Jennifer Coffey

The title “Bookaholics” is inspired by the movie, Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009) directed by P. J. Hogan. As an avid reader, I can relate by purchasing way too many books. To acquire design inspiration for this project, I analyzed recent movie posters to study their structure and patterns. 

Structure

To follow a traditional movie poster, I set up my poster with the names of the actors, characters, main title, slogan, release date, credits, and rating. 

I made the characters the largest object to attract the viewer’s eye there first. To create more depth, I placed the main character in the center and superimposed her above the layers of the other two characters. 

The next colorful element on the poster is the title, where the viewer’s eye should go next. The title is made up of individual book covers to make the title memorable and recognizable. I placed each individual letter in order, then set the image on top, and placed a clipping mask. I also added a 3 pt black stroke to the letter to make sure the full title “Bookaholics” is still visible despite the faint text of the books inside the letters. 

The background consists of two images. One is a close up of a page of a book, and the lower photo is a picture of a book on a brick ledge. The purpose of the background images is to create depth to the poster.  

I erased the edges where the photos met and decreased the opacity, so the two images were blended almost seamlessly. Many movie posters featured multiple images, and I also wanted to do that as well to offer the most important part of the movie on the poster, the characters and the books they love.

I used the close up of the book page for the background of the characters to add more depth but not distract from the characters themselves. I think the blurred out text adds a light texture to the poster. The bottom photograph helps to transition to the credit, release date, and rating, which don’t contribute to the main storyline. 

Color

My goal was to keep the colors light and bright. Books usually have white or tan pages, so I added a faint gradient with those colors to the background. I also chose to have the characters and title in color to emphasize their importance. 

Typography

I used a total of three different fonts on my poster, just like most professional posters. I wanted the title “Bookaholics” to be bold and thick so I could place the images inside them. To contrast the bold text, I chose Athletica from the rest of the textual elements. Athletica looks like a font that would be used in a book, and I think the serifs and weight complimented the strong text of the title. Lastly, the text for the credits was tall and thin, like most textual credits. I did not want the credits to distract from the main elements of the poster.