Ollie Road Race Poster

Event and Issue

The Ollie Road Race is an annual 5-mile race that was established to help the South Boston Neighborhood House, which works with families and other community members to improve the area. Though I am a runner and it caught my interest because of this, I was particularly interested in the event because my mother is a South Boston native. But I had never heard of the Ollie race. While there were not many neighborhood problems in South Boston when my mother grew up here, years later the area became associated with poverty and crime. I’ve been to “Southie” several times and certain areas do reflect that. So, I thought featuring a very positive event, which has ties to my interests and my family’s history, in the area would be a good choice.

Visual Message

Although racing is a competition, I wanted to put more emphasis on the reasons people should participate – helping South Boston while enjoying an invigorating, fun experience.

Audience

This poster is intended for both competitive racers and casual runners who want to contribute to the event’s cause. As Boston’s form of grassroots promotion mirrors many big cities, the poster would be placed at subway stations and bus stops, where a large number of people pass through each day.

Design Strategy

People tend to pick runners’ legs as their defining physical attributes. That’s why I chose the outline of a racer’s legs and running shorts as the poster’s dominant image. You don’t need to see the upper torso to know this is a runner, which also helps to communicate how this event is for everyone, not a specific gender. I decided to make the outline of the South Boston waterfront appear like a course map because the race takes place along the waterfront, a major spot in the area, but also because it further associates the race with community-building. The colored flags, usually seen at finish line chutes, are fixtures in the running community. I tried to include them as an attention-grabber for runners, who will then see important race information on the flags. I also wanted minimal but memorable text so only necessary details would be presented and the viewer would not have difficulty remembering the message of the poster. Antique Olive is a strong choice to accomplish this because the bold sans serif I used really stands out. I tried to streamline the design of the poster as well as the text so the viewer would start at the leg outline and naturally progress to the tagline, what the event is for and the other important information (date, time and directions for registering).

Style Sheet

“Start” and “Finish” markers: Antique Olive Standard bold, 18 pt.

Tagline: Antique Olive Standard bold, 100 pt.

Sub-tagline: Antique Olive Standard black, 30 pt.

Event Date: Antique Olive Standard black, 26 pt.

Event Time: Antique Olive Standard black, 26 pt.

Call to action: Antique Olive Standard bold, 20 pt.

Color Choices

Whenever I’ve participated in or gone to a race, I noticed bright colors everywhere – the attire, the signs, etc. I wanted to incorporate this atmosphere into the poster and have these bright colors jump off the page and attract attention. However, I didn’t want this color to overwork the viewer’s eyes so I made an effort to give this vibrancy order. For example, the blue and red of the runner’s shorts and sneakers matches the blue and red type below, as well as the center flag, and these objects are all in a straight line from top to bottom. The green and yellow flags add to the brightness but aren’t distracting. I also used a light blue as the background color because it connects to several things I wanted to convey – the location of the race on the waterfront, the cool weather at the beginning of September and a welcoming tone to all runners of different skill levels, which is also complemented by the other bright colors present.