Storytelling, and not giving away the ending. A poster invites or startles; it provokes action. It's not an easy thing to create.

I had no movie in mind, but I'd just finished the CBS series "Salvation," and enjoyed the acting and the writing. Considering our dilemma with climate change, it was a startling series to watch.

Salvation's creator is Matt JL Wheeler, so his name and the title are the two textual components, which I added last, adding my first "outer glow."

My Poster:

My Planning:

The series focuses on an Elon Musk type techno-savior and a young geek who try to save the world from an oncoming asteroid heading straight for earth but each plan is disrupted by politics, revolutionaries, math, physics, and flaws. Will they find the right plan to save the earth?

My app is Affinity Designer and it includes a selection of "assets." My decisions:

• the timer- time is running out
• radio waves-- a warning for the entire earth
• rocket-- several possible scenarios

I created the "earth" with  green and blue circles beneath a texture mask. I erased the blue to leave the green and adjusted with shapes from the pen tool.

The asteroid includes two "cloud" shapes with varying gradients of color with three direction lines for movement.

I arranged the earth off center and enlarged the radio waves to surround it, creating a two-color reddish danger symbol.

Above the earth, I place the enlarged timer in the same colors with the grey "save the day" rocket  inside that timer.

I created a path with a brush in orange [danger with hope] to show one possible path and possible solution.

I created a text circle larger than the timer and added the text -- grey outline with blue "earth/life" inner color and and outer glow of orange to show the danger and hope.

The creator's name is clear and attached to a circle path below the earth.

To Improve:

The asteroid needs work: it's really not looking like an asteroid, but overall I think I captured the dire danger and immediacy of earth's dilemma.

Thanks for the great introduction to making posters -- what a process! I will certainly look at posters with a keener eye.