For my poster, I chose the CROP Hunger Walk. By doing a lot of research, I found out that over 1.2 billion people around the world are without adequate resources and are starving. The first CROP Walk was in 1969, and there are over 2,000 each year around the United States. The Church World Service sponsors the CROP Hunger Walks, and at Syracuse University, the Office of Engagement Services at Hendricks Chapel sponsors the walk as well.
The problem with the CROP Walk at Syracuse University is a) it is under-promoted, and b) nobody knows what the CROP Walk IS. That’s why I decided that a strong and intense visual / headline combination was necessary. People know in the back of their heads that hunger is a problem...but people rarely realize the severity of it. My headline is: “Lunch? Because for 1.2 billion people worldwide, this is reality,” and the visual is a hand holding a lot of grass. It is true that people around the world eat grass in order to keep themselves from completely starving. Especially after droughts that kill crops and create food shortages, dried grass becomes a constant meal. My headline is also very versatile and could lead to an entire campaign. Other posters in this campaign could have headlines like “Breakfast?” “Dinner?” “Midnight Snack?” etc., all showing pictures of foods that one normally wouldn’t eat for a meal.
To get the visual, I had my good friend Kara rub her hand in dirt and then collect grass from the wet ground. I took around 15 pictures from all different angles of her holding grass in her hand. The biggest problem was finding a good background, since there were few options. I didn’t want the sky to be the background, and I didn’t want buildings to be the background. I wound up choosing a gray concrete wall for the backdrop of most of the pictures, but eventually I took out the backgrounds altogether, cropping just the image of the hands.
The target audience for this poster is high school and college students, who are probably very naive in regards to starvation around the world. They need to see a shocking visual in order to realize the severity of the issue of hunger. The font also has to be really big in order to stand out to this target audience who see hundreds of other posters and advertisements daily. If this poster was hanging up in the hallways, they’d be able to see “LUNCH?” from far away, and then hopefully be intrigued enough to approach the poster and find out more. In addition, this is an event that people can participate in with friends and family, so hopefully this poster will create word-of-mouth buzz.
I chose the font “Celestia Antiqua” for the headline because when it is made really big, it looks like there have been bite marks taken out of the sides of the letters. Or, from another point of view, the letters look distorted, and is comparable to people who starve and have distorted bodies and lives. The other typeface I used is Stone Sans Std. because it is a clean and distinct sans serif font. The two typefaces complement one another and overall give off a good feel on the poster. The tone is simple, somber, and in a really sick way, humorous.
Originally my poster was vertical, but after a lot of drafts and consideration (and advice), I decided to make my poster horizontal instead. The protruding arm holding the grass leads your eyes up to the headline, and sends a strong, clear message to the audience. In order to balance out both sides of the arm, I put a rectangular block of green on the left side of the poster. I think it highlights the green “CROP HUNGER WALK,” the grass, and balances out the visuals on either side. Because the poster bleeds to the edges, I believe it is an effective use of color.
Overall, the CROP Hunger Walk is a great experience and a great way to help fight hunger around the world. All you have to do to start making a difference and helping out the world is to donate a few dollars and walk 3.5 miles. See you on October 18!
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