Graphic design - thru a lens.
How many words does a picture paint? Well, a thousand words… From a typesetting point of view we’d say preferably the less words the better on the finished print or web design - we let the photography do the talking.
Many designers make the mistake of using too much copy which detracts from a powerful photograph, having the confidence to tell the client to be less verbose isn’t a bad thing. Very often we’re more than happy to rewrite, we’ve had clients that see white space on a page and think it’s an open season to fill it with copy.
Sometimes, just sometimes, we get to work with some very good photography, with other jobs we have to weedle out the potential from some less than inspired supplied images with creative column grids and nice choices of font to make an aesthetically pleasing whole. We can change the temperature of an image to simulate sunlight, or sharpen an image but it’s never “quite” as good as it could be if the composition or the focus is poor.
One of our friends was a professional photographer for many years, he was a magician in a mystical world of red-light in the darkroom he’d certainly embraced the alchemy of photographic film, experiments with exposure times, different types of film dodging and burning areas of a print, and different film types. The relentless progression towards digital photography overtook the more artisanal nature of traditional picture taking. But he had one thing that you can’t replace - an eye for composition.
Many clients ‘feel’ that an expensive camera is automatic admission to the world of pro photography but that simply isn’t the case. Okay you can buy a camera and have some change left over versus a pro’s daily rate, but how gifted are you at catching a natural unforced expression on a child’s face, their happiness radiating despite the conditions of poverty in which they live? Could you light and photograph a range of Stainless Steel industrial products, destined for large exhibition panels in the Middle East? If in doubt we’ll bow to our professional photographers, despite having inhouse talent.
Digital photography permits live previews and multiple shots, allowing you to try any number of compositions. Resolution however is key in digital photography. How large will your image be used in the final piece? We always ask clients to shoot RAW or with compression switched off, at the biggest size their camera will facilitate. There’s not much point spending a day taking pictures on a compact camera with the resolution set too small and compression switched on - it’s just a waste of time. Once an image is photographed with compression artefacts in the file - we can’t take those out. If a picture looks like it was done with a King Edward Potato, no amount of design prowess can help that!
In our work where we have powerful imagery to use it does a lot of the “heavy lifting” in a piece subliminally the viewer has gleaned a lot before even reading the copy. Some of our best images have come from those people on the ground with the charities we work for all around the world.
A case in point is a recent Ramadan campaign that uses images of the people the charity serves with the colours their culture affords them to great effect. The copy is stripped back, this was something of a sea-change for the client, but we feel it’s probably going to be one of their best campaigns.
So - what’s the final cut? The attention span of the recipient of direct mail or even a brochure is precious, they have other things to do with the day. So yes, if we keep imagery simple and considered and used prominently, it often says so much more. It makes clients be more design aware and part of the creative process which for all concerned is a better return on investment and builds a stronger brand.