OUGD505 - Studio Brief 02 - Final Composition + Screen Printing

Stock

Chose two stocks to take forward into screen printing so that I can make a definitive decision for the final composition.

• 125gsm cartridge paper
• White card 

I chose to experiment with the white card because it is a heavy stock which means it will remain rigid once some of the tabs are removed from the poster. The white stock aims to create high contrast with the black type, creating more impact. 

Layer 1:

After my initial experiments with just using the lexis 'missing', I looked at other definitions and adjectives to describe someone who is not present in order to further engage and show the emotions and actions of someone going missing.

Decided on:

• absent
• departed
• lost
• astray

The feedback for this poster was positive because it made you want to read it and find out more. The variety of word lengths also adds to the aesthetics.

For the copy, I settled for Helvetica Regular instead of bold because I am confident it will expose well for screen print. This also creates more contrast against the bold adjectives. Feedback from a peer

Bitmapping

In preparation for screen print, I bit mapped the faded type so that I could capture the different gradients. Exposing an image with a lot of tonal variations doesn't work due to the fact that the exposure unit isn't powerful enough to burn soft tones into the screen so when the emulsion is washed off, the tonal areas wash off also. By bitmapping the composition essentially replaces the block colour with tiny dots, the lighter the shade, the further apart the dots are.

The tabs will be printed on the back of every poster:

Prepared my screen and took advantage of the large screens so that I could fit all of my posters onto one large screen. Due to the number of posters I had to sacrifice the red colour stencil and replace it with bold.

Registering the pages to create consistency which will be crucial when printing the back of the posters as each layer will need to line up.

Back:

• Pleased with quality and clarity of the print, especially the small type as I was conscious that the narrow stroke width would be lost through exposure. 

• The bitmapping was a success as the tonal variations are clear

• Screen printing the reverse of the posters was challenging due to the fact it was placed in the corner of the screen. This meant ink bled through the right side of the screen. Unfortunately this is evident on every poster which doesn't demonstrate a professional awareness.

The fact that the posters are slightly marked by ink and printing mistakes limits the professionalism of the outcomes. However, through feedback I managed to gain some really positive views as they thought it was app

The fact that the poster is disposable appropriates the rustic look.