Magic Of Macy's!

I saw this ad on television and thought it was SO creative---especially with the whole design of the commercial! This commercial really draws you in and paints the way to the "Magic Of Macy's"!! I love how there are so many 'A-Listers' featured and how they are involved with the 'behind the scenes'---It tries to portray what a sales man goes through to get what you need---in this case, a shoes salesman. Everything seems to come together really well!!! I even love how the Macy's logo seems to pop up every now and then!! You can see the great design taking place and forming throughout the whole 1 minute commercial. There seems to be so much information, but is placed great within the film. Take a look and enjoy!

The Stinky Cheese Man

The Stinky Cheese Man (and other fairly stupid tales), is one of my daughters favorite books!! She received this as a Christmas gift last year and I have read it about a dozen times to her!! Not only are the pictures in the book pretty amazing to look at, the stories are taken from really old tales that I grew up with listening to. The only difference with the stories in this book are the many different twists added to each one!

This is the title page. You can already tell the lackadaisical style of the text and how it's placed on the page. There is no rhyme or reason, just to make the book more interesting and fun to view!





The text throughout the book is great!---Ranging from Serif to Sans-serif--and many, many different styles and sizes!!

This is an example of one of the stories in the book. The story is called "Jack's Story". It's a spin off of Jack and the beanstalk. You can see how the text starts off large and then as the story goes on, it gets smaller and disappears completely off the page...What an interesting and fun way to have a book tell a story!!!

Here is an example of the incredible graphics and colorful pictures in the book!!! I love how they look antique and how they are drawn! You can even tell the style of characters in "Jack's Story"--what fun!

LoTuS!

I loved this when I saw it! The design is pretty incredible. This is an ad for Lotus Energy Drink...The can pretty much sells itself really! I love the use of graphics in this ad, from the dragon on her face-showing shadow, to the Lotus symbols in her eyes! It's pretty great! My eyes go to the girl first and then move to the actual can of the product. The red lettering is good against the white, but fades away into the black, which makes it really hard to read. You can tell that the text wasn't important in this ad, because if it was it would stand out more! I think the designer was more focused on the product standing out.

Here are a couple more pictures of the graphic design used in this ad. Here is an example of the Lotus flower design in the girls eye. To me it seems that if you take a sip of this drink, the energy starts taking over...keeping you awake! And of course there is the can that is depicted in the right hand corner. Even though the design is pretty simple, the simplicity sells! I would definitely try it!!

Time Line of Art

"Yellow Cow" Franz Marc 1911

When I saw this piece I just had to take a picture. This is an oil painting from Franz Marc depicting Early Modern Expressionism. I chose this painting because I thought that the colors and movement of the cow brought forth such an emotion! It almost looks as if the cow is dancing...or jumping with so much passion! The cow is enjoying life!

"Dancer" Alphonse Mucha

After browsing through the ART section in Barnes and Nobles I stumbled across a book with Alphonse Mucha's work. I was fascinated by how many of his works depicted such strong women. He made them up to look so beautiful and lush. His "Mucha Style" became known as Art Nouveau. He wanted to steer clear of it, however, focusing more on a  spiritual message. I absolutely love his style of work. I love how he also incorporates flowers and even flower halo's on the women.

"Roses of Heliogabalus" Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema

I think that the Victorian movement was my favorite movement during the 19th century. I chose to take a picture of the painting "Roses of Heliogabalus" by Alma-Tadema  because of how beautiful it was. It is quite breathtaking! I did a little research on this painting and Alma-Tadema actually had petals sent to him weekly during four months in the winter of 1887-'88. He wanted to get each petal accurate. How amazing is that! Just to think how an artist would go to such extremes to create a masterpiece!

"Acanthus Wallpaper Design" William Morris

We have studied about William Morris and his contribution to the Arts and Crafts movement. I chose a piece of his work because it's very intriguing and organic looking! He created this wall paper in 1875. He believed this wallpaper reproduced charm of the forest inside the home. His way of thinking was to portray "purity and elegance" in his wall decorations. I'm not sure if he used this in "Red House", but boy would it have been a sight to see! It's really interesting to see how arts and crafts were used during this movement-from woven rugs to tapestries-they were all made with precision and care.

"Paris Art Deco Exhibition" 1925

This was a picture of a Paris Art Deco Exhibition that I took out of yet another art book in Barnes and Nobles. I chose this piece because it clearly represents this design internationally. Art Deco was prominent in both America and Europe and even the ocean liners that traveled to them both!
You can see the examples in their structure in how sleek and angular they both looked. This exposition was created to show the public a "fairyland" for six months. The different architects were given the reigns of freedom with their designs! It must have looked spectacular!

                                                                                          
                            

All Naturale??

Front box

Side box

I was par-oozing around the house looking for ideas on what to blog about. I ran into a box of my mom's hair color. I started to read the box and was quite taken by the title of Clairol's product. "Natural Instincts "...this box has natural talents or skills? The girl on the front of the advertisement looks so happy with her hair color...it really makes you want to buy the box and maybe my mom chose this box from all the other brands because of her smile =)! What ever it was that sold her, it did a good job of doing it!!

I think the layout is pretty decent though. The name is at the upper top and then after following the lovely, flowing hair towards the bottom of the box, the natural gifts of what this box of color can do for your hair is explained...

On the side of the box, it seems really busy and almost confusing in a way.
It gives the user two steps of identifying your current color. I was always confused at how you can determine what your current color is, when the box only gives you two options to go by...why is this? I also love the shade guide because in all actuality, once you dye your hair the boxes color, I don't think

Back box

there is ever a box where your after color shade will even compare...I don't
think it's ever the same really! The layout, even though it's busy & hardly ever
accurate, is still pretty interesting to look at.

The back of the box compares with the side of the box. It just goes on in MANY words to sell the product even more...as if the busy front and side didn't do the trick. It expresses it's many vitamins and how gentle the formula is...why not try it out? I think it's advertising is right on target...but wonder if it could sell even better with the less is more factor!