I chose to support a charity that tackles homophobia because I feel like in today’s society that 

Homophobia is having a negative opinion and attitude towards people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. Homophobic behaviour can be expressed through antipathy, prejudice, hatred and contempt. All of which, I believe to be stemmed from both ignorance and irrational fear. I feel that some homophobic people don’t understand what it is to be lesbian, gay or bisexual therefore they reject it and try to shun these people out from society without any real reason.

I understand that some people have religious reasoning behind their homophobic attitude and everyone has a right to their own personal opinion. However, there is no need to go out of your own way to make their lives harder. No one should have abuse being thrown at them just because of their sexuality. Homophobic behaviour is old fashioned and wrong on all levels.

Further Work:

To conclude this project, I think the Lesbian & Gay Foundation can do a lot to reach out to a wider audience and gain new supporters through simply just getting their charity name and objectives out there. I believe I have chosen the 3 most effective ways to promote them to a mass audience. Of course, there are many other techniques and methods that LGF could go for, to spread word of mouth.

For example, I think that my typography based project could work in an effective video form similar to a past video that was used to showcase the charity’s work:

Experimenting With Images

Here I was experimenting with another photograph and typography. I tried to manipulate the text on to the model’s face and body, using the distort filter and displacing the text to mould around the highlights and shadows in the photograph. I think it does have a unique effect but the results could do with improving. The more detailed areas of the picture look too distorted for the text to be readable, especially the model’s hair and around her eyes. I think to improve, I could experiment more with the typography. Although here I did play around with lowercase and uppercase lettering as well as font styles like bold and italic. Next time, I think I would try out using different fonts, sizes and the direction of the text so that some texts are vertical.

Bus T-Side:

To start with my public transport advertising campaign, the t-side of a bus is one of the most recognisable bus formats for clients and brands to take their product or service across the streets of the UK. It offers the most high profile means of reaching the high street population and is the most premium standard of bus side advertising. I used a photograph of a bus on the road as a template for my own t-side advertisement. By designing directly onto this photograph, I won’t have to estimate the dimensions and it will give me a clear idea of how my final advertisement will look in the real world as I’m creating it.

I began using the pen tool to create the custom t-side shape and set a white colour background. I added in my ‘How Would You Feel?’ logo just as a reminder of how I would be able to utilise the oddly shaped space and placed it roughly on the right side.

Apart from the logo, I had the rest of the space to fill up and get my message across to general public who would be seeing my advert across London. With an approach similar to what I used in my poster, I wanted the audience to really empathise for lesbians, gay, bisexuals and transgenders who are very much misunderstood people. However, I didn’t want to use the same language as I used in my poster since I don’t think people would have been accepting to seeing the words ‘faggot’ and ‘gay’ splashed out on public transport. Instead, I thought of using the passengers that would be sitting on the bus to help with my campaign. By adding speech and thought bubbles that are placed carefully pointing at both the upper and lower deck seats and even the driver himself, I planted saddening emotions within the bubbles. By doing this, I’m putting the charity’s cause into more perspective for the general public to visualise and understand. I arranged the order of the text so that at first, it’s quite vague what the advertisement is talking about to set a more powerful first impression. When the audience finally reads ‘Support the Lesbian and Gay Foundation’, they’ll piece all the emotions together as something that gay, lesbian and bisexual people have to go through in their lives. I also added the charity’s website below, suggesting to the audience if they want to support these people by whatever means, they can visit the website for more information.

I used a pale green colour for the speech bubbles and a pale blue colour for the thought bubbles, two colours that we associate the most with messaging. I like this idea of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people sending a message of how they have been made to feel to everyone so that homophobic people will think twice before discriminating against them. After all, no one wants to be stressed, hurt, depressed, helpless, ashamed, upset or alone.

Poster:

FIrst, I started by creating a typographic portrait of my friend who I got to pose with a straight impression. I wanted to base my poster on typography to convey all the discriminating words of abuse that gay people hear on a daily basis. I feel this would create an influential and effective image.

I chose to use black and white as my colour scheme as a symbol to the underlying issue of homophobia. There is a clear right and wrong and I want everyone to realise that whilst you may not agree with their choices in life, you have no right to discriminate against lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender people for no reason. I have ‘painted’ a black and white picture to represent homophobia being a very old fashioned and ignorant opinion to have as well. I feel like if I used a different colour scheme like LGF’s rainbow theme, it would have taken away the seriousness of the matter. I also believe that if I used the original colour scheme in the photograph before editing it, people would have subconsciously considered the model’s age and race when analysing the poster. I wanted to completely take his demographic profile away so that the poster is instantly recognised as a anti-homophobic advertisemnt, first and foremost.

