\n

The models of the athletes are so simple, because it doesn\u2019t really matter who they are or what they look like. Remember, what\u2019s important here is to catch the exact moment of athlete\u2019s routine.<\/p>\n

Speaking of which, I haven\u2019t draw those models myself, they are actually from 4 Yeo Sport<\/a> dingbat collection. Text-size was set to around 200pts with smooth anti-aliasing.<\/p>\n

Typography<\/h3>\n

Since I knew from the start the exact caption, I needed a simple and open sans-serif type. The simpler, the better. At that point I also decided to set the caption in all caps. When I was looking for appropriate typeface, I was particularly interested in the \u2018E\u2019, \u2018R\u2019, \u2018M\u2019 and \u2018D\u2019, because it seemed to me that those were crucial in that particular phrase (\u201cFree Your Mind\u201d).<\/p>\n

Why those? Simply because double \u2018E\u2019 in \u201cfree\u201d we recognize as \u2018free\u2019 even without actually reading the whole word. Further more, the \u2018M\u2019 and \u2018N\u2019 are very similar, so if I\u2019m satisfied with \u2018M\u2019, chances are that I\u2019ll like \u2018N\u2019 too. \u2018R\u2019 and \u2018D\u2019 were important for the same scanability<\/em> reasons.<\/p>\n

I wanted the height of the \u2018E\u2019 to be approximately equal to its\u2019 width. \u2018M\u2019 had to have barrel straight and not slanted stems (stem is vertical stroke of the letter; good example of the slanted stem is \u2018M\u2019 in Trebuchet). I was also looking for \u2018R\u2019 and \u2018D\u2019 with bowl (belly-like stroke) vertically symmetrical and broad counter (counter is the enclosed area of a type character surrounded by the strokes). See more about character anatomy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t mind using free type, especially if I need just a few particular characters, so I went to DaFONT<\/a> where I found Media Gothic<\/a>, which suited just fine. (The main trouble with a free home made typefaces is usually poor kerning, so be warned.)<\/p>\n

The text itself was justified to make some more room (air) between the letters.<\/p>\n

Drop shadows<\/h3>\n

Subtle drop shadows were added later to gain more focus on the central object and push \u2018the sun\u2019 behind. Shadows also provide that nice separation of the object\u2019s fill and its\u2019 surrounding, which could not be achieved with the strokes only.<\/p>\n

Colors<\/h3>\n

It\u2019s a modern convention that the pink is for girls and the blue is for boys. I went with the red in the girl version and the light blue in the guy version. I needed to keep that male\/female contrast, but I also wanted to balance each of the two sexes.<\/p>\n

The girl had to be stronger and more powerful than girls usually are and the guy had to be easier, more refreshing and more calming than the average male. With the chosen colors, each of them became more balanced.<\/p>\n

The summary<\/h3>\n

The final metaphor set:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • the moment which suggests perfection<\/li>\n
  • an athlete and a jump suggesting power and energy<\/li>\n
  • the sunlight which suggests positivity and something \u2018high above\u2019<\/li>\n
  • free and balanced individuals<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    brings us to something like:<\/p>\n

    \n

    \u2013 \u201cFree and balanced individuals are capable of great achievements.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

    I\u2019d like to know \u2013 did you get that<\/em> message when you first saw those postcards or did I missed? Tell me what you think. Was the overall entry helpful, interesting, dull? Any tips of yours?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I made two postcards just for fun. Sometimes, when I have spare time, I create stuff, because I simply enjoy it, even though I\u2019m much more comfortable with the paper and pencil. Anyway, inspired by the examples of famous Mr. Moll and encouraged by a few people who already saw those postcards, I\u2019ll explain how […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.maratz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}