1. Advertising Principles
and Practices
Design and Production

2. Questions We’ll Answer
What is the role of visual communication in advertising?
How can we define layout and composition, and what’s the difference between the two?
How are art and color reproduced in print advertising?
Which steps in planning and producing broadcast commercials are most critical?
What are the basic techniques of Web design?

3. Curiously Strong Advertising
Altoids depicted extreme flavor with amusing, self-deprecating ads featuring wacky images and short headlines.
Sales grew by 60% in the 12 markets where the campaign was focused.
Ad Age calls the Curiously Strong campaign “one of the most awarded and successful campaigns in the last 12 years.” \
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4. Using Visuals Effectively
Grab attention
Stick in memory
Cement belief
Tell interesting stories
Communicate quickly
Anchor associations

5. Using Visuals Effectively
An intriguing idea grabs attention and sticks in memory.
A picture in a print ad captures more than twice as many readers as a headline does.
People remember ads with pictures more than those with just type.
Principle:
The visual’s primary function in an advertisement
is to get attention.

6. Other Purposes of Visuals
Visual storytelling—the visual sets up the narrative and tell the story.
Brand image—the brand must be consistently represented.
A logo graphically identifies a brand or company.

7. The Art Director
In charge of the visual look of the ad how it communicates mood, product qualities, and psychological appeals.
They decide which type of visual to use—art, photography, film, animation, etc. for ads.
May also work on branding/corporate logo including office interiors, merchandising materials, delivery vehicles.

8. Designers Toolkit: Photos
Photography’s authenticity makes it powerful, more realistic.
“John West” is a British canned fish
Ernest Hemingway Collection is a line of Thomasville furniture
Photos add credibility.
Photos are realistic.
Use is determined by strategy.

9. Designer’s Toolkit: Illustration
Illustration eliminates the details of a photo and focuses on the “highlights” of the image.
Can also simplify the message and focus on key details
Illustration is more fanciful.
Use is determined by strategy.

10. Designer’s Toolkit: Color
Color can attract attention, provide realism, and establish moods, and build brand identity.
Lack of color—black and white—can add dignity and sophistication.
Spot color—added to black to accent or highlight certain elements.

11. Designer’s Toolkit: Type
Typography refers to the appearance of the ad’s printed matter.
Typeface or font
Capitalization
Variations in shape
Column width
Size of type
Legibility
Principle:
Type has a functional role in the way it presents the letters in words so they can be easily read; but it also has an aesthetic role and can contribute to the meaning of the message through its design.

12. The Art of Typefaces

13. Print Layout and Design
A plan that imposes order and creates an arrangement that is aesthetically pleasing
Picture Window
All Art
Panel or Grid
Dominant Type/ All Copy
Nonlinear
Grunge

14. Design Principles Direction—creating a visual path for the eye
Dominance—the point of emphasis
Unity—elements fuse into one coherent image
White space—area not covered by art or type
Contrast—makes elements stand out from one another
Balance—formal and informal, symmetrical or asymmetrical
Proportion—equally proportions of elements are visually uninteresting
Simplify, simplify, simplify—the fewer the elements, the stronger the impact

15. Final High-Resolution Film
Layout Stages
Thumbnail Sketches
Rough Layout
Semicomps
Mechanicals
Comprehensives
Final High-Resolution Film

16. Composition Refers to the way elements in a picture are arranged
Photographers and videographers
Place or arrange elements for the camera
Manipulate the point of view to if elements can’t be moved
Storyboards are sketches of the scenes and shots in a commercial and reflect camera positions.

17. Print Media Requirements
Different media have different design and production demands.
Newsprint is printed on high speed, inexpensive, rough-surfaced spongy paper.
Magazine offers better reproduction than newspapers.
Yellow Pages ads must stand out in a cluttered environment, but contain useful information.

18. Creating Effective Outdoor
Graphics—eye stopping
Size—images are huge
Colors—bold, bright, contrasting
Figure/ground—keep it simple
Typography—simple, clean, legible
Product ID—make label or package large
Extensions—go beyond the frame
Shape—use 3D
Motion—use movable parts, or revolving panels

19. OAAA
The Outdoor Advertising Association of America is the trade association for the outdoor advertising industry.
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20. Print Art Reproduction
Line art is an image with solid lines on white paper.
A halftone is an image with a range of gray tones
Printers create the illusion of a halftone by shooting a photo through a screen to create a dot pattern.
Screens are also used to create tint blocks or percentages of black or color.

21. Color Reproduction
Process colors (magenta, cyan, yellow, black) are used in the four-color printing process.
Color separation is a process by which a printer reduces or “separates” to four negatives for each of the four colors.

