Simple but different

It has become increasingly difficult to get a piece of print advertisement noticed, as we are constantly bombarded with information and images in which are all competing against each other for our attention. Therefore the combination of bold colours, multiple images, large pieces of text with exclamation marks and arrows will not work in your favour, but rather work against you as it becomes too complicated and confusing.

 Leonardo da Vinci, “…simplicity is the ultimate sophistication…” By simplifying a piece of text or an image to only show the most meaningful parts and removing the unnecessary obvious information, which can communicate a far greater impact. To create a piece of advertisement into a great simplistic form, involves a lot of clever thinking behind it to make sure it is not dull but unexpected simple, for example by putting a twist to the usual outcome.

 Juan Cabral is an Argentinean art director who shows how deeply researching a subject, can lead to uncovering a different insight rather than the obvious connections, which can be highly predictable and so making the advertisement boring. This idea can either be really simple or simplified, making the advertisement easy to follow but still keeping it meaningful and so memorable. One example of Cabral’s advertisements is for Sony Bravia, where the quality of colour was the unique selling point. He discovered an interesting fact that a television was made up of millions of tiny balls to create the colour image. Cabral therefore used this simple idea of having millions of brightly coloured balls falling down a street and so creating an intense surge of colour.

Sony Bravio Television Advertisment

Logos are another example of where the more simplistic you make it the better, due to the fact it is often the first glimpse into the company and therefore it should give an instant, clear message. Often when trying to put everything that the company has to offer into a logo can cause it to become over complicated. This then may lead people to misinterpret the message and so causing them to go else where and possibly to other competition. After completing a recent project which involved designing a logo for ‘Visit Birmingham’, allowed me to realise the importance of keeping logos as simple as possible. This is due to the fact that they need to be adaptable on any type of medium, from the largest scale such as a billboard to the opposite end of the scale such as business card.

 One artist, whose work I find inspirational for various reasons is Peter Callesen, one of those reasons is the fact that he combines one of the most simplistic mediums; white paper and the simple technique of cutting and folding. However with this minimalistic approach Callesen creates the most complex and meticulously intricate pieces of artwork all from a single piece of paper, even for his large scale installations.

Peter Callesen - White Diary