“After all, what’s more human than the fight for survival?” – Tokyo
I chose the poster for the Spanish crime drama TV series Money Heist. As a whole TV series, the poster was also designed with a revolutionary message in mind. Money Heist has a lot of revolutionary symbols starting from the plot that describes a group of people pulling off the largest heist in history to small details, such as robbers’ costumes. The color of robbers’ jumpsuits wasn’t chosen by accident – it’s bright red which has been historically associated with revolutions. The use of Salvador Dali masks is also meaningful, as a lot of artist’s work was created during Zurich's Dada movement. The movement was based on rejecting the modern capitalist society which aligns with the theme of the TV series.
I like this poster because it’s chaotic – as chaotic as life and all the plot twists in the series. The poster is also full of symbols that one can interpret differently. That’s why it was really hard to analyze it. Sometimes it seemed as there is no system at all, but I hope I can show you otherwise.
Grid system
Identification of the grid system was a painful process, as nothing seemed right. When I tried four squares grid, I noticed several things. Firstly, the center isn’t focused on anyone specifically, despite a crowd of people on the poster. Secondly, a vertical line doesn’t perfectly separate a title “Money Heist”, as one would expect. The line actually touches a bit of “Y”. However, it does separate “Netflix | April 3” almost perfectly.
Then I tried a frame grid made with lines located at 150 pixels from each side. The bottom line separated the release date and the platform’s name from the rest of the poster. Three other lines separates one of the main characters each. One might wonder, why I chose 150 pixels exactly? Well I tried different options and this one worked the best and was the most logical. I did try to find the reason for such location of characters. The one on the top (Berlin) is only present in flashbacks to the past and thus, isn’t an active character. I can speculate that this is a reason for his separation from the rest of the group. Berlin also came up with the idea of the Heist shown in seasons 3 and 4 that explains his location at the top. I didn’t find any certain reason for the characters on the sides to be separated, although there was speculation on the web. One of them betrayed the group and another will be the next one who get killed in the next season. However, there is no certain proof for that.
In the last grid I combined cross and horizontal lines. The horizontal lines are separated in 300 pixels between each other and in 150 pixels from top and the bottom of the poster. It puts the title in a triangle and also shows the point after which the background becomes darker to accent the title even more. The grid also shows how chaotic and disorganized the crowd is. They don’t stand in rows. They don’t follow the rules.
Central, frame, and cross with horizontal lines grids
Hierarchy of elements
The first element that attracts attention is the title. Then the attention focus moves on to the platform name and the release date. The center of the poster is the next point, as the grey costume in contrast to red costumes around catches the eye. Then our eyes start to wonder around the man in the grey costume and notice the faces without the masks. After that, you look at the masks and notice a man at the top without one. Interestingly, all people without masks look you in the eye, while not all of those without masks do that. This is another factor that attracts viewers' attention.
System of elements
Typefaces and type family
Arya - a Devanagari and Latin type family;
Compacta SB – compacta type family;
Heroic - sans-serif family;
Organetto - sans-serif family;
Bebas Neue - sans-serif family;
Different fonts on the poster
Colour palette
At first, I thought that poster was using analogous colour palette as on the picture below. However, I now believe it’s using a monochromatic colour palette from black, to dark red, bright red and white. Beige colour is used on faces and masks, as the only colour which is irregular to the palette. Hence, although the red colour is supposed to draw one’s attention, the beige one is the accent colour due to the overwhelming use of red. The poster is done in warm tones.
The colors used, monochromatic palette
and warm/cool tones
Negative space
That’s interesting, but there is no negative space. It feels so overcrowded that it almost feels like too much. Because I spent so much time looking at the poster, it actually is a bit overwhelming. But I guess the revolution should be overwhelming, right?
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