I decided to do a poster on a make-believe Korean festival (Joseon refers to the Korean dynasty) to honor my heritage. Moving to Bloomington and attending IU has enabled me to learn about Korean history and culture, so I saw this project as an opportunity to express that.
I decided to use a textured paper background that was demonstrated in the last tutorial, and a dark brown and deep red border for visual harmony. The South Korean flag is worked into the background. I roughly drew the red and blue symbol with the pencil tool and used the blurring effect to make it look as if it’s been lightly painted on paper.
I wanted the typography to emulate Chinese calligraphy, like elegant brushstrokes. I used the font “Lullabies”. The headline has a light shadow just for some differentiation.
The tiger and flower are my attempts at using the pen and pencil tool in Illustrator. I hand-drew the tiger first and used that as a reference, whereas the flower I played by ear. The tiger, Korea’s national animal, is a historical symbol that represents the nation’s strength and resilience. The flower is the rose of Sharon, the nation’s flower. I applied the “Rough Pastels” artistic filter on the tiger; the result reminded me of traditional Korean artwork. Setting the blending mode to “Hard Light” made the tiger vibrant and eye-catching. The tiger is the biggest element of the poster, and I positioned it to kind of go in the flow of the flag symbol. For the flower, I applied a “Film Grain” effect and set the blending mode to “Overlay” for a soft, textured look. It was included primarily for visual balance, but also for its cultural significance.
I took inspiration from the tutorial for the time and place box. I also put a white box with low opacity under the text to make it more legible.
After adding the time and place, the bottom was looking a little empty, so I added some grass by using the watercolor paint brush.