After I finished my portrait, I duplicated the layer into a new portrait document to start designing my poster. I added in the Lesbian & Gay Foundation’s logo at the bottom left corner to gain a sense of layout.

I then duplicated my new campaign’s logo into the document and placed it in the center underneath the main image. I also changed the colour of my logo to a red because I felt that it blended in with the main image too much and didn’t stand out enough as the main text. I chose red so that it would strike out to the audience and grab their attention, almost like a warning.

After this, I was displeased with the plain white background. I felt it wasn’t very pleasing too the eye but I didn’t want to overdo the poster by using an image background, since the typography is the main focus. I decided to just simply add more words from the main image and place in randomly in the white spaces, to add a sense of overbearing abuse being thrown at the model used in my poster.

New Campaign Logo:

To start, I needed to design a new logo for my project/campaign. I wanted it to be similar and recognisable to LGF’s current logos for their existing campaigns. I quite liked the logo they had for ‘Love Equal Marriage’:

To recreate the shape, I used the pen tool to trace over the squared speech bubble and set the fill to white and the stroke to a black.

Looking at the font LGF used, it looks like Impact but with a stamp effect on it. I used ‘Masterplan’ will is a close match and a really good imitation. I then experimented with angles, letter spacing and sizes to produce the look below.

As a final touch, I added a question mark to the speech bubble to add more character.

How Would You Feel?

After going through which medias I plan to use for my project, I have thought about naming the project ‘How Would You Feel’. It will be like a campaign but one that targets the publicity of the charity and promoting their work to a wider audience.

I want to put the general public in the shoes of a lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender and show them what it is like being abused and discriminated against. My main aim is to generate enough interest for people to want to visit the charity’s website, by both mentally challenging them and visually grabbing their attention.

I feel that it is important for me to present to the audience a powerful and thought-provoking campaign that makes you sympathise and feel bad for lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders who go through a lot of pain, just for being in love with the same gender as their own. I feel this way would get more people to want to help, support and donate to the charity.

Different Medias:

It is important to take in consideration what medias I will use for this project since there is a wide range to choose from. However, some medias will be more effective in reaching a mass audience than others and I want to use a method that will a lasting impression on the audience.

Below I have constructed a list to explore the variety of advertising techniques there are and to give me a better idea of what I want to pursue:

- Television
- Radio
- Newspaper
- Magazine
- Online Web Banners
- Posters
- Flyers
- Online Videos
- Public Transport
- Guerilla
- Billboards
- Endorsements

I think creating a television advertisement will definitely reach a mass audience but it would be difficult to choose a time slot that would be most effective. Whilst it is a good way to communicate to large numbers of people, it is also an old fashioned and perhaps an outdated technique. Less and less people are watching TV these days and trying to get a prime-time slot is both competitive and expensive. For me to suggest that LGF put so much money into a television advertisement is very unrealistic and impractical.

Radio advertising doesn’t appeal to me wither since I don’t feel I would be able to appeal to listeners enough for them to be interested in helping the charity. I am looking to visually grab the audiences attention and sustain it long enough to make an impact on their opinion about homosexuality.

Newspapers and magazines are also not the best way to go in my opinion. Although I have the freedom to use visuals with this technique, charity advertisements are non existent in the print world and for a reason too. Magazines appeal to their specific target market like fashion magazines are made for fashionistas, wedding magazines are for brides to be and wedding planners and so on. Having an advertisement in newspapers or magazines greatly limits my target audience to the same as the magazine’s own target audience.

I think that having advertisements on public transport is a very good idea. A massive amount of people commute on buses, trams and trains every single day, all ranging in ages, genders, religions, ethnicities and social class. Another point to consider is that people use public transport for quite a long period of time before reaching their destination so the chances of someone glancing at the advertisements on their transport is very high. I could choose which mode of transport I would publicise on and where, like the interior of a bus or the exterior where there are allocated spaces used for advertising purposes. If I used the exterior to advertise, I would be getting attention from people outside who are walking by. All in all, I think public transport advertising will be a very good way to promote the charity to a massive audience!

Online video advertisements have interested me as well, like on YouTube where you are often played a short advertisement before you can proceed to the original video you intended to watch. I think this would provide a great, modern alternative to television marketing. YouTube is the most popular video streaming website to date that attracts a wide array of visitors and I would definitely consider using video advertising as another strategy to help the charity.

