The Moving picture world (March 1925-April 1925)

268 MOVING PICTURE WORLD March 21. 1925 / Universal Release GOOD DRAWING, BUT RATHER WEAK LETTERING All Hand Design Is Not Best Technique "Drawn by Eugenia Johnson" is written on a number of samples of work from the Alamo Theatre, Louisville, Ky.. and that is the chief trouble with them. They are entirely hand work. The design we reproduce is about the only one where there is a partial excuse for all hand work. With a clumsy compositor the lettering might suffer in this display. Most of the others are so framed that type not only could be used, but used to greater advantage than the drawn letter. In all of the drawing the work is well done ; better done than usual. Miss Johnson is an artist and not merely an "inker in." There is strength, even vigor to her portraits and she does well with mass colors. If she would stop with that and let the printer perform his natural function she would produce a better than usual design. But, like so many artists, she seems to resent the presence of type within her space. She wants to do it all, and so she letters the entire space, to the detriment of the display. If hand work were better than a more regular cutting, it would be no time at all before the typefounders produced a series of faces in this style, but the Pen Print, of limited use, is about the only regular font, outside of the conventional scripts, because straight cut letters are more desirable. To throw away the advantage of legibility for the very doubtful "artistic" atmosphere is to waste some, often much, of the money paid for space. The only excuse for hand lettering is to get the exact display in a space so small that even a six point cannot be handled well. In a space one or two inches deep and one or two columns wide, especially where there is considerable drawn design to interfere with the setting in of the type, a hand lettering is permissible. But these spaces are all of them large. The sample shown in a five eights and other sizes run around a three nines or tens. Here it is possible to use type mortises, and in some of the designs about half of the engraver's bill could be saved, while the effect would be materially increased. Generally the comeback is that the printer does not have a sufficiently ornamental letter. We got that from three Pittsburgh press agents before Milt Crandall came on the Rowland and Clark Circuit. Xow most of Milt's displays carry type. He bought a few fonts, and he gets a good result with from a quarter to a tenth of the other Pittsburgh spaces. He has paid the relatively small cost of the type many times over— and he still has the type. We think that if Miss Johnson will letter in the title and stars and let the printer get a chance at the rest, her very good art work will show to better advantage, and she will be helping the house to better sales. She has good ideas of display, and she can get these worked out in type if she will stand over the printer a couple of times. Two Displays of Unusual Interest Two advertisements from Frank H. Burns, of the Beacham Theatre, Orlando, Fla., very markedly show the advantage of a big attractor over a group cut. Both displays are good, but the attention value of the large figure is greatly in excess of the smaller one, though this is only about an inch and a half deeper than the other, and of the same width — a six column. Mr. Burns, who is publicity manager for H. B. Vincent, has developed the j ' ' STARTS TOMORROW FOR THREE WONDERFUL DAYS "PETER I PAN" A Paramount Release A SIX FIFTEENS white border almost into a trade mark. Generally he uses this device to save space, but for Peter Pan an extra space was taken. The cut is the press book four column size. It made a nice display, and of course it was backed up by a lot of press work. But the second day announcement is so much better in its attention-getting quality that there is scarcely any comparison. This cut was planned for a full page advertisement, but it does as well ; perhaps better, as a six sixteens, because here it fills the space and is more dominant. In a general way it is a poor idea to permit a cut to take up so much space. Were this more than a single figure, the rule would hold good here, but since the cut shows only the figure of Peter, it is disposed of at a glance and the eye seeks the copy. That is what makes the overlarge cut (in proportion to the space.) dangerous. The eye and the mind are so busy looking at the cut details that they overlook the text. With only the single figure this does not hold true, and the idea of Peter dominates the mind while the copy is being read. Precisely the same cut area showing a lot of people or many happenings would defeat the advertising aim, but the single bold figure helps. This is one of the prettiest displays that Mr. pita Ran A Paramount Release ONE INCH LONGER Burns has ever sent in, and the reason it is sightly is that he has not overcrowded the white space with a lot of talk. He still holds to the value of white space and does not cloud the cut by bedding it in type. The essential copy is that in the upper left hand corner. Below it is a repeat and extension of the opening.