Photo Advertisement

This design would have started life as a film poster and later been adapted as a magazine advertisement as part of the film’s extended publicity. As with all successful movie promotions you’ve used photographs of the film stars to create your teasing trailer. Powerful use of title and credits gives your design the stamp of authenticity. It’s the attention to fine typographical detail that makes your advert so utterly believable.

The use of a cute calf to promote nourishment by a well-known baby food manufacturer is clever especially by combining the cow and gate to visually illustrate the company’s name. You’ve taken a photo which lends itself perfectly to publicise nutritional, farm fresh food for newborns and your simple slogan milks the ad for all it’s worth.

I’m not usually a fan of selective colour photography but when it’s used creatively like this it works extremely well. Your photo converted to mono with essential bits left in full colour enhances the adverts playful narrative. It takes a good eye to take a good street photo but to notice its potential as publicity material was really insightful. The lettering could have had a black keyline or a drop shadow added to give it more prominence but that doesn’t take away from your very original beer advertisement. Cheers!

Comedy plays a huge part in advertising and your use of black humour to promote an independent funeral directorship (cheekily named after two notorious, murdering, grave robbers) instantly put a smile on my face. Overlooking the company name and the subtlety placed one-way sign, your text conforms to every sinew of decency one would expect to see in the delicate subject of touting for dead business. Its this juxtaposition of comedy and caring (plus a good mix of legible typography) that turns your successful photo into an advertisement to die for.

Your opportune snapshot of a fellow cameraman is a ready-made advertisement publicising a school of photography. All it took was the addition of your humorous copywriting to complete your promotional composition. Emulating advertising agency photographers you’ve left enough space around the subject for the design to be adapted to various magazine ad sizes. Just like your publicity shot you have covered all possible angles.

This is clever. A photo of a couple of Egyptian builders, posing in front of their renovated work, used to promote a tongue-in-cheek tomb clearance service established in 1400 BC. It clearly shows you’ve had a lot of fun designing and copywriting your advertisement. The company name plastered over the hieroglyphic logo is a fair old (or should that be Pharaoh) finishing touch to your well-conceived advert.

This is a perfectly balance photo advertisement in more ways than one. The pose struck by the lady practising the art of Pilates is a good side-on shot showing her core physical stability. Good use has been made of the blank wall in the background to display the clean uncluttered choice of typeface. I particularly like how you’ve taken the trouble to run the text behind the figure’s head and feet. This is a nice, restrained piece of minimalism that would grace the pages of any colour magazine.

This cleverly staged photo simulating a mother feeding her chicks is a deft touch advertising a robust product. I love how the adjustable spanner is clutching the gold nugget in its beak whilst the various sized spanner’s are waiting, open-mouthed, to receive the morsel of food. Using wire wool to build the nest is the masterly stroke that completes your very original entry This is a case where ‘throwing a spanner in the works’ does the opposite by working in your favour.

This is a great aerial publicity photo with just enough wing showing to tell the complete story. I imagine the aeroplane is flying back towards its headquarters in Dublin airport where Ireland’s flag-carrying national airline is based. Your view outside the window of the emerald island’s patchwork landscape perfectly echos the colours of Aer Lingus and the shamrock logo. I hope you fastened your seatbelt in the likely event of landing a top ten place.