Design Ideas: Death.

Initial experiments with design ideas based upon the "opposites" theme of death, using Adobe Illustrator software to create vector-based poster designs.

 

One of my initial ideas, representing death in a reincarted-esque way, the butterfly symbolic of a new beauty and freedom. I like the concept, however, I'm not sure how appropraitely this would visually communicate and convey death to a mass audience- perhaps a little too expressionate and spirtuality-based?

  

Again, more simple designs- representing the fade into death with decreased opacities and gradients. I liked the image on the right (which was developed from the image on the left)- perhaps I could reflect the word 'life' as opposed to duplicating 'death'?- reflective of how, despite opposite, the two are very naturally found together- almost unable to "be" without the other.

Here, I began to look at motion in type- conveying the sharp slum into death, when it drops with a "sudden thud." Quite a simple, yet I think effective idea. Again- it's really about being able to effectively communicate this message, as I'm not sure that this would automatically be the association with the design. Perhaps try to manipulate the angle or choose a more suited, gothic text to aesthetically represent death and the "fall into death"...

...Again, a very similar idea- this time manipulating the text a little more- creating the concept that "death is like a dripping tap"- the effects ripple out, just as a droplet would upon calm waters.

I preferred the concept but really dislike the design- I think it looks particularly cheap and almost child-like in design. Using this typeface as a standard for this experimentation phase, it's clear from both this, and several other designs, that it wouldn't be suitable in this design context.

Death- Falling off your perch. Another similar idea, this time an angular fall with a gradient decrease down the page. Again, I prefer this design- not too fussy, but the slight angle of the type makes it a little more interesting.

Another initial idea... I really liked the concept, emulating the shape and lines of a heart rate monitor, with the straight line finalising the image, symbolising death, but despite this just being a very quick sample, I wasn't very happy with the results. I think that the image was too sparse to be representative of my context, and would work far better if seperate words, and not sentances were angled.

Enjoying the development and experimentation with quoatations and famous sayings, I decided to narrow down my information to a more simplistic form- on this occasion, using the famous 'nevermore' from Edgar Alan Poe's 'The Raven'- using raven vectors around the type, as if lurking around, waiting for the death or 'nevermore'. 

Despite being a fan of the striking contrast of black and white, I felt like the image looked a little plain...

 

...A slight alteration, this time adding a textured antique paper-esque layer. I think that for this style, I should have made the black detaling brown as the mixture of tones is quite muddy-looking, quite unattractive with seemingly little style or direction.

..Another variation of the 'nevermore' images- I have really enjoyed experimenting with textures and layers- definately something I will consider when creating my final poster designs- it's inspiring how such little effort and editing can completely transform a design.