For this week’s assignment, I chose to use a poster used to promote travel to New York City in the 1930s. I saw this poster at MoMA this past weekend and decided to use this for my project analysis this week. I really enjoyed the use of color/white space, and also the depth of field illusion created by the illustration.
The buildings juxtaposed are the Rockefeller Center, Manhattan Bridge, and the Empire State Building. All within blocks from each other, these tourist destinations are not relatively close in the manner in which they are displayed. This poster promotes all the wonders of Manhattan during the 1930s and was most likely incredibly successful.
NEW YORK the WONDER CITY | Grid Analysis
I have added a total of 5 grid-lines, which separates the poster in 3 vertical columns and 5 horizontal rows. The 3 vertical columns are created by the three main elements of this poster; The Rockefeller Center; The Manhattan Bridge; and The Empire State Building respectfully. Horizontally, the first row in the grid s created around the typography; secondly, negative space; followed by the Manhattan Bridge again; and closed up with the remaining building structures. It is very clear that the Manhattan Bridge is the centerpiece of this image - as an advertisement to see Manhattan, it really holds the most weight.
NEW YORK the WONDER CITY | Color Analysis
There were four colors in this poster, all used very effectively. The color red takes up the majority of the image, while the white creamy color is used as light reflecting off the structures. Black is used to show the shadows and pink is a variance in color used to bring depth to the poster. The use of color in this depiction were simple, yet potent - a great eye-catching image to promote tourism, indeed.
NEW YORK the WONDER CITY | Typography Analysis
I used a tool called What The Font to analyze the poster and choose the closest fonts to the image. I was pretty amazed by the overall function and close accuracy in finding computer generated typography similar to the hand-drawn characters from the 1930s. Poster Gothic Cond ATF Heavy by ATF Collection is closest to the ‘NEW YORK’ typeface; Fledgling Heavy Italic byTypodermic suffices as the match for ‘the’; and WTC SALUTE by BORUTTA GROUP is almost an exact match for ‘WONDER CITY’.
Overall, I’m a bit blown away by the typography recognition of the What The Font tool — however, I’m also very impressed by the selections. I like the poster because it brings some of the best of what NYC has to offer in one eye-catching, four-color print that communicates the purpose of tourism clearly and inspires those who are curious to travel to NEW YORK the WONDER CITY.