By Tajudeen Sowole
(Tuesday, December 02, 2008)
TODAY, the secrets behind creative visual art contents of advertisements would be revealed as art teacher and ex-brand concept personnel, presents a literary work.
Book Cover |
It's a book by graphic artist and teacher at Yaba College of Technology (Yabatech), Lagos, Dr. Iyabo Khadijah Tijani, scheduled for presentation at the Yusuf Grillo Art Auditorium, situated inside the school.
Titled Advertising Principle and Practice, the work, according to Tijani encompasses her experience since 1988 when she joined the advertising profession as a graphic artist up till 1994 as art teacher till current.
During a preview, Tijani said expected personalities at the launch will include Chief Akin Odunsi, chairman, Rosabel Leo Burnet Group as the chairman of the occasion; Chief launcher, former Commissioner for Works, Lagos State, Rauf Aregbesola. The Chief Host of the day, she revealed is Rector, Yaba College of Technology, Mr. Olubunmi Owoso; and host, Dean, School of Art, Design and Printing, Yabatech, Dave Ohiohenuam.
Revealing parts of the content of the book, she briefly touched on illustration, noting that the principles and purposes of illustration is to capture attention, focus and create desire. The concept, she explained, should have a stopping appeal, choosing between photography and artwork will depend on the atmosphere to be created, but a lot will depend on the final artistic rendition. She stressed that an advertisement needs five characteristics: attracting attention, arousing interest, creating conviction, producing a response and impressing the memory.
Tijani argued that most theories used for characterising photographs and cartoons as visuals in advertising are alike.
"This is because they both follow the rules of composition - place the centre of interest away from the centre of the total layout. Following the 'rule of thirds', keep the horizon level, placing it according to the rule of thirds. Do not cut a visual into two equal parts.
"In photography, the camera allows a photographer to select and save rectangular bits and pieces of the all encompassing ever-changing reality in which we exist, the photographer can include, exclude, associate, disassociate, isolate designs, and show significance. A good photograph will have a single, dominant centre of interest, will not allow important tones and textures in the main subject to merge with the background, the frame will be filled and most of the cropping will be done in the camera viewfinder. The big advantage of photography lies in its believability, and the speed with which it can be produced provides another advantage. Photography can be produced faster than an illustration. However, using the photograph of a person as advertising visual requires the permission of the person appearing in the photograph while there is also model releases to contend with. There is also the flexibility of photographs such as cropping them as to any size
or shape and retouching with brush or airbrush or otherwise doctoring to create a desired effect. Finally, when price must be considered, photographs come cheaper than an artwork after everything has been considered. Another advantage photography has over illustration is that in photography, amateurism is harder to detect.
Back cover of the book |
"A cartoon or illustration has no need for model release. The greatest advantage that a cartoon has over photography is that designs follow trend and presently the trend is cartooning. A cartoon does not have to be funny to advertise a product but still there are certain adverts that only photographs can advertise. It is almost impossible to use a cartoon to advertise a well-prepared food item or even perfume or general toiletries, which only photograph will do. There are also certain effects that the cartoon can produced better such as in advertising drugs where some distortion of natural phenomenon is necessary."
Tijani has been lecturing Graphic Art for the past 12 and a half years at Yabatech, Lagos having been a lecturer in the same discipline at Kaduna Polytechnic, Kaduna State. She had her first and second degrees in Graphic Art at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, and PhD in Art Education from the same university.
Graphic designer are also called web designer or graphic artist. They are the ones who are responsible in making colorful advertisement, designs, logos etc, that we see almost everywhere
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