22. Digitization
Method for creating a reproducible form of an ad to distribute to a number of publications.
Also used by agencies to send ad proofs to clients.
A computer codes images electronically for tone or color; they can then be transmitted electronically to clients, printers, or newspaper printers.
Digitization is also used to create out-of-home advertising with changing digital screens and moving images.

23. Binding and Finishing
Die-cutting—a sharp-edged stamp is used to cut out shapes
Embossing (raised surfaces) or debossing (depressed surface) or image
Foil-stamping—a thin metal coating molded to the paper surface with heat or pressure
Tip-ins—separate, preprinted ads clued into a publication (perfume samples in a magazine)
See-through—graphic images are separated and printed on the front and back of a page

24. Broadcast Production Stock footage Crawl Morphing
Previously recorded images, either video, still slides, or moving film
Crawl
Computer-generated letters that move across the bottom of a screen
Morphing
One image gradually changes into another

25. Filming and Editing
Copywriter—writes the script, even if there are no words.
Art Director—in TV, develops the storyboard and establishes the look of the commercial, whether realistic, stylized, or fanciful.
Producer (can be an agency staff member)—handles production including bidding, all arrangements, specialists, casting talent, and budget.
Director–responsible for filming/taping, including scene length, action, how lines are spoken and characters played; in TV determines camera set up and records the flow of action.
Composer–writes original music and sometimes lyrics, too.
Arranger–orchestrates music for the various instruments and voices to make it fit a scene or copy line.
Editor–assembles all the pieces including audio, dialogue, and footage.

26. Producing TV Commercials
Television ads create excitement and drama through the moving images.
Can be filmed live, prerecorded on film or tape, or animated.
Film-to-tape transfer—shot on film or video, digitized for editing, then transferred to videotape for distribution.
Principle:
Visual storytelling in television commercials is constructed through the careful design of individual shots and the sequencing of moving images.

27. Producing TV Commercials
Animation
Used to create characters like the GEICO gecko
With computer animation, images appear real
Stop motion
Used in claymation or to make other inanimate objects appear to move
Music and action
Should match music to action; can be used to get attention, set a mood, or stick in memory

28. Television Production Process
Preproduction
Production notes; preproduction meeting; find talent, location, props, costumes
The Shoot
Recording the action; technicians include camera operator, gaffer, grip; record music, sound effects, voices; graphics
Postproduction
The editor assembles the pieces to match the storyboard;

29. Effective Web Design
Web pages, especially first screens, should follow the same layout rules as posters.
Graphics should be attention-getting but quickly downloadable.
Type should be simple; avoid all caps.
Use high-contrast colors.
Web pages can combine elements and design styles from many different media including print, still photography, film, animation, sound, games.
Web designers use many tools including animation, complex navigation paths, and sophisticated design software.

30. The One Club Creative Showcase
The One Club advertising competition hosts this site to showcase winning advertising.
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31. Action and Interaction
Web advertisers are continuing to find ways to make the imagery more engaging.
Sites should have clear navigation.
Users should be able to easily move through the site and find what they want.
Regular site visitors should be able to customize the site.
Minicomputers, PDAs, and cell phones present new opportunities and challenges for businesses to display products on the small screen.

32. Discussion Questions

33. Discussion Question 1
One of the challenges for creative ad designers is to demonstrate a product whose main feature cannot be seen by the consumer.
Suppose you are an art director on an account that sells shower and bath mats with a patented system that ensures that the mat will not slide (the mat’s underside is covered with tiny suction cups that gently grip the tub’s surface).
Brainstorm some ways to demonstrate this feature in a television commercial.
Find a way that will satisfy the demands of originality, relevance, and impact.

34. Discussion Question 2
One approach to design says that a visual image in an ad should reflect the image of the brand.
Find a print ad that you think speaks effectively for the personality of the brand. Now compare the print ad with the brand’s Web site.
Does the same design style continue on the site?
Does the site present the brand personality in the same way as the print ad?

35. Discussion Question 3
Three-minute debate: Your team is assigned to a new client, which is a new hand lotion for men, one that is designed to help men whose hands take a beating in their jobs.
One of your colleagues, a photographer, believes the only way to visualize the product and its use in an ad is through photography.
Another colleague, an artist, argues that there are times when art is a much better way to illustrate a product than photography and that this production is a good example.
Analyze the difference between using an illustration and using a photograph. What are their roles, and how do they create different types of effects? Are there certain product categories where you would want to use an illustration or a photograph? Which would work best for this new product?
In class, organize into small teams with each team developing a case for using photography or artwork. Set up a series of three-minute debates with each team having half that time to argue its position. Every team of debaters has to present new points not covered in the previous teams’ presentations until there are no arguments left to present. Then, the class votes as a group on the winning point of view.

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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Printed in the United States of America.
Copyright © 2009 Pearson Education, Inc.  
Publishing as Prentice Hall