Initial Ideas:

From briefly looking into what actions that the Lesbian & Gay Foundation have taken towards fighting for their cause, I can now begin to explore what I could to do to advertise their charity to a bigger audience as possible.

Rather than create a new campaign that only raises awareness about a particular issue such as same sex marriage, I want to promote the charity’s work as a whole and combat homophobia.

Homophobia is having a negative opinion and attitude towards people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. Homophobic behaviour can be expressed through antipathy, prejudice, hatred and contempt. All of which, I believe to be stemmed from both ignorance and irrational fear. I feel that some homophobic people don’t understand what it is to be lesbian, gay or bisexual therefore they reject it and try to shun these people out from society without any real reason.

I understand that some people have religious reasoning behind their homophobic attitude and everyone has a right to their own personal opinion. However, there is no need to go out of your own way to make their lives harder. No one should have abuse being thrown at them just because of their sexuality. Homophobic behaviour is old fashioned and wrong on all levels.

I think the key to reaching out to a mass audience is by coming up with a direct idea that everyone will be able to relate to, not just a specific niche audience. By doing so, I can effectively and efficiently inform people of all ages and backgrounds.

The Lesbian & Gay Foundation: Campaigns

So far, LGF have created various different campaigns and ways for you to participate in and volunteer for. These opportunities range from helping out with data input and making phone calls all the way to days away at events promoting their mission of ‘ending homophobia, empowering people’ and everything inbetween that.

WE EXIST & I EXIST:

Their ‘We Exist’ campaign is a guide to getting involved in public lie for lesbian, gay and bisexual people. It appeals to those who have an interest in representing the community and who want to be an active voice to bring up unheard and un-addressed issues that affect the whole community.

They also have an “I Exist’ guide that keeps members of the community informed and up to date with their legal and civil rights. By being well-informed, everyone can begin to use their rights in a way that will make a difference to their lives for the better, fighting prejudice and discrimination in all it’s forms.

Their guides serve as an introduction to a whole host of legal rights that particularly affect lesbian, gay and bisexual people. Both guides are downloadable pdf files from their website.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH:

Their ‘Enough Is Enough’ campaign takes a more active role in spreading word about their concerns on homophobia. It is a whole movement tackling homophobic abuse and encourages their members and supporters to take action against this issue through public protests and other things.

It has been 4 years since the start of their “Enough Is Enough’ campaign and to commemorate the third year, LGF held a competition where first year students from The Manchester College produced short videos to promote the campaign. By using a voting system open to the general public, viewers could watch and vote on LGF’s official YouTube page:

http://www.youtube.com/lgfonline

The prize for the 2 most voted winners were to have their videos showcased over the next year.

You can also subscribe, like and join in on their official facebook page with 4,551 other people:

https://www.facebook.com/LGFEIE

Love Equal Marriage:

The Lesbian & Gay Foundation have also launched another campaign to encourage people to fight for equality, by supporting same-sex marriage which is an important issue for everyone. Members of the charity have submitted their responses to the government consultation in March 2012, which set out their proposals to allow same-sex couples to have the right to civil marriages. By the end of the consultation, 228,000 responses were submitted and the results were announced in December.

If people want to support this particular cause, there are options to donate, sign up or contact your mp on the website. You can also read further information on this topic, see other people’s opinions, leave a message of support and go onto other resources regarding civil marriages.

One Day Events:

On top of all these currently running campaigns, LGF also set up one day events that call out to organisations, groups and individuals to unite together and make a visible stand for their rights. In the past, these have taken form in ‘Flying the Flag’ on 17th May 2012 and ‘Spirit Day’ on 19th October 2012. To keep track of these specially hosted events, you’ll have to take a look at their ‘What’s On’ section of their website which will also tell you about 

Volunteering & Fundraising: 

Aside from all of these special campaigns and events, you also have the opportunity to volunteer for a total of 14 different roles, either short-term or for one-off events. Within their volunteering section of their website, you can discover what roles they have to offer and which appeals to you most before applying.

Lastly, another way to get involved is by raising money through taking part in runs, doing a challenge or doing your own thing. By raising money for the Lesbian & Gay Foundation, the charity can continue to deliver their services and achieve their mission of ending homophobia and empowering people. On their website is a guide to fundraising with useful tips and various ideas to help you get started.

All of this can be looked into more thoroughly at:

http://www.lgf.org.uk/Take-